Thank-you for your strong engagement with our first (insofar as we can remember) members’ opinion survey.  We had 205 responses with plenty of food for thought in the comments sections.  

Every opinion matters and we are now assimilating the scores and the feedback, and we will shortly report out to you on all the contributions and our views.

On the subject of member engagement, don’t forget we have an SGM coming soon on Wednesday 18th October, 7:15pm for a 7:30pm start in the clubhouse lounge, to present and propose the following motion: 

Members to approve the programme of work required to refurbish and upgrade tennis courts 10, 11 and 12

 
And we are holding 2 drop-in consultation meetings on the subject on the preceding days, Monday 16th and Tuesday 17th October from 7:30pm. 

Tennis

The Rebo Wall is up and it’s great to see that it’s proving popular and getting plenty of use.

Our team did brilliantly at the National League finals weekend in Bournemouth, reaching the semi-finals:  the top 4 clubs in the country!  Unfortunately, we came up against Roehampton, the Man City of the tennis and squash world, the eventual champions once more.

Our first ever Tennis Handicap tournament is underway and will culminate in Finals Day on Sunday afternoon 29th October.  Good luck everyone!

Squash and Racketball

The new season is getting underway. 

Team matches start in early October - we will show a fixture list of all the home matches in the large A-frame board behind court 2.  

This season we have 2 teams in Herts Div 1 competing on Thursday evenings.   The standard will be fantastic, with pro players at number 1:  well worth coming along and watching - most Thursday evenings from 5th October, start time 7:45pm.

There have already been a few notable individual successes.  Joshua Rowbotham won the Herts U9s; Ethan Duncan won the Herts U19s; Mati Nichol won the Bucks U15s; and at the other end of the age spectrum, Richard Carr won the Three Counties Masters O55s.

And our own home-grown pro player, Grace Gear, won the Scottish Open last weekend and is now up to her highest ever world ranking of 51.  World Top 50 here we come Grace!

Social

We had 9 teams comprising 58 people at our (approximately) quarterly Quiz Night last week.  A brilliant evening, compered in his unique but somehow masterful style by Bobby.

The Rugby World Cup gets down to the business end of the tournament in the 2nd half of October.  We’ll happily show the quarter-finals/semi-finals/final if there is sufficient interest.

Look out for news coming soon about another Rock & Roll Bingo Night raising money for the Hospice of St Francis, and a Members’ Christmas Party.

Spotlight on… how we run the club

This section of the newsletter usually focuses on some of the people working for or at the club.  This month we thought we’d switch things a bit, and shed some light on the how rather than the who:  the club’s governance structure.  In part, as context when we report out to you on the Members’ Opinion Survey.

The club is registered as a Community Amateur Sports Club (CASC) and the Club Constitution is the rulebook for how we run the club.  It describes the objectives of the club, the management of the club, the discretionary authority and decision levels of the management committees, and many of the general rules that apply to all members.  It can be found here on our website https://www.bltsrc.co.uk/page/about/club_constitution

The club is administered on behalf of its members by an elected (at the AGM) voluntary Club Council, supported by voluntary playing section Committees for Tennis and Squash, with day-to-day administration undertaken by our 2 part-time club managers, Susannah and Vicky and maintenance by our part-time groundsman Kev Spratt.

Minutes to all Club Council and Committee meetings can be found here on our website https://www.bltsrc.co.uk/page/about/council/council

Membership of Club Council and playing section Committees currently comprises:

1. Club Council:  John Shaw (Chair), Phil Trimmer (Treasurer), Michael Beavis (Tennis Chair), Matt Markwort (Social Chair), Tracey Mackey (Deputy Tennis Chair, Mark Shattock (Deputy Squash Chair);
2. Tennis Committee:  Michael Beavis, Tracey Mackey, Tyrell Diaz-Stevens, Kevin McDermott, Tim Pratt, Shrina Patel; and
3. Squash & Racketball Committee:  John Shaw, Mark Shattock, Adam Fuller, Gill Trimmer, Rob Harbron;

New faces are always welcome.  We refresh the volunteer representation with reasonable regularity, whilst maintaining experience and club knowledge, but that is of course dependent on offers of help.

We aspire to do our best for you at all times.  In a club of 750 adult members, that can sometimes be subjective, and there will naturally be some different viewpoints.  But we always try to bring everyone with us in our direction of travel!

And when we say you can always talk to any of us about anything, we mean it; we’re always happy to chat about any aspect of the club.

One last thing

At the Friday evening junior tennis club night, we love to see lots of youngsters charging around and having a great time, and parents unwinding at the start of the weekend and enjoying the best beer garden in Berko.

But do please keep an eye on them.  The kids, not the parents.  If left completely to their own devices, things sometimes get a bit OTT.  A couple of Fridays ago we found that the (fairly new) carpet behind our main squash court had been extensively coloured in with felt tip pens.  Which is completely unacceptable, as it would be in your house.

They may be out of sight at times, but please do not keep them out of mind.

That’s all for now, until next time.  Hope to see many of you at the SGM!

Club Council

(John Shaw, Phil Trimmer, Michael Beavis, Matt Markwort, Tracey Mackey, Mark Shattock)