As I write this, it is only 2 weeks until the working party that opens the club up for the 2024 season. In the background, plans have been made, memberships processed, foreshores prepared, dialogue with visiting fleets concluded to name but a few of the tasks that your committee and associated volunteers have been working flat out on.
So where do I start on this final bulletin before we see hulls touching water (don’t worry there will be more to come as the season gets underway)?
Well firstly a huge thank you to everyone who has already processed their membership this year. Whether you are paying in full or by monthly direct debit, having cash in the bank and visibility of membership so early on ensures that from a financial viability and cash flow viewpoint we start the year in a good place. It also gives us a view of the membership types and allows us to start thinking about future events around the types of members who have joined.
So lets kick things off with the working party on the 9th March. We normally plan this as a 2 day event but to be honest the last few years we have had such a great turnout that we are done on the Saturday. The aim of this is to get the club up and running by getting all of the boats up in the clubhouse and on the patio down into their respective places. We also do other things such as commissioning the bar and galley out of its winter state. Also, this year due to the members fantastic efforts of taking their boats away, we have been able to clearly identify truly abandoned kit and this year we will be gathering all of these boats, trailers and other residue into a single place for disposal. We will need a small team geared up and kitted to do this alongside the normal tasks. If you are able to attend, we normally start to gather around 09:00 to 09:30 but if you can only do a part day that’s OK, every pair of hands is gratefully recieved. This year I have put an entry on Dutyman so people can register their support/ effort, alternatively you can just message me to let you know you are coming. We will be issuing the gate code to everyone who helps out so they can bring their boats down on the Saturday should they choose to (the code will be issued to all other members that evening who can then bring their boats down from Sunday 10th). Please note, if you are supporting the working party and bringing your boat down on the Saturday we would ask you purely just to drop it into your chosen foreshore place then leave it (ie don’t rig etc). The priority on the day is to open up the club.
So, what do we have planned in the first 2 months of the season? Well March is going to immediately be busy with the working party kicking things off then the following Sunday(17th), we are going to try something new. To get the season off with some energy we are planning a “rigging morning”.Yep, its exactly what it sounds like. We should have the galley open serving hot drinks and breakfast butties and the plan is to get as many members down with their boats and basically lend a hand rigging. It can be a daunting task if you are trying to bring your boat of out storage and having to step masts etc on your own etc so we are hoping a friendly morning of sharing resources should get the season going in a happy relaxed way. Ideally, we aim to get rigged by about lunchtime then conditions permitting, we are hoping to have some “on the water” fun exercises to shake off those winter hibernation blues and get everyone back in gear for the season.
We then (even before club racing starts), dive straight into two open events. The hardcore members love to get going with the opening race of the season and this is the “Massacre Pursuit Race”. Last year 15 boats took to the start line for what can be anything from light breeze or an absolute hoolie! We then follow this up with 2 days of Regatta racing with the Easter Regatta spanning Saturday 30th and Sunday 31st with 6 races over the 3 days. This year we will be visited by the Catapults as part of their touring season. These inflatable catamarans are regular visitors to Bala and absolutely love spending time with us so its great to welcome them back. April then sees the start of the club racing season with a 7 week series kicking off for the “Commodores Cup”. Don’t forget that this year we are also awarding rolling trophies for the best placed female helm or crew, the best placed youth, and also for multihull and seniors. A change to the Champion Helm kicks in this year as well with a personally adjusted PY pursuit race being the new format (more on this to come). Finally, we have the first Saturday of the month (in this case looking at the next 2 months it will be April 6th) where we will be having two things going on. Firstly, our Cruiser Fleet Captain will continue to develop a monthly “cruiser day” with focused cruising activities based on those members wishes (you never know, we may get the informal cruiser racing underway if that is the flavour this year). Secondly our Senior Coach (Andy) will be running monthly coaching sessions, initially focused towards racing but anyone looking to improve their sailing skills are welcome to join. Andy has some great ideas and will be mixing this with him either guiding us in his RS100 or coaching us from an O-Boat. These are going to be great sessions so please make use of them.
We have had a great early take up on duties and I would like to thank everyone who has put their names forward already. As a reminder, any full sailing members and any sailing members on family memberships agree to do 3 volunteer duties to allow us to run our club racing and Open events. This is a core part of our club culture as we are not a business where we have funded roles, we are a volunteer ran local sailing club which incorporates other water sports activities. I have emailed out to all eligible members who have not signed up asking them to complete this in the next week prioritising those with qualifications to drive the RIB’s to place their duties under this task. I have also taken the opportunity to email all other members where, whilst it is not compulsory, to consider offering their time to support the club. As part of our social element (which is an important revenue driver which helps us fund the club and keep membership costs down) we have to run the Galley during specific events and the Bar (especially for the opens). The Galley is ran by our Galley Captain (John Rees) and normally we need 3 people to cook and serve for the session. The bar is ran by our Rear Commodore (Lisa Butler) and this is slightly more intricate as sometimes the bar opens late and as part of our bar licence we need to demonstrate that specific legal aspects have been communicated. In order to run our program this year we have a large number of needs for people to support the Galley and Bar. If you are able to and would like to support this aspect of the club please pop your name down via DutyMan (please ask if you do not know how to access it).
Coming up in the near future, you will be receiving notification of a Special General Meeting. Over the winter the committee have undertaken a review of the club constitution and are proposing a number of amendments to align our governance to the way the club operates. This change has come about over a number of years as the club has adapted post COVID etc, and whilst there is nothing that is contentious, it is important to keep everything in-line. Any changes to the club constitution can only be enacted by a members vote hence the reason for the SGM.
One thing that has worked really well, has been the club “Noggin and Natters”. These are informal 1 hr Zoom calls where members can hop on with committee members to discuss points of interest, share ideas or ask questions. On thing that came out of this was a member’s “flyer”. A simple document showing the full years calendar plus some additional info about the club that maybe new members are not aware of. This has been created in a PDF format so we can email it out and members can print it off, especially the yearly calendar on one page. You can find the current version here. If anything changes we will issue new ones.
As per last months bulletin, we are still looking to recruit a number of roles into the Committee so if you can spare about 3 hours a month in the evening for committee calls and probably about 4 to 5 hr hours of “doing stuff” one of these might be right up your street?
- Competition Secretary – manages all of the Open events (admin and making sure we have all the right bodies on the day and that it runs smoothly)
- Social Secretary – manages and co-ordinates all of the social events
- Diversity and Inclusion Officer – develops and supports the execution of a club strategy towards a more diverse and inclusive club membership in line with the RYA policies and general society good practice
- Publicity and Newsletter / Social Media Officer – manages out social media, develops our present in the community and liaises with Y&Y for event reports
If you are interested in any of these please let me know but also watch out for a tap on the shoulder if people mention that you might have the perfect skills to help us out.
Finally (and once again a follow up from last months report), we are looking to sale a number of the clubs fleet. At present we are considering the following, so if you are interested, please speak to one of the committee who can point you in the right direction to have a look at them and maybe take them out for a try.
- Wayfarer
- Topper Magno
- Laser Vago
- Laser
Hopefully by the time the next bulleting comes around, the club will be open and we will all be out on the water. Best wishes to everyone for a fantastic season.
Rob
Bala Sailing Club 