Welcome to the October newsletter!

The weather is distinctly cooler, the evenings are starting to close in, but the club continues to be a hive of activity for everyone.

The 2nd of our 2 annual Open Days, on 25th September, was a great success and we warmly welcome the new members who joined us.

We are pleased and relieved to finally have our phone line and broadband service restored, after it had been knocked out last month by a car crashing into a telegraph pole in Broadwater Road.  We had to put a number of temporary manual workarounds in place to keep everything working.  Apologies for any inconvenience that this caused.

When we finally get our fibre optic lease line connected (currently to be seen hanging outside the club office awaiting the arrival of the next in a seemingly endless series of Openreach teams), it will transform our broadband speed and capacity.

Tennis

On Sunday 9th October we hosted the finals of the Harris Cup 2-pair doubles knockout competition for Herts clubs.

The sun shone, the atmosphere was superb - thank you for your brilliant support, and the tennis fizzed.

Excellent performances by our men’s pairs of Josh Sapwell/Josh Rose and Joel Pierleoni/Jezz Baker (and Tyrell stepping in after an injury to Jezz) saw them beat Bishops Stortford to clinch the men’s title.

The women’s final was also a brilliant match, with Townsend narrowly defeating Welwyn.

Work commences later this month on the installation of new LED floodlights on courts 7, 8 and 9. Please bear with us while this is undertaken - the end result will be a fantastic improvement to those courts and, other than a couple of remaining pieces of planned maintenance, will conclude the 2022 programme of work on our facilities.

On Saturday 29th October, Olly Culwick is running a Halloween Monster Slam for 5-11 year olds.  Contact Olly as usual at BTF if you’d like your children to be involved.

Tennis winter team matches are now well underway for all leagues and Wednesday match practice will resume once the lights are installed.

Squash and Racketball

The annual pre-season round-robin graded evening at the end of September was a great success as always.

Winter box leagues are now up and running, team matches have commenced, the Wednesday women’s squash evening has resumed and, this past weekend, we hosted a superb PSA Satellite Open alongside our first ever Berkhamsted Graded Open.

Our junior and schools squash programmes have record participation, so much so that England Squash want to come and do some promotional filming in the next few weeks.

All in all, it’s been great to kick-off the 2022/23 season in style!

We do, however, require a sponsor for our 1st team.  We are able to provide a package of promotion and benefits in return.  The cost is less that you might think and the benefits are more than you might expect!  If you are potentially interested, please contact either Adam (adam@best-academy.co.uk / 07751 239472) or John Shaw (john.gs@btinternet.com / 07775 542712) who will be happy to discuss.

Social

The weather may be turning colder outside, but things are hotting up inside the clubhouse!

On Wednesday this week, Quiz Night returns, with Bobby Mercandino compering in his unique style!  Contact Bobby if you haven’t yet signed up (social@bltsrc.co.uk).

Then we’ll be turning our attention to the World Cup, from 20th November to 19th December.  With our big screens and surround sound, the club will be the best location in town to watch the matches.

Other bits and bobs

Most months we tend to use this section for our version of the ‘rants and pants’ meanderings of another monthly Berkhamsted publication.

This time, with everyone being exemplary citizens of this parish, and having referenced the squash boxes, we’re going upbeat and taking the opportunity to give a shout-out of thanks to the members who voluntarily give their time to running our club box leagues, our club nights/social play, and various other playing arrangements:

• Dan White, tennis singles boxes - since, well, forever!
• Michael Beavis, tennis doubles boxes - how does one ever get 4 people to agree a match day/time?
• Rob Harbron, squash boxes - the most populated club box leagues in the county, and quite possibly the country.
• Andrew Bryson, racketball box leagues - gradually expanding as racketball becomes ever more popular for beginner adults, those of us with ailing knees/hips/ankles/backs and, increasingly, anyone who simply wants the best ever competitive aerobic workout in 45 mins.
• Lynn Wallis, Tuesday ladies tennis doubles morning - always well attended.
• Phil Trimmer and Julia Mills, Tuesday tennis club night - mid-week bar takings always peak on a Tuesday!
• David Wells, Thursday tennis doubles night - now an integral and excellent part of the weekly (graded) social play calendar.
• David Watkinson, Sunday tennis social morning - perfect way to shape up after the night before.
• Sean O’Shea and Tyrell, squash and tennis club champs organisers, respectively - most of us just expect the annual tournaments to happen automatically!
• Mark Shattock and Tracey Mackey, squash and tennis club team co-ordinators - bit like herding cats but the job gets done perfectly with no fuss, no drama, every year.

• All our team captains - teams don’t run themselves without someone at the helm.

• along with the many others who help, assist and deputise.

These jobs are thankless tasks.  So let’s change that:  thank you guys!  You are at the centre of what we are. Without you, we wouldn’t be the community we aspire to be. 

That’s all for now!