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Flooring Professionals To The Leisure Industry
Courtship Flooring is a commercial sports flooring contractor working in Cumbria and across the UK. Work here is planned as a complete residency rather than a call-out, with everything agreed and priced before we travel.
A family business established in 1987, working exclusively on commercial indoor sports and timber floors. We survey, install, restore, mark, test and maintain, keeping every stage in our own hands so one warranty covers the whole system. Domestic work is handled separately by Ryan’s Restorations.
Overnight/Weekend Installations
Professional Cleaning Demonstrations
Squash Court Maintenance
Recommended Cleaning Products
Professional Pendulum Slip Testing
Deep Clean & Reseal Service
Remote facilities are frequently told a job is not worth a contractor’s time, or quoted a premium that reflects inconvenience rather than cost. We take a different view: distance changes our logistics, not the price of the work.
Projects are quoted as complete programmes with mobilisation included and stated up front. There are no additional travel charges appearing later and no partial jobs left waiting on a return visit.
Where several facilities in an area need attention, booking together spreads the mobilisation across all of them and reduces the cost for each. It is how a good deal of our work in remote areas is arranged in practice.
We are happy to coordinate that between unconnected organisations and quote each separately, so nobody is tied to anybody else’s decision. It is simply a more sensible use of everyone’s budget.
Where users arrive in walking boots and wet weather is routine, the first few metres inside the door take more punishment than the rest of the hall combined, and that is precisely where slip incidents occur.
We specify finishes that cope, advise properly on matting and barrier zones, and concentrate slip testing on entrance areas rather than only the playing surface. It is the cheapest safety improvement available in most buildings.
At Medina Leisure Centre we refurbished the main sports hall floor completely: sanding, repairs, resealing and a full set of new markings, with the logistics planned down to the last detail so the centre lost as little bookable time as possible.
The after photographs show a hall transformed, and the programme finished on the date agreed at the outset.
~ Matthew Evans
An outstanding company to deal with and they couldn’t have been better to work with. St George’s Ascot now has a stunning new sports hall floor and we are delighted. From quote, support, delivery and after sales, the Team has been brilliant. Thank you. 
~ James Anderson
Most enquiries reach us as a description of a symptom, and there are a few things that let us give a genuinely useful reply rather than a holding one.
Photographs are the most valuable. Two or three of the whole room, and two or three close up of whatever is worrying you, tell us more than several paragraphs. If there is a worn patch, a stain, a lifting board or a dead spot, photograph that specifically.
Approximate dimensions, or just the number of badminton courts, gives us the area. The rough age of the floor and whether anybody knows what is underneath helps. If you have any record of previous work, even a decade old invoice, that is genuinely useful.
Then tell us what the room is used for and when it could realistically be closed. Those two facts shape the recommendation as much as the condition does.
From that we can usually give an informed steer and a budget range before arranging a survey.
A school crest or club badge at centre court is one of the few things that genuinely lifts a hall for a modest cost, and it is far cheaper done during a refinish than as a separate visit.
Logos are painted from your own artwork between coats of seal, so they sit under the final lacquer and wear at exactly the same rate as the floor around them. Anything applied over a finished floor will scuff and peel within a season, whatever the supplier claims about it.
We work the artwork up to the correct scale for the circle or the area it is going into, and we show you a layout before anything goes down. Colours are matched to your own brand rather than approximated.
Coloured keys and zoned areas work the same way and have the same effect. A hall with a filled key in a contrasting colour reads instantly and looks designed rather than institutional, and it costs very little on top of work already underway.
Not every tired floor needs taking back to bare timber, and knowing the difference saves facilities a great deal of money.
A screen and recoat is a light abrasion of the existing finish followed by a fresh top coat. It restores grip and appearance, it takes a fraction of the time, and it costs a fraction of the price. It works when the seal is worn but still intact across the floor.
A full sand removes everything back to bare timber and rebuilds the finish from scratch. It is the right answer when the lacquer has worn through in the traffic lanes and dirt is sitting in open grain, when there are repairs to make, or when the markings need setting out fresh.
As a rule of thumb, a well maintained hall wants a screen and recoat every two to three years and a full sand roughly every ten. Sticking to that keeps the boards alive far longer, because every full sand removes timber you cannot replace. A floor refinished every three years will run out of wear layer decades early.
