Lots happening…….

Hi everyone, James Thomas has just given me a hard time for failing to blog for ages and having looked at the date of my last blog it’s a fair cop! Perhaps I will start by talking about James and his new role. Having now been the CEO for about 16 months I have  a much better idea of the sport, its people and the challenges we face. I still learn something new every day and like Tom and James I am committed to providing you with the best service I can to ensure our sport grows and remains enjoyable. To this end we want to see a much greater link between the game at club level and Team GB.  We recognise that unless we can recruit more players, grow healthy clubs and provide enjoyable domestic competition, we will never be able to keep players interested and we will never have international teams who can challenge for gold. So I have now asked James to take on a different role as Head of Operations. In this role he will have oversight of delivery of the whole sport plan – from recruitment through to clubs and competitions and onwards into Team GB where he will have a wide ranging perfomance management role. He will continue to work closely with Tom who will now be able to focus much more intensely on his key role which is to find and nurture talent and then create world beating teams – no pressure there then Tom!  In addition Tom will become more involved with clubs and in particular will provide Coach Development days. This new approach many of you will have seen at the Nottingham Regional Development Day in February which James organised. Here we had a morning of workshops for officials and coaches followed by an afternoon of rugby with a number of Team GB players also taking part. Our recruitment drive has also started and we have visited the Royal Marines Rehabilitation Unit in Plymouth and also the spinal unit at Salisbury. In addition we supported Pirates to deliver a recruitment/taster session in Cardiff for 25 injured servicemen. While all of this is going on, preparations are under way for the first of the Coloplast Super Series events which will be at Medway Park in Kent on 19/20 March so we are looking forward to a well attended event. I also hope that you are able to catch up with the weekly blog coming in from Florida where we have 5 of our development  players taking part in an international training camp. So lots and lots going on…………….. look forward to seeing you in Kent………..David

Here’s to 2011!

I hope like me you enjoyed the Powerplay in Liverpool – and if you didn’t go you missed a treat! As we as some great play opportunities for the 40 or so who turned up, there was some excellent kit given away, all with our new logo and branding, and a great social event to follow with some good prizes – none of which I won! Actually it was a great way to end the playing year and it was followed by some very good news. First we heard that we have been successful with funding support from the BOOST charity which will help our Ambassador programme, then we heard that the ‘Get Kids Going’ charity will partner us for the build up to 2012, and then this was followed by the news that we have been successful in our bid for funding from the Wooden Spoon charity to develop the schools programme I have mentioned before – more of that in the new year. All of this is great news and the result of pretty hard work from the management team so thanks to James, Richard and Tom. This funding will really help us deliver our long term aim of getting new players and giving more support to clubs. I am already pretty excited about the start of 2011. On 19 January we launch the Ambassador programme which aims to target new players. We are starting this in the Royal Marines rehabilitation unit in Plymouth looking to see if there are potential players or marines who are just keen to get involved with the game. At the end of the month we are sending some of Team 2012 to Florida for training which marks the start of the Team 2012 year. Then we have a really exciting new events programme which will certainly provide many more playing opportunities for all of you – the Super Series, Regional Development Days, Low Point Tournament, Powerplay  and National Championships are all there to take part in so check out the website for details. To help clubs who need a bit more funding to get things going the newly launched Club Support Fund has gone live and already some clubs have been successful with their applications. So here’s to 2011! Meanwhile have a fun Christmas and we look forward to seeing you in 2011.

David

we are committed to helping!

Since returning from the World’s the senior management team has been very focussed on how we can better support you and the clubs. We are all committed to growing the game and helping you to run your club. We have heard from you that recruitment is a problem and so we have been working on a recruitment programme called the Ambassador’s Programme, which will involve regular and targeted visits to Spinal Units, Military Rehab Units and other disabilty groups to raise awareness of our sport and to encourage potential players to ‘have a go’. In addition, we have worked up a pilot schools project which we will start in the new year in partnership with the Wooden Spoon charity. Whilst all this activity is going on, Tom and James are visiting clubs over the coming weeks to find out exactly what practical things we can do to help you. Perhaps it is to help get you some chairs, or to find a better venue, or to help you with coach development. The  Domestic Working Group – which was your idea at the AGM. has also been meeting and its main focus has been to help shape a better league format for 2011. This has been achieved in principle with  3 x weekend league commitments – @ Medway Kent; @ Greenbank Liverpool; and @ Surrey Sports Park Guildford. In addition you will know about the Christmas Powerplay tournament @ Greenbank Liverpool on Friday 10 December. The 2011 Nationals will be 29-31 July . In agreeing this programme the aim is to deliver high quality competition @ high quality venues. But in addition we know that more playing opportunities are wanted by many of you and we want to build on some of your good ideas fro achieving that. So there is lots going on and we want to work with you and for you to deliver more. Please help us to help you for it is only by working together that we can take this sport to an exciting new level.

Best wishes,

David

Welcome to the new GBWR website…

Hello,

I hope by the time you read this you’ve had a chance to look at the all new GBWR website and explore what it can do.
It’s a really exciting time for GBWR. Not only is Team GB progressing well towards the Paralympic Games, but the unprecedented media coverage we have had thanks to Channel 4’s partnership with the Paralympics means that the organisation has the optimum opportunity to succeed and grow at grass roots level.
We have re-launched the website because the GBWR community asked us to – and also because a successful organisation like ours needs world class communications!
The site is now full of functionality which players and the community can use to keep up to date with news, what’s going on and matches and events.
There is social media attached to the site so content can be Facebook, Tweeted and You Tubed.
Video functionality enables great pieces of action to be posted to the site.
There’s also team and player info, inspiring stories and lots of help for people who are thinking about getting involved with GBWR.
There’s also a forum where you can have your say.
The site was developed by Onshore Media, who also do our PR and our branding. And James Thomas, GBWR’s National Development Director managed the project. I hope you will agree they did a great job.
But the job is not over. Now we are ‘live’, we need you to send in your information, send us stories and videos and tell us what you think. A good site is only as good as the people who use and contribute to it.
The new GBWR branding and site is a sign of the commitment to our great sport and players. Please let us know what you think.

E-mail us on info@gbwr.org.uk

David Pond, Chief Executive, GBWR