The last few weeks just gone have been pretty hectic for us, and there has also been a major achievement on the tennis front.  Read on!

Tennis

Finals Day on Saturday 24th June was fabulous.  Probably our best-attended Finals Day ever, setting a new club record for a single day’s bar takings - well, it was hot wasn’t it and what is a person supposed to do other than drink plenty of liquid as the experts advise.

Congratulations to everyone who made it through the draws to take part on the day.  32 finals were played!  Tyrell has already issued a report but, just to mention the two main events:  Josh Sapwell retained the men’s singles title against Reece Farrow; and Maddie Lightfoot won the women’s singles - unfortunately, her opponent Farida Korallus had to retire injured.  At 16yo, Maddie is one of our youngest ever winners of the singles title.

Let’s come onto that major achievement.  On Saturday we won the national playoffs in Coventry to qualify for the National League finals for the first time ever!  Bournemouth here we come 8th - 10th September!  Well done to the players, Tyrell, supporters; plus a massive thank-you to our team sponsors.

Squash and Racketball

We had a fantastic 4 days of the Berkhamsted Linksap Open, our 3rd year of holding a PSA Challenger Tour event at our club and bringing in world class pro players.

Ben Coleman won the men’s, reclaiming the title he won in our inaugural event in 2021.  Ben regularly trains here as part of Adam’s pro group.  Saran Nghiem won the women’s.  Saran was one of the top English juniors and is now on a squash scholarship at Harvard.

As with our tennis NTL team, a huge thank-you to our event sponsors, without whom we would not be able to run the tournament.

As spectators will have noticed, we managed to get a just-in-time delivery of a couple of AV features for the event: we can now relay court 1 matches from the CCTV camera onto the big screen in the lounge; and we can now cast and mirror scores onto the monitor behind court 2 from both Android and Apple devices (we’ve been wrestling with this for a while but it’s now solved).

Enough about the pro’s and our new tech.  What about our own players?  A belated shout-out to Ali Coker, Gavin Roger-Lund and Tony Clifford who competed in the British Open Masters last month, and were absolute stars!

Ali was runner-up in the O45s; Gavin narrowly lost 3-2 in the O55s quarters to the eventual winner (who didn’t drop a game in any other match); and Tony was runner-up in the O80s.

Fancy having a go yourself at a Masters event?  What’s the worst that can happen - you lose in the 1st round of both the main event and the plate, but so what.  The perfect opportunity is coming up soon, 8th - 10th September just down the road from us:  the Tring 3 Counties Masters Open (Herts, Bucks, Beds), details here https://www.englandsquashmasters.co.uk/Events/EventDetails.aspx?@EventID=131

Let’s get a Berko contingent involved!

Facilities

You thought we’d done the tennis bit.  There’s more.  We’re getting a Rebo Wall and it’s coming in the next few days!

For years members have been asking for a rebound wall for solo hitting practice; a warm-up before a game; practicing a technique or shot you’ve been working on with your coach.  Coaches would love the facility too, as they can concentrate on observing technique without having to feed and rally.  It’s also a great workout - you’ll hit a lot more balls in a short space of time than you would do on the other side of the net from someone in an hour long match.

Until recently, and what has put us off, the solution would have required a significant cost and loss of space to build or repurpose (and soundproof) an external wall.

These days, however, semi-mobile rebound ‘walls’ have come onto the market, notably Rebo Wall.

It will be installed on court 6b, against the fence next to the car park.  6b is about to soar in its popularity stakes!

Inside the club we now have new tills at the bar.  Yes, that’s tills plural; we used to have one, now we have two.  And when the (new!) mobile/outdoor bar is being used, that will have a pay facility too.  We’re aiming to get you a faster service on those busy occasions.

Finally, the upgrade to the women’s showers is both ahead of, and behind schedule.  How’s that for a project status update!

The good news is that the showers are installed, the vanity area is finished, and it will all be available for use from Monday.  The bad news is that there is a delay on the delivery of the cubicle screens, due to a factory shutdown for a Summer break.  So they will be fitted at a later date. 

Spotlight on… Susannah, Vicky and Kev

So, if outsourced business partners provide our tennis coaching and our bar and catering, and our head squash coach is self-employed (comprising the 3 editions to date of this Spotlight On feature), who is it that the club employs? 

Well, we have just 3 employees, all of whom are part-time:  Susannah, Vicky and Kev.

Susannah and Vicky are our Office Managers, working 35 hours a week between them (in effect, the role is a job-share).  Kev is our Groundsman, working a daybreak shift from 6am to 9am on weekdays.

Susannah started in the role in November 2008, having been a squash member (a regular in the box leagues and a Friday ladies morning taken by Adam) when the predecessor left and the job was advertised internally.

Although Susannah retired her squash racket some time ago, she is now a regular runner.  Did you know that Susannah has run 7 marathons, including the London marathon 4 times.  Indeed, in 2016 both Susannah and Vicky ran the London marathon!

Vicky started about 15 months after Susannah in February 2010, after returning to England from living in Australia - somehow post-uni backpacking travels had led to 10 years in Oz where she got married and had her first child.  Vicky used to be a tennis and squash player, but a back injury got in the way and she now keeps fit by being a regular gym-goer.

As well as working part-time for us, Vicky is also a qualified Personal Trainer and works about about 10 hours a week with people who have had a cancer diagnosis, helping them to prepare for treatment with prehab and recover afterwards with rehab.

Kev is our most recent joiner, taking over from Pete Littlejohn in March 2021, having retired from a 40-year career in the petrochemicals industry designing oil pipelines.

Although Kev is born and bred in Berko, his career took him to South Africa in his early twenties, where he made 2 excellent decisions - he met his wife, Marie, and he started playing squash.

Kev’s still playing squash (and racketball) most days, but he has given up football in recent years, having played for Northchurch and Berkhamsted Tornadoes for about 3 decades.

Tune in again next month to see which of our people or area of operations we’re going to put the Spotlight On. 

That’s all for now, until next time.

P.S.  we haven’t forgotten about the Club Survey we mentioned last month.  Keep your eyes peeled.

Club Council

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