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by Nicola Jordan

The retiring headmaster of Medway’s poshest school is throwing a lifeline to a run-down council-owned sports centre in Rochester, once threatened with closure.

Dr Ian Walker, head of King’s School Rochester, is set to clinch a long-term lease to take over The Stirling Centre and give it a £500,000 pound makeover. The deal is Dr Walker’s parting shot as he prepares to leave the school after 26 years.

He said it has long been his ambition to transform Medway in to the best centre of sporting excellence in the south east.

The Stirling Centre has a chequered past since it opened in the 1980s and has several times faced closure as part of council cutbacks. In 2003, a deal to take it over by Chatham Boys Grammar fell through.

A keen sportsman himself, Dr Walker is on the brink of signing a contract with Medway Council for the centre in Maidstone Road.

He said: "It should be open to the school and the public by September at the latest.

"We will be offering lower rates and better facilities than other centres. It’s a super way of doing something for the community."

King’s plans to spend half a million pounds on the centre over the next two years, including £140,000 upgrading the nine outdoor sports courts.

Dr Walker is currently in negotiations with a local authority that has connections with the Lawn Tennis Association for a grant to bring the courts to world-class standard.

Among the improvements would be an air-hall, known as a bubble, which covers the courts enabling play throughout the year and in all weathers.

Dr Walker has spent the past year negotiating a long-term lease for the centre near Rochester Airport.

He said : "I am so glad this has all come together in my final month here.

"I have always said the standard of sports facilities in Medway is poor. The new King’s Rochester Sports Centre, as it will be called, will change that."