th
HONORARY SECRETARY’S REPORT- Pat Walsh
The purpose of this report is to highlight the activities of the executive committee members other than chairman, honorary treasurer and the captains as they are covered separately in the agenda.
MEMBERSHIP – Barry Kehoe
For the second year running, membership has increased. Here are the figures for 2013 (up to November), with the figures for the two previous years given for comparison:
2011 2012 2013 (to Nov.)
Families
Indiv. Senior
160
272
164
309
182
308
Indiv. Junior
Indiv. Student
Pavilion
Overseas
147
14
48
6
161
12
68
4
163
16
70
5
Honorary
Trustees
Deferred
Total members
5
3
43
7
3
22
7
3
37
1227 1291 1345
Fee income: €249,916 €244,436 €254,410
While the above table gives the number of members, it does not give an indication of movement. For example, in 2013, 152 new members joined, while 98 existing members left. These figures underline the ongoing importance of both attracting new members and retaining existing ones.
We again ran a successful open day in July, and had two membership information points during the Davis Cup in April. I would to extend a big thank you to everyone who was involved in both of these, and also to those who organised the coaching sessions for new members. Finally, many thanks to Gay O’Hea for all her work on membership matters.
DAVIS CUP 5th-7th April
The Davis Cup event was one of the highlights of the year. The event ran from Friday 5th to Sunday 7 th of April. There was a huge amount of work involved in both the preparation and running of this event and highlighted again the tremendous volunteer ethos that exists

in the club as this event would not have been a success with the efforts of all the many volunteers.
Again, I would like to hank everyone for their extraordinary efforts in making this event such a success.
TENNIS OPEN DAY - 6th July
The national tennis day ran again for the 2 nd year in a row. Once again we opened up our club to encourage visitors to come and see the excellent facilities we have in the club. As was the case last year it lead to a number of new applications for membership.
Again, there was a team of volunteers who helped make the day such fun and I would like to thank them for their support.
DEVELOPMENT PROJECT - SGM 16th September
There were expectations from last year’s AGM that would make significant progress in our development program for the club in 2013. At a special general meeting that was held on 16 th September, a proposal for development was rejected by a majority of 55% to 45%. A survey is being conducted to try to better understand what options within that proposal have/have not favour and to determine what if any modifications can be made that would be acceptable to a majority of the membership.
The survey remains open until 30 th November and all members are encouraged to complete it.
SOCIAL – Sue Spencer
After a years experience organizing Social, the core commitments ran relatively smoothly.
However, this year there were two “international” events that provided greater than usual challenges.
Davis Cup 5 th -7 th April
For Social this event started on April 1 st with team and support staff catering through to a formal dinner for both teams, the Finnish Ambassador and sponsors.
Overall there were approx 670 meals provided for players, lines people, support staff and workers. In addition, over 500 spectators were fed hot food over the 3 day period. The workload was tough but the support from members, both in manning the kitchen and the service area, in addition to baking cakes and scones, was truly amazing.
The Gathering 27-29 th September
Teams from Wimbledon and Belfast joined us for a 3 day fest of tennis, fun and craic.

There was music and food on both evenings and lunch on Sunday. A total of 180 members and guests were fed and watered over the weekend. A charge of €10 per head for food for each event was charged.
Numbers catered for at Core Club Events:
Ladies and Men’s Team tennis Finals 110
Mixed Team Tennis Finals 90
Springs Championships 83
Senior Championships
Club Championships
62
80
League Night 120
A few new things were tried and seemed to meet with approval from the members who attended. Tex/Mex food was extremely popular as was the music/karaoke for the finals of the Spring Championships.
Other Events
Santa, Choir Mulled wine and mince pies 90
Interclub Tennis Invitational
Interclub fund raiser
From Clare to Here
65
32
90
New Years Eve Dinner
New Years Day
68
80
The number of these types of events was down this year for several reasons. CLTC’s got
Talent (originally planed for November) had to be postponed til early next year as we had no Musical Director. So keep your eyes peeled for information and a call for performers in
January. Also, there was no major sporting event like Euro 2012 to build an event around.
The highlight of this year was definitely New Year’s Eve. In that it was a totally untried event it was daunting to embark on. Those who supported it had a brilliant night out. The clubhouse looked fantastic as did the guests…..we all scrubbed up great. The tickets for this years event sold out in 24 hours and we are doing all we can to accommodate as many on the waiting list as is possible.
Non Tennis related
These were started last year in response to comments made by members to address certain circumstances. These were:
That many members had more time free during the day and -
They felt they lost contact with the club whilst away through injury.
Art classes: These have run almost continuously (excluding summer break) and have proved to be extremely popular.

