The Tennis Club

click Sports and Social Club for list of articles bout the club

The Lacey Green & Loosley Row Tennis Club is a section of the Lacey Green and Loosley Row Sports Club.

1962 Lease for Extra Land to enable a tennis court to be built in the southeast corner of the Sports Club grounds.

10th January 1962.

Lease between Richard Montague West and Hilda Elsie West both of Stocken Farm Lacey Green in the County of Buckingham, "the landlords", of the one part and Edwin Leonard Biggs of "Wayside Cottage", Lacey Green and Herbert Steven Tong of "Woodfield Cottage", Lacey Green "the Trustees"

Left Dan (coach) right Nigel Glenister

Schedule. The Landlords leased to the Trustees - All that piece of land situate at Lacey Green having a frontage of 15 feet against Slad Lane and a depth therefrom of 140 feet (upon which to build a tennis court) to hold for the term of 86 years from the 1st January 1962 for the yearly rent of one peppercorn on the first day of each year. For the full terms and conditions click The Sports Club leases

The Official Opening. The club started with just one hard court which was completed in August 1962 at a cost of just under £900. It was officially opened by the Bateman family on 1 September and was in use most weekends until Christmas, when snow prevented play until late March!

1962 The Tennis Club Founded. The original tennis club Minutes Book and correspondence give an interesting insight into how the club was founded in 1962 and development to 1982-83.

On 4 July 1962, the Sports Club formed a Tennis section. Mr W Lacey chaired the inaugural meeting and formed a committee comprising R Biggs - Secretary, G May - Treasurer and 3 other members: A Luxford, E Mines and G Baker.

Annual subscriptions were set at 20/- (£1) for seniors and 10/- (50p) for juniors. The one and only court was built in September 1962 at a cost of £900 with grants of £300 from the Ministry of Education and £600 from the Sports Club. Whilst having only one court, the club used other private courts around the village for league fixtures.

Membership in 1965 was 18 seniors and 12 Juniors. With a tremendous fund-raising effort and various grants, the original court was resurfaced and the second and third courts were built in the early 1980’s on land generously leased by the late Mr John West.

Issues discussed at the early AGMs concerned the state of the court, grass cutting, nettles, tournaments, social evenings, and of course much needed fund-raising for court repairs and improvement. Sounds familiar - some things never change - apart from the subscriptions!

Hallmark December 1982. Tennis Club. reporting Diane Bradley (click Wyndham & Diane Bradley for more about Diane.

The Club has had an active and enjoyable year. Good tennis and profitable social events. Membership now stands at 50 Senior Members and 40 Juniors.

Club nights are held on Wednesday evenings and this season we suggested Sunday mornings should also be regarded as club mornings, encouraging, we hope, people to just turn up and be able to get a game without pre-arrangement. Wednesdays prove particularly popular and thanks to the kindness of Mr. and Mrs. Plowman (John & Frankie Plowman) in letting us use their court in Church Lane, we had good sessions - almost too many people on occasions, which stresses the need for a second court.

We successfully entered the Aylesbury and District Tennis League Division 6 and won the Mixed League and came third in the Mens League. This is very encouraging

Our affiliation to the L.T.A. enabled us to purchase Wimbledon tickets and we had a draw to decide the lucky purchasers.

Junior coaching was continued this year to encourage our younger players. A qualified coach, coached for two one week sessions during the summer. Informal coaching on Saturday mornings was also held.

Fund raising has still dominated our activities this year. We have had two successful: Dances, a Jumble Sale and an American Tournament in July which was followed by a Barbeque open to all members and friends. We tried a new venture in April - a Race Night. This was enjoyable and profitable, but we needed more customers. Very recently we had a friendly Cheese and Wine evening in the Sports Pavilion.

Once again, we shall hold our Christmas Dinner in the Pavilion. This has become an established annual event, not regarded as fund raising but a gathering of members. Last year we had to cope with being snowed up, but with the loan of John West's Landrover, which was able to struggle down to Loosley Row to collect the committee and the turkey etc., we had a very good evening. It is good to see our own club house used for this event and we had a "full house". We hope for more clement weather this year.

This year we tried a new venture to extend the Tennis Club's winter activities. Once a month we reserved a court at Bisham Abbey's splendid new sports centre. This proved popular with a limited number of members who wended their way to Bisham during the winter months. We are continuing this activity this year and hope a growing number of members will play.

The problems of siting the second court have been overcome. We have accrued the money - loans, grants, the 100 Club which is still our main source of income, and profits from our fund raising activities. Construction has now started and, at the time this report reaches you, we should have a second tennis court ready.

Hallmark April 1981. Bob Barton reporting. The Club is on an upbeat at the moment. Interminable plans to build a second court of our own are hardening up. We hope to build most of it ourselves over the next 12 months. Advice, here, or labour, would earn not a lot, except much gratitude, and a few drinks.

