Club News - the Gossip Page

The Youth Speaks District 1090 Final was held in Wycombe High School today. Our Club had a particular interest in this event as St Mary's School Ascot had a team in the Intermediate Section. There were four teams competing in this section and as was to be expected the standard was very high. The St Mary's team was just pipped at the post by the Royal Grammar School High Wycombe. 

When we staged the Zone Final a few weeks ago the Senior Section was won by Uxbridge College and they were again successful at the District Final. Both wining teams now go forward to the Regional Final to be held on 13 March at the Cranleigh Baptist Church, Cranleigh, GU6 8RT (1:30pm for 2:00 start).  (Report by Alan Clare)

Today is also "Thanks for Life - End Polio Now" day, with Rotary Clubs up and down the country operating collections outside over 300 Tesco stores.  At short notice our Club took on the organisation and manning of the collection at Tesco, Martins Heron, operating a rota from 9:00am to 6:00pm.  The day raised over £530 which will be our contribution to the national total.

Pictured left are President Colin, with Moya and Anthony.  Anthony coordinated the day, which was judged a great sucess.

The District Final of the Young Chef compterition  hosted by the Rotary Club of Farringdon at the Farringdon Community College took place today, and President Colin went along with Moya to support our competitor, Hannah Wilson. 

Unfortunately neither  Hannah from Ascot nor Nadin Harris from Wokingham made it through to the next round but they both enjoyed taking part.

Tonight it was Ascot's turn to host the annual "5 Clubs" dinner, attended by over 60 members of the Rotary Clubs of Ascot, Bracknell, Crowthorne & Sandhurst, Easthampstead and Wokingham.  Our District Assistant Governor Robin was present and our guest speaker was Peter Caddick-Adams, who spoke on the subject of "Media in Modern Warfare".

(Apologies for the poor quality of this photo)

Tonight the Club ran the Zone Final of the "Youth Speaks" competition, with schools from Slough, Windsor, Northwood, Uxbridge and Ascot competing for a place in the District Final in March. The teams have already won a local competition to get into this zone final, and we were very pleased that an Ascot team, St. Mary's School, were sucessful tonight.  They won the Intermediate competition (pictured right receiving their trophy from President Colin), and now progress to the District Final.  Individual prize winner in this age group was Rahul Soni of Herschel Grammar School.

In the Senior competition, Uxbridge college made a clean sweep, winning the team tropy and a place in the next round, and their Speaker, Ismaila Ngum winning the individual prize.

We are grateful to St. Georges School, Ascot, who kindly hosted tonight's competition, Master of Ceremonies and Event Coordinator Rtn Alan Clare, and the judges, Chris Majewski, Margaret Barton and Paula King.

The third leg of the Sunninghill Wheelbarrow Race Triathlon took place tonight, at a Gourmet Dinner and Auction attended by the Ascot Day Centre Benefactors, Rotarians and partners, and guests from the local area. The event took place at the Jade Fountain in Sunninghill, and the auction and raffle raised in the order of £2,000.  This means that the total monies raised for the Ascot Day Centre through the three activities comes to £7,000. 

During the evening the Wheelbarrow Race winners "Taking the St. Michael's" were presented with their trophy, now engraved.

Our Special General Meeting, delayed by the snow fall earlier this month, finally took place today.  After presentations by the candidates for the Senior Vice President post, the ballot result was in favour of Rtn Beverley Williams, pictured left receiving the SVP medal from President Colin.  The Junior Vice President ballot elected