Well, the snow and ice had melted but it wasn’t exactly
balmy outside as a goodly crowd arrived, squeezing themselves cheerfully into
the Conference Room which we had been warned was rather smaller than the
adjacent hall.
So, if anyone had thought that the smaller scale of the room was unimportant
because probably not many would turn up on this substitute date, they were
wrong. A cartoonist might
have had some hanging out of the windows or swinging from the lampshades but,
as it was, everyone found a perch somewhere and the proceedings began.
Lest some might consider that at an AGM most of the hot air
comes from the top table, in this case they’d also be mistaken.
The chill air outside was soon forgotten as the Association members sat
cosily shoulder to shoulder shedding jackets as time passed.
Outgoing President, Sue Cook, chaired the meeting, made the
introductions and paid tribute to past members, including Liz Gamble who was a
County Second Team player, a keen supporter of golf in general and a lady with
a fine sense of humour. One
First Team player remembers her fondly as a wonderful ‘trolley puller’,
inclined to invoke the help of her cat as a medium in times of tribulation
during Championship matches and, when the cat was no longer around, to call
upon her goldfish to help out in a pinch!
The effect it had, of course, was to provoke laughter, the best
tension breaker known to man - or woman.
The business end of the meeting inevitably involves
finance, with grateful thanks to sponsors, Sabona and Ransomes Jacobsen, plus
the generosity of those who played in the Suffolk Golf Day and an explanation
of The Suffolk Golf Partnership.
Comprising the SLCGA, SGU and SPGA, the Partnership has
received funding for the County’s golfing activities from England Golf
enabling it to set up training for coaches, development programmes, The
Disability Golf Project and to encourage clubs to go for the GolfMark ‘High
Achiever’ Award which broadly aims to encourage young people into golf.
It might be churlish to suggest that some of this sounds like a game of
‘Chase The Money’ because the extra funding available to the Clubs who can
achieve the status does go hand in hand with opportunities for young people to
develop their golfing skills. However,
there is no doubt that the sight of gold at the end of the rainbow does seem
to make everyone lick their lips. For
the idealists among us it adds an uncomfortable edge to something which one
might hope would happen anyway even if sacrifices were needed to achieve it.
The other and most important factors in the Association’s
activities are the people.
There was great goodwill and enthusiasm, generosity and appreciation as Sue
Cook stood down and Judy Hamshere of Bury St Edmunds took over as President.
Judy, always capable of looking on the bright side, promised not to
lose her sense of humour during her Presidency.
Thank goodness! It
would be much missed. Mary
Wilderspin, a thoughtful, determined and kindly Captain, has another year to
go and Vice-Captain Sheila Jarvis, her laugh always at the ready, is there as
backstop and energetic Second Team Captain.
Those helping the Juniors to develop their skills and the other members
of the Governing Body showed up in force and the only thing missing seemed to
be the
Heidi Baek was awarded the Nigel Birrell Trophy for the
outstanding progress she made over 2009 but understandably she was unable to
collect it because she is currently studying at
