NELSON Swimming Club had a whale of a time celebrating its 100th anniversary — and now the fight is on to keep the club alive.

More than 50 people turned out to mark the club’s landmark at Pendle Wavelengths, in Nelson, with a night of inflatables and wave machines.

But one of the club’s volunteers said it needed to attract more members and more funding to stay afloat.

Louise Martins, from Burnley, said the event proved how much potential the club had.

She said: “In order for it to be sustainable we’ve been told we need to get 58 members coming down every week. At the minute we’ve got about 30 but Pendle Wavelengths have been great with us and have told us they will support us as best they can. It’s a Catch 22 situation: we need more funding for coaches but we can’t get that until we have more members, and we can’t attract more members without more coaches. The club is a bit disorganised at the minute but we’re confident we’ll sort it out.”

Louise, 26, got involved two months ago when her brother, Daniel, 10, joined the club.

She said: “The anniversary event was a really fun night and we can’t thank Pendle Wavelengths enough.”

The club meets every Monday from 6pm to 8pm at the Leeds Road venue.