The 2022/23 season has been a difficult one with many tournaments/events cancelled or rescheduled due to adverse weather throughout the year.
Several major events were subject to rescheduling, however in the end we did manage to complete our Championship events as well as our 2 extended tournaments, Harcourts Classic & Greenwich Gardens Founders Triples. We are indebted to both Harcourts Cooper & Co (James & Jo) and Greenwich Gardens for their continued support.
Club members managed some exceptional performances at Centre level, with David Payne winning the Mens Singles and Gaye Horne, Theresa Rogers and Joy Watkinson winning the Womens Triples. The Mixed team of Alison Rennie, Phyl Humphries, Ron Rennie, Elwyn Beatson, Glyn Taylor, Julie Chhour, Norm Clarke, Annie McGrath and Steve McGregor was successful in winning the Mixed A Pennants. Our Women’s Premier Team came second in the Women’s Premier Pennants Division.
Arvida Mixed Triples, Silverfin 5’s, Harcourts Classic and Greenwich Gardens Founders events all continued to be very popular and we are grateful to all our sponsors for their continued support.
Business House was once again very popular with teams in the mid to high 20’s both before and after Christmas. Forsyth Barr was a generous sponsor for the after Christmas series. Thank you to Stuart Jamieson and his team who all combine to make this a very successful part of our programme.
A big thank you to all the event controllers particularly David Pearse, Gerd Hutcheson, Theresa Rogers, Russell Parkinson & their teams, who ran events during the year, as well as the volunteers who were always on hand to help set up & tidy up after the event. Thank you also to John & Linda Valentine & their helpers for the much appreciated Thursday morning teas.
The Club celebrated its 75 Year anniversary this year. Celebrations were co-ordinated by Gaye Horne, Colleen Rice, Glenda Rowntree and Tony Trent. Many thanks to this group for the tremendous effort they put in to making the celebrations such a wonderful event.
Special mention needs to be made of the individual personal efforts and time contributed by Board members. Colleen Rice, Gaye Horne and Sandra Coombe have given almost their full time to ensuring that the Club runs efficiently. Alan Daniels in the role of Junior Organiser and Co-ordinator of Selectors has been exceptional. Tony Popplewell and John Smith have worked behind the scenes at a level that members would be astounded to learn if weekly hours were to be tabulated.
Personal contributions by Stuart Jamieson running Business House Bowls, Bruce Aley supporting Sandra Coombe with Sponsorship and Steve McGregor submitting and managing our Grant applications have together ensured that the Club has achieved a healthy surplus for the financial year. Many thanks to Jan and John Gledhill for tireless efforts keeping the Club clean and tidy and to Leon Wech for all his behind scenes work on the maintenance side, including the completion of two vanity units for the Men’s toilets.
President Kevin has been critical in his role in Relationships in developing the support of the Mairangi Bay Fishing Club and Mairangi Bay Surf Club.
Garth Partridge has been enormously helpful to the Board and members with his running of the Club website and the sending out of notices and suggestions via Mail Chimp.
During the winter of 2022 Knightsbridge Green was renovated by removing the top layer of maniatoto and bringing in a contractor to till the next 15 cms of soil and relevel. Club member support for this stage of the renovation was exceptional with at least 20 volunteers committing time to remove and relocate the sliced turf to the area between the carpet green and block wall supporting the Knightsbridge shelters. However as it turns out the remainder of the renovation process did not go as planned. Wet weather delayed the completion of levelling and seeding, with consolidation of the base taking much longer than anticipated. Knighstbridge was not available for use until mid December and even then was below what has previously been our accepted high level of performance. An increasing level of criticism from Club members and others created an environment that became detrimental to the welfare of the Club as a whole. The green was subsequently withdrawn from service.
Disruptions from the damage caused by the Auckland Anniversary floods are likely to cause further problems as we move towards achieving a settlement with our insurer and the undertaking of renovations of the Clubrooms. Once a start is made on Clubroom renovation the facilities will be out of action for a relatively short period according to the insurer, however when a start is to be made is still an open question. John Smith will continue to be the Club’s liaison with Insurers and Council on these matters even though he has stepped back from continuing as Club Secretary. The Board is very grateful to John for his work as Secretary.
Lastly I think it is timely for there to be a list of major expenditure projects undertaken by the Board over the past year or so:
Purchase of 10 sets of bowls for new member and Business House use
New Heat Pump installed in the Bar Area, with two more to come for the Dining Area next week
New BBQ
New Tables and Chairs in the Bar Lounge area
New Blinds for the Clubhouse
Kitchen upgrade with new Urn and Fly zapper
And of course the famous Bike Stand
That’s all from me.
Ian Coombe
Chairman