NATIONAL INTER SCHOOLS TOURNAMENT

First of all I would like to thank Wesport our County Sports Partnership especially Beth Mayman and Lisa Blacow for the help with funding and organising of these tournaments without their involvement they would not have occurred. Thank you also to all the teachers some of whom umpired non stop for 3/4 hours and then drove mini buses back to their schools in the Friday rush hour traffic.

The tournaments have been very successful this year with 8 tournaments taking place and a total of approx 200 children taking part, the response from N.Somerset and Banes has been brilliant but the tournaments in South Glos and Bristol could have been better attended.

The 1 st round has been completed and the County Final will be held in Feb/March with the winners going through to a regional final.

The results will be on the website in January.

CLUB FUTURE

Just a gentle reminder to return the club self assement forms that were sent to you in October. Badminton England would like a reply from you by January 11 th even if you are not intending to pursue Foundation or Premier Club status; it will help them understand the problems that clubs face. At the present time Avon does not have as many premier clubs as the other south west counties we only have Keynsham Juniors but we do have Severnvale, Uphill, Racketeers Junior and Beaufort Junior who are interested in working towards premier club status.

I have had some queries from one or two other clubs asking about the new Club structure and if anybody would like more information please get in touch with either myself pennyshears@googlemail.com or John Edwards the Regional Development Officer. johnedwards@badmintonengland.co.uk

There are small amounts of money to help if clubs are going for Premier Club status they are to help fund coaching courses and the other courses that are needed. Details of some of these courses can be found on Avon’s website but if anybody knows of any other places that run courses could they get in touch, we are especially short of courses in the Weston area.

COACHING

Level 1.

The course that we were trying to run this Autumn has not gone ahead due to a shortage of Tutors but we are looking at dates in March, so if anybody is interested could they get in touch with myself or Gary McDonald dropshot@blueyonder.co.uk or 07876 480846.

Level 2.

We have a level 2 course running at the moment with 6 of our junior club coaches on it and we would like to run another course next year, I have had a few enquires so if you are interested could you get in touch with myself.

Badminton for Teachers Courses.

We will be running a teachers course in area, the venue and date has not been confirmed but it is likely to be some time in the spring. Please get in touch with myself if you are interested.

NATIONAL BADMINTON WEEK

Thank you to SLM at Horfield and Kingsdown Leisure Centres for their support with the 1 minute challenge.

Thanks also to Racketeers Junior club for taking part.

A total of £47:50 was raised for NSPCC.

UK SCHOOL GAMES

These are to be held in August in Bristol and Bath – 8 sports including Badminton are included.

At the moment I have not been given many details as to Avon’s involvement but I do know that we have been asked for some volunteers and they are keen to get some 17 to 19 year olds involved, most of Avon’s fantastic volunteers are not of that age!! I will need help identifying some extra new people so if you have any young players in your clubs who would like to get involved please contact me. We will be running some young officials courses for them, details not available yet.

For further information on any of the items in this newsletter, please get in touch.