Timber remains the benchmark for indoor sports flooring, and the reason is simple: it performs well, it can be refinished repeatedly rather than replaced, and players prefer it.
The systems divide by what sits beneath the boards. A sprung floor uses resilient pads, foam blocks or engineered cradles under battens, producing an area elastic response that spreads load when a player lands. A semi sprung system uses a shallower build up. A floor fixed directly to the slab has no give at all and is hard on joints where sport is played regularly.
Above that, the playing surface is solid strip or engineered board. Maple is the traditional choice for its hardness and pale colour, with beech and oak also common. Solid strip has a generous wear layer and will take many refinishes. Engineered board has a thinner layer over a stable core, so there is less margin.
The detail that governs longevity is the perimeter. Timber moves with humidity, and a floor without a proper expansion gap and ventilated skirting will lift in the middle. It is skipped surprisingly often.
Cumbria work comes to us from school sports halls, leisure centres and a very large number of village and community buildings, and the programming matters as much as the specification.
Because journeys within the county take longer than the map suggests, we plan work here in continuous blocks and bring everything we need with us rather than expecting to collect materials locally. That makes these projects more thoroughly planned than a job close to base, not less.
The building stock includes a lot of older halls with timber floors laid decades ago, and the recurring theme is that they are in better condition than people assume. Under the polish and the chair scoring there is usually plenty of board depth left, and restoration transforms them for a modest sum.
Moisture deserves a particular mention here. Older buildings, solid floors and limited damp proofing mean we take readings as a matter of course rather than as a formality, because sealing over a floor that is still giving off moisture guarantees the finish will fail.
Where several facilities are considering work, it is worth sequencing them together.
Cumbrian enquiries usually resemble one of two projects, depending on the building.
For school halls, De Wint School is the closest comparison. A hall in constant curriculum use that had gone well past its proper refinish cycle, sanded back to bare timber, damaged boards replaced, resealed and remarked from measured dimensions with several redundant sports removed while the floor was open.
For community buildings, St Katherine Hall is the better parallel. That was an old timber floor carrying badminton one evening and a community event the next, buried under decades of polish and scored by chairs and tables. The polish had to be removed chemically before sanding, and underneath was a floor with plenty of depth left. It is now set for another few decades of everything it is asked to do.
Both projects illustrate the point we make about remote work: it is planned more thoroughly, not less, because everything has to be resolved before we set off.
Cost is driven by area, condition and specification. Because we do not subcontract, there is no margin stacked on top of another contractor’s price, which is one reason our quotations tend to compare well. Everything is itemised so you can see exactly what you are paying for.
Yes, and we regularly work considerably further afield. Our quotations include travel and mobilisation openly rather than adding them later, so the figure you see is the figure you pay.
Yes. Plans typically cover an annual deep clean from four pounds fifty per square metre, condition inspections, recoating, repairs, relining and slip testing with written reports.
Yes, and it usually costs less. We survey the estate together, apply one specification and schedule the sites into a single programme with one point of contact.
Usually straightforward on a sound floor. Removing old lines completely requires sanding, so we will plan the new layout to work with what is already there and explain the options.
Photographs of the room and of anything specific that worries you, approximate dimensions or the number of badminton courts, the age of the floor if known, and when the room could realistically be closed.
Constantly. Summer holidays and half terms are when most of our school work happens, and summer slots book up early. If you are planning for next year it is worth speaking to us in January rather than June.
It can if it is run too hot or brought up too quickly, which dries the boards and opens gaps. The system needs proper commissioning and controlled surface temperatures, and the timber needs to be specified as suitable.
A failed pad, cracked batten or tired cradle beneath the boards. It is a structural problem, and sanding the surface will not change how the floor feels. We lift the boards locally and replace the failed components.
Usually because the expansion gaps at the perimeter have closed or been blocked, or because moisture is coming up through the slab. Both need diagnosing before refinishing, or the cause simply repeats.
Yes, routinely. A great deal of our leisure centre and university work is done overnight so the facility keeps trading. It costs a little more in labour and usually saves a great deal more in lost income.
Book a free survey of your floor in Cumbria and we will tell you honestly what it needs, what it will cost and how quickly it can happen. Call 01823 674562 or send us a message.