Outings: We have had a Literary walking tour of Georgian Dublin, Visit to National Gallery for a private viewing of Turners paintings, and most recently a VIP trip to Kildare with free
Bus (and Prosecco).
Mental Mondays: Where tennis meets fun Table quiz. This suits those free during the day and is great fun. Lunch is provided at a nominal charge. Thanks to Tony O’Flynn for his time and great questions.
CLTC walkers: We had four outings over the year which was a bit down on last year. I think the fine weather and all the outdoor living affected things. Once again thanks to Chris
Walsh and Adrian Brannigan.
Fun cycle: Held in the park and we hope that this will be the start of ongoing trips. Thanks to Vincent Hilliard.
If you have any ideas feel free to tell us, or even better join the Social Committee.
Thanks to Declan O’Brien, Eugene O’Brien, Niamh O’Gorman, Jean McDonnell and Marie
McGee for their help. Huge thanks to Marian Coady and Trish for their help throughout the year along with Joe and Gabriel in the Bar. To the group of members who consistently give of their time to give a dig out preparing food, dishing up and tidying up, thank you so much.
And of course Gay who put up with calls about posters, emails, tickets for New years eve etc.
A final thanks to you the members for supporting the social events run by the club. It was great to see so many new faces at some of the “Finals Nights” this year. It is often easy to feel that you were hockeyed in a competition and not bother to come to prize-giving. But those nights are not just about the tennis but about meeting people and making new friends so looking forward to seeing even more of you next year.
CHILDREN’S OFFICER – PHELIM KELLY
Child Protection is an agenda item at all executive meetings in CLTC.
Phelim was grateful there were no incidents to report in the last year. In addition Phelim had to ensure that all Committee Members, coaches etc had been Garda vetted and had obtained a Garda Clearance Certificate. All members will be asked to sign a certificate on renewal of their membership that states that they understand the rules and procedures of the club in relation to child protection.
JUNIOR ACTIVITIES – NICKIE COFFEY
The Junior Committee’s objective over the last year has been to

● Recruit and retain our younger members
● Ensure that there are relevant coaches to work with their development
● Provide information to players/parents about camps, internal and external competitions.
We have kept the club’s members informed of all club junior activities through newsletters, e-mails, notice board and the clubs website.
Over the next year, we would like to encourage all our juniors to organise and play matches. This is vital for the development of their tennis and does not relate solely to juniors within the coaching programme.
MEMBERSHIP AND RETENTION OF JUNIOR MEMBERS
One of the most important and challenging roles of the junior committee is the retention of our junior members, as they are the members of the future.
This has been quite successful with an increase of over 11%.
2013 Membership 491 Juniors
2012 Membership 440 Juniors
With all the other lifestyle distractions we need to be considering ways in which we can keep these players interested in tennis and we will continue to organise events for all ages and levels.
2013 saw Richard Foley and Odhrán O’Sullivan take up places in American colleges. We would like to wish them both all the very best.
The ongoing success and growth of the juniors within Castleknock is a credit to the players and their parents, club members and coaches who put so much time and energy into the ongoing development of our younger players.
JUNIOR COACHING PROGRAMME
The 26 week programme commenced in September and caters for juniors of all ages and abilities. This year we separated the juniors into age/level determined groups (in line with
Tennis Ireland Guidelines) in which we provide drills and fundamental skill-building exercises.
Through the programme we aim to ensure that they have fun whilst learning basic tennis skills, behaviour and sportsmanship.

