24th February Court PreparationWhat an amazing start to court preparations for this year! Thank you to all our amazing members who came out on Saturday morning armed with rakes, brushes and cutters to begin work on the grounds at Grove. With all the rain we have experienced, we couldn't work on the actual courts, but there was plenty to do in and around the clubhouse including collections of lots of branches and leaves, clearing moss from the roof, expanding the parking area. This session has made a great impact! There was a lot of love and laughs on the WhatsApp group and everyone said what a great atmosphere it was. Many thanks to all who helped! Look out for further dates planned so we can hopefully hit our target open date of 1st April. Come on sunshine. Give us a chance! It was a glorious day to kick off the hard work for this year. Thankfully Helen was on hand making cups of coffee and Kat treated helpers with the most amazing cinnamon rolls. Many thanks!
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Grove Members Are The Best!On this icy cold February day, it seems a long way until we'll be outside playing tennis at Grove. However, once the weather warms up a bit we will be calling on all Grove members to help support the club and help prepare the wonderful clay courts for this season. We will be posting planned dates for Court Preparation soon. We tend to organise preparation meet ups on Saturday mornings, however members can use the WhatsApp group to make arrangements that suit them. There should be job lists in the clubhouse, but please ask if you are unsure what to do or have any questions. There is something for everyone to do... Jobs include clearing leaves, lifting the moss, sifting through clay and laying and rolling the new clay.
Preparing the courts seems like an enormous task (and it is!) however when we work together, it is amazingly satisfying and a fantastic achievement. If you are unable to do heavy lifting or manual work, then you could always consider making cups of tea and coffee for the workers - always appreciated. Grove Members Swap Rackets for PaddlesGrove members were invited to join a 2 hour Pickleball Taster session at Huddersfield Sports Centre. This was a great introduction to a fun game that is growing in popularity throughout the world.
It was great to see a number of our members turn up wearing the fabulous Green Grove Hoodies and white shirts. The hoodies were soon discarded as we all realised what a fast paced game this is!! Following on from the success of this event, a future session is already booked. Please contact Richard if you would like to find out more. If you don't know anything about Pickleball then you can check out some background information on Wikipedia. Three of the lovely Pickleball Huddersfield club members were on hand to teach us the game and we had a lot of laughs and fun over the 2 hour session. Find our more about them by clicking on the Pickleball Huddersfield Facebook page. Other events are planned for this year, including an Archery Taster session, so please check our WhatsApp group or our Events page on the Grove website to find out more. Games Nights at GroveIt has been a great success! It was lovely to see such a welcoming atmosphere and bundles of encouragement buzzing about at Grove.
Even when members did not want to play, they would often turn up to cheer on others, have a chat and enjoy a cuppa. We all agreed that Wednesday Social Nights were a huge hit with our amazing members, who we already know are the most friendly, lovely members on the planet. So now we are into the depths of Autumn with these depressing cold, dark evenings. While we do have a couple of members still managing to grab a game or two on the weekends on court one, for most of us, we have had to hang up our rackets for the year due to poor weather and bad light. However many of our members wanted to maintain the social contact. So we decided to continue our Wednesday Social Nights. Helen and Richard are kindly organising the weekly get together and they are there come rain or shine to catch up with other members with a range of gaming activities. We have a fabulous new table tennis table with all the associated equipment as well as a small snooker/pool table. Members have played various games such as Dominoes, Uno, Cluedo, Dobble, TopTrumps, Sock Game and we have a whole pile of others to get through. Keep an eye on the WhatsApp group for updates about our Wednesday Socials and let us know if you are planning to join us. It is great that we are maintaining our social connection. Despite the temptation to curl up and hibernate, it really is good to get together. Final Coaching SessionSeveral of our members have taken part in the WeDoTennis Coaching at Grove over the past few months. Coaching lessons took place on Sunday afternoons. This has been a great opportunity for many of us to improve our tennis. Despite some concerns that we might not be good enough or we might feel awkward, we had a lovely bunch of folk to work with in the sessions. This made it fun and we were all very supportive of each other. WeDoTennis coach Peter ran the sessions in 6 week blocks. Over the course of each block, he offered advice and training to a wide variety of participants ranging from beginners to team players. He introduced a range of techniques, explaining how they are being used by professional players, then showing how we can improve and practise the technique. Following our final Coaching Session, we celebrated in the way we do best at Grove - with plenty of drinks and treats (including a fabulous homemade baked cheesecake and a delicious homemade chocolate orange cake!) Thank you ladies - you know who you are! Special thanks to Peter who was incredibly helpful, encouraging and patient throughout the coaching. I have never met anyone with such a passion for the game of tennis. We are hoping to offer further coaching sessions at Grove from April next year. We will update with dates and times as soon as we know more.