We have had a rush of blood to the head and joined a men's league. So a few new, or even not so new, men would be handy. Then there's a veritable social whirl of extra-mural activities. Watch for the monster jumble sale next month. (Well what did you expect, a May Ball?)

We have fixed an LTA coach for the juniors this year. It may be we can get him to take some of us in hand as well, if enough want it. All secured for an inflation-beating basic £10 a year, with concessions for families, which means your on key and virtually unlimited access to the court (and use of another).

Go on - gives us a try. I'm on 5824; Match Secretary on 3037, and secretary Diane Bradley on 4512. Or just turn up at our corner of the sports field any Wednesday evening about 7pm if it is fine. You never know, you may enjoy yourself.

-

June 27th 1986. Tennis Club Mid-Summer Ball, 8pm.

-

Hallmark February 1987 report by Barrie Edwards at Main Club meeting, "The Annual Christmas Dinner was held at the Pavilion on 13th December with a full house as usual. A successful and healthy £140 profit. Many thanks to all helpers.

Indoor tennis is played every Wednesday at Bisham Abbey and for the particularly crazy amongst us the winter leagues resume in mid-January.

The summer league and club nights start in April and we look forward to plenty of competitive and social tennis with hopefully a few new faces. All standards of players are welcome; contact Maureen Kelly on P.Ris 4010.

Hallmark February 2022 reporting Nigel Glenister.

This year, it has been relatively mild (so far), and the Sunday morning club sessions have generally been sunny. We normally experience a drop in attendance during the winter period, but these club sessions have had record numbers. Perhaps it’s the weather or New Year’s resolutions, but whatever, it’s great to see so many.

On Sunday 9th January we took the opportunity to show members our new trophy for Club Of The Year which we received at the Bucks Lawn Tennis AGM in November. The award was for the progress that the club has made over the last few years and the substantial upgrade in facilities. The Japanese have a great word “kaizen”, meaning continuous improvement and certainly the club cannot afford to rest on its laurels.

This year, our focus is on building a clubhouse by the courts which has toilet facilities and an open plan kitchen with plenty of glass facing the courts. We have just appointed a local architect and we are looking forward to seeing his ideas.

This is going to be an expensive project and will require a lot of effort from members in terms of fund raising and will be reliant on us being successful with grant applications. It’s not going to be easy, but we hope to complete the building in 2023 or early 2024.

A clubhouse will obviously have numerous benefits, not least allowing us to host our own events by the courts. Social events are an important part of the club, and we try to do as many as possible throughout the year.

In late November, 41 members had a very enjoyable Christmas dinner at the Pink and Lily. It’s not easy catering for hungry tennis players, but the Pink and Lily produced excellent food with good service too. It was a lovely evening and the club managed to raise some £300 via a raffle kindly organised by Jackie Coles.

I was also delighted to be invited to Dan’s beginners’ class Christmas dinner at the Black Horse. The word “beginners” does them a disservice, they have improved massively over the past year or so. Anyway AJ, the new Black Horse chef produced a fantastic Christmas menu which we all enjoyed.

Hallmark February 2023. Excerpt from the report by Nigel Glenister

The men’s 1st team currently sit second in division 5 with a very good chance of promotion this year. The men’s 2nd team, having been promoted last year are struggling in division 7 and sit second from bottom. The points are quite close, so a couple of wins could save them from relegation.

Our ladies’ team are steadily improving and benefiting from a larger pool of players. The extra practice sessions have paid off and they sit 3rd in division 8 with every chance of promotion.

The mixed team are mid table with a mixed bag of results. Having been promoted last year, a year of consolidation would be a good result.

Off court we had a record number of social activities. On 26th November 40 members enjoyed a fabulous Christmas meal at The Pink and Lily. Dan our tennis coach also had his DAFTA awards (Dan’s award for tennis achievement) which were presented during the evening and were highly amusing. Categories included the player who had lost the most balls, time keeping and the worst on court jokes. I may have won one of those awards!

Dan’s Monday improvers group organise a few social activities throughout the year and had a lovely meal at the Black Horse at the beginning of December. The year was completed with both the men and ladies going out. The men had a curry evening at the Radhuni and the ladies had a meal at a Thai restaurant in High Wycombe. We were all impressed with the subsequent video that was circulated showing their hand co-ordination and high-spirited festive singing to Twelve Days of Christmas!

Planning permission for our new pavilion was finally approved on 19th October and since then we have installed a standpipe by the shed and are awaiting Thames Water to connect us in Slad Lane. We are also looking to replace some of our older wooden benches with more modern heavy duty plastic ones. I am grateful to the Parish Council for their continued support and thank them for their recent grant.

Finally, | was pleased to award prizes to two members of the year. Jackie Coles has done an amazing job with fund-raising, putting in hours of work together with her partner Mike. Also, one of our newer members, Simon Floyd has really engaged with the club, playing lots of tennis and introducing a number of his friends to the club. Well done both, here’s to a great 2023!