2013-2014 Programme 206 Juniors
2012-2013 Programme
2011-2012 Programme
204 Juniors
180 Juniors
We hope that by the end of the programme these children will have progressed and improved their skills to a far better level than when they started.
The cost of the programme has been increased this year to ensure that the programme continues to breakeven financially. We have to meet the cost of the lights (which have been increased), pay the coaches (this year the ratio of coaches to children has been revised) and purchase equipment throughout the programme.
JUNIOR CLUB TOURNAMENTS
2013 saw us host 4 Junior Tournaments:
Junior Spring Championship 25 th – 30 th
April
U8’s & U9’s Spring Championship
Junior Club Championship
West Dublin Junior Open (See Below)
12 th May
6 th – 13 th
July
20 th -24 th
August
Note: The U8’s/U9’s Spring Championship was held on 12 th May due to the adverse weather conditions whilst the Spring Championships were being played in April.
West Dublin Junior Open
Sponsored by Castleknock Orthodontics and Dentistry
We were delighted to have Castleknock Orthodontics and Dentistry sponsor our Junior
Open in 2013.
274 juniors entered the Open. The participation level was very high, with 428 entries in 20 events. James McGee very kindly agreed to make the presentations on finals day, much to the delight of the juniors. This memorable event was captured by photographer Elena
Venzo. Feedback was very positive and it was very encouraging to see a great turn out.

Leinster Tennis had requested clubs to consider hosting U11 events, either as stand-alone events or as part of the clubs Junior Opens. We decided that it was important to support this and included this age category in our 2013 Open.
Throughout the week we sold tickets for an Andy Murray signed tee-shirt, Conor Niland coaching session, 2 Wilson rackets and a selection of other gifts which raised €1,000 for
Temple Street Hospital.
A lot of work goes into to overseeing this event and we would like to thank Jo O’Connell, Ed
Seator, Eoghan Furlong, Fiona Cleere, Tony O’Flynn and Eoin Cleere who gave up a tremendous amount of their time to ensure that everything ran to schedule.
CAMPS
We held an Easter Camp, Summer Camps, Supervised Hitting and a Halloween Camp all of which proved to be very successful and generated membership enquiries.
These camps are ideal for younger members who want to learn/hone their skills and make new friends
JUNIOR TEAM TENNIS
Ran from October to Christmas with prize giving held on Sunday 12 th January.
This event proved very popular with our juniors who (thanks to Cliona Fitzsimons and
Christine Duffy’s regular updates on how the teams were doing) could be found over those months “battling away” on the courts. As already mentioned, matches are an important factor in the development of a juniors tennis.
The success of this event can be credited to the amount of work and time Cliona and
Christine put in to running such a well-structured and organised event.
SOCIAL TENNIS
5 th / 6 th
Class
Tennis
Took place on a Friday afternoon and has proved to be very popular and was oversubscribed most weeks.
This is overseen by Ann Marie Carmody and Paula Courtney, helped by
Stephanie Fay, Michelle Hourican, Gillian Fitzsimons, Fiona Gleeson, Maeve
Gleeson and Sarah Tiernan.
3 rd / 4 th Being overseen by Ann Marie Carmody, Deirdre Kenny,

Class
Tennis
Orla Higgins Marie Boyle, Nuala Watt and Catrina McLoughlin.
Pizza Night Being run by Maria Rogers and Shay Dolan
Thank you to everybody.
JUNIOR LEAGUES
The Girls U12 and the Boys U14 reached finals.
Girls U12 B and Boys U12 A reached semi-finals.
Thank you to the juniors for representing the Club. The team managers and parents for the making and receiving of phone calls (ensuring they could field a team every week) and for the time spent driving to and from matches, supporting the children. It is very much appreciated.
LEINSTER MATCHPLAY
Congratulations to all our juniors that have qualified to play in the Leinster Provincial match-plays that will take place from Friday 29th November to Sunday 1st December
CLUB DEVELOPMENT
We would ask that when filling in questionnaires about the Proposed Development of the
Club or attending workshop meetings you take into account the lack of facilities for our junior membership. Examples being junior changing rooms, a functional furnished junior room and midi courts.
Special thanks to Steve O’Reilly and Gay O’Hea, for their support with the work generated in the Junior Sector and Peter Furlong for his I.T. Skills which enables us to keep the membership updated with junior news.
Junior Development Committee
Nickie Coffey, Fiona Cleere, Roisin Wallace, Julia Barisnikova and Edel Clarke
FACILITIES – Philip Carey