If you are interested, please let us know so we can try to plan the lessons. All lessons must be booked and paid for direct with WeDoTennis on their website. Grove Partners With We Do TennisCoaching began at Grove on Sunday 11th June. Grove is working with professional coaching organisation We Do Tennis to offer group coaching sessions on Sunday afternoons. The coaching costs £34.99 for the initial 6 week programme. Coaching must be booked through We Do Tennis on their website - https://wdtvenues.co.uk/grove We are hoping to expand the coaching going forwards. We know that many people have enquired about coaching recently and we are delighted that we can now offer this at Grove. Adult coaching is currently taking place from 4-5pm on Sundays. We have some interest in the children's classes and hope to add these sessions soon. We Do Tennis classes include members of different ages and varying levels. All are welcome to join. Many of us had a free trial of the coaching at our Open Day, which was excellent. We have also had positive feedback from the coaching sessions that Peter has delivered so far.
Thank you to everyone for making our Open Day so great!What a fabulous day with a great bunch of people! The courts and the clubhouse were buzzing on this gloriously sunny day. We were thrilled to see so many people enjoying the facilities and warm welcome at Grove Tennis Club on Saturday 13th May. This was Grove at its very best - friendly, welcoming and fun We had people of all ages chatting, enjoying delicious homemade cakes, as well as having a go on the courts. Many of us sampled the excellent coaching sessions from We Do Tennis coach Alan. Alan ran sessions for children as well as adults and many people commented on how useful they found the coaching. We have lots of great photos thanks to several keen photographers. Hopefully you will get a real sense of the atmosphere on the day if you look through the photos. Click 'Play' to look through the stream of photos below. Thank you to all that came to support the club and share in the atmosphere and special thanks to those that contributed food and drinks and helped provide a welcome to guests. If you missed out on our Open Day and you are interested in having a look around, please contact us by email at [email protected] or contact:
Richard on 07768 345048 or Helen on 07711 008923. We are always keen to welcome new members and show off our lovely clay tennis courts. We are looking forward to welcoming past, present and potential new members at Grove at our Open Day this Saturday (13th May). Our members will be on hand to offer refreshments and the opportunity to look around and play some tennis from 10am to 4pm.
Free coaching will be on offer from our coaching partner We Do Tennis. All ages and abilities are welcome to join for a taster of coaching, drills and tips. 11:30 - 12:30 - Junior coaching session 12:30 - 1:30 - Adults coaching session Book your interest online with We Do Tennis: wdtvenues.co.uk/grove (The first 6 week coaching course will start on Sunday 11th June.) We have our fingers crossed for fine weather so you can see our lovely, friendly club in all its glory! I am delighted to report that Grove Tennis Club is open for 2023!
Huge thanks is owed to the dedication and significant effort of members and volunteers. We are all proud of our clay courts, but they do require significant efforts to prepare and maintain them. We were delighted to welcome volunteers from GoodGym for the first time this year. They provided their support on two evenings to help prepare the courts. GoodGym is a great community of people who get together to combine exercise and volunteering. Enjoy your tennis and please leave the courts and clubhouse as you found it (or better). Please look after the courts by brushing them carefully each time you play. Please wear appropriate footwear (avoid thick treads). Do not play on courts if it is raining or if there is water on the courts. All we need now is some lovely sunny weather! We love our red clay courts at Grove. However they do require significant preparation and maintenance. To keep membership costs low, we do not employ any professional help to maintain the courts. This means we are completely reliant on the support of club members and volunteers.
Court preparation is already underway and organised sessions start on Saturday 10th February at 10:30am - 12:30pm. We will continue meeting weekly (weather permitting) until the courts open on Sunday 9th April. Work can only be done in fair weather so we have limited opportunities to complete the work. First tasks to complete include pruning branches, fixing the fence and clearing moss around the outside of the courts. During organised sessions there will always be someone to advise on what needs to be done and how to complete the tasks. If you can spare any time to help with the court preparation, please keep in touch on the WhatsApp group or show up to one of the organised sessions. |
AuthorCatherine is less of a player and more of a watcher. She loves to sit on the veranda or the grass and watch her family (3 generations!) playing tennis at Grove. She will be writing blog posts to keep members up to date on what's going on at Grove. Archives
February 2024
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