Sunday afternoon saw the innovation of President’s Day, Captain’s Day and Awards Night all wrapped into one event and what an excellent afternoon and evening it was, enjoyed by all those playing, partners watching and many visiting past senior members coming along to join in the occasion.
The game was played as one rink and ten triples indicating the excellent support for this event. The game was played as a President’s team v a Captain’s team with the result of a win for the President by 200 to 162. Before the start of the meal President Rosemary asked those in attendance to stand for grace and hold one minutes silence in memory of David Basher who only last week passed away.
Top rink prizes were presented to Mike Mitcham, Mike Alexander and Will Ilott for the Presidents team and Simon Northway, Ingrid Thorogood and Denise Howard for the Captains team.
As is traditional the Ladies Vice-Captain gave a vote of thanks to Bev Lilley for the hard work she had carried out in what was a particularly difficult year, there having been no full-time men’s captain to assist. Ellen indicated that she had given Bev a new nickname of “beaver” because they are known to work tirelessly until they achieve a result. During the year Bev had also developed a new saying which Ellen hoped to adopt and that was “Don’t worry about it”.
During the speech it was mentioned that Bev had a liking for all thinks pink and fluffy and then a gift from all the ladies of the club was presented to the captain by young Marissa Ambridge, suitably attired in a fluffy pink flamingo outfit (see photograph).
Captain Bev then responded with the usual thanks to the many that had supported her in this unusual year. Many events had taken place that were a credit to the club even though it was hard for the men’s leagues with no captain and support unusually low for leagues.
Specific thanks and congratulations went to Richard Bradfield for starting the ball rolling for what turned out to be a very enjoyable and successful tour to Weymouth, to Lynn Hicks for reaching the semi-finals of the Bowls Wiltshire Ladies unbadged two wood competition, to Gerald Webb, Trefor Jones and Keith Scrannage in reaching the finals of the Bowls Wiltshire over 60’s triples. Bev herself had the fortune to play in the very successful Bowls Wiltshire Ladies Johns Trophy team who for the first time in many years reached the finals at Leamington and came out on top as winners.
Next Bev carried out the traditional presentation of gifts to all who had worked hard and given her and the club assistance during the year.
With phase one of the event now completed we moved on to phase two, the President’s address.
President Rosemary fully endorsed the captain’s comments regarding the help received and went on to remind members that we are a self-help club and without help we cannot run and included an appeal for all who could to offer help wherever they could. Rosemary paid tribute to the ladies who had provided a wonderful meal for the celebrations and for the support from the voluntary bar staff and expressed very grateful thanks to the large number of past members who had chosen to support her by attending the afternoon. It is always a delight to see everyone and renew acquaintances.
Phase three was the presentation of trophies to the winners and runners up of this year’s club competitions. Even though a lot of members in attendance did not have trophies to collect all stayed on to applaud those who did and the President thanked everyone for doing so and finally paid tribute to Sheila Garlick who, ably assisted by Ray Ward had done her usual excellent job of preparing all the trophies for the night, on top of organising the whole of the competition events throughout the season.
With this the President coupled with the Captain wished everyone a safe trip home, wishing them well over the winter and expressing the hope that all would support winter social events and return, refreshed, for next season.
A New Season Message from our President