The main goal set out at the start of the year was to bring the club to a position of statuary compliance for the systems and plant we run in the club this would be in tandem with the club publishing our safety statement.
We are now fully compliant in all the areas where we have statuary duties and obligations
We have also set out on an energy conservation programme and have made some changes to the way we use our energy like Gas, Water and Electricity, to this end we secured a cheaper electricity tariff, put in place timed flow water taps and flush system’s some of these measures seen to be a nuisance to begin with but are very worthwhile both in terms of saving money and the environment.
We have made less progress on some capital type projects such as the overflow car park and the roof on the indoors this was in some part due to the outcomes of the development plans, however the leaking roof is historical and probably appears worse than it was before, now that we have the new surface on the indoors the water sits on top of the latex membrane and is not able to permutate away as it could with the original surface. We have had the manufacturers of the roofing material to site to inspect it with regard to material defect but they have informed us that it is not a material defect but actually it was installed incorrectly. In the interim we attempted some remedial repairs on the roof which were unsuccessful. We are now looking at a permanent solution which may involve some reroofing.
The overflow car park likewise was levelled and stoned to make it more usable again this was pending direction on the development.
Thank you for your patience and cooperation during the year and your continuing concern for our great club.
Some of the improvement’s and work undertaken this year

Routine maintenance requests were processed on as they occurred

Repairs to underground surface water and foul water pipes completed

Full energy audit completed over January yielding interesting findings relating to tennis court lighting costs and energy costs generally

Clubs emergency lighting system was fully overhauled and is now compliant with the statuary requirements

Dumb waiter goods lift is now certified and compliant with the statuary requirements

Fire alarm is fully serviced and is compliant with the statuary requirements

Firefighting equipment fully serviced and is compliant with the statuary requirements


Clubhouse Burglar alarm has been up graded and is fully operational

The burglar alarm on the indoor courts was recommissioned which will allow for it to be linked to the club house alarm phone link, this will result in the indoors having to be officially opened

All the lamps in the light fittings on the indoor courts have been replaced

Timed flow water taps have been fitted to most sinks to conserve water

New smart TV fitted in the bar

3 Defibrillators in secure alarmed boxes fitted in bar, locker room lobby at courts
1,2 & 3 and at the entrance to the indoor courts.

An upgrade to the paving area outside courts 8,9 & 10 has taken place which gives a much safer footing for pedestrian traffic, the addition of a handrail is a necessary health and safety requirement to prevent people inadvertently falling off the raised area.

New outdoor furniture has been provided to compliment the new area at 8, 9 &
10

Wind breakers, Scoreboards and Advertising Signage was erected around the courts for the Open day, Junior Open and West Dublin Open

Wind breakers removed from locker room end of courts 1,2& 3 to increase viewing

The keypad facility to latch the clubhouse gate in the open position has been withdrawn to try tighten security generally around the club house

Snooker room renovated and snooker table donated to school in Finglas

New Office space created for Club Manager

Programme of re-locking and re-keying vulnerable areas completed

Exit door to balcony to be repaired

Indoor Fire alarm and club Fire extinguisher’s service carried out

Indoor dividing nets refitted & operational

Leak in Cold water storage tank repaired however it caused damaged components in Smoke heads of fire alarm system which also has been repaired and is back in service

New lock barrels fitted to some internal doors for added security

Cracked glass replaced in entrance porch, bar and gents showers

Eclectic Lock on main door faulty and replaced

Water Temperature in Ladies showers reduced following member’s feedback

New circulating pump replaced on ground floor heating circuit

A problem with automatic electric gate to the overflow car park was identified as problem with the main processor board a replacement was fitted and put back in service


Bar lighting master control panel repaired

New pneumatic wheel fitted to indoor court cleaning machine

Graffiti removed from overflow car park

Pedestrian gate adjusted to close automatically

Cold water storage tanks and the entire clubhouse water system has now been chlorinated

Electric lock on main door replaced with Mag Lock while new lock is sourced and refitted

New thermostatically controlled showers fitted to ladies locker room

New insectocutors fitted to Kitchen
And Finally…on behalf of the executive committee
I would like to thank all of the staff for their dedication and support for the club during the year and also the hundreds of volunteers and supporters who have helped in many ways.
The club could not function without their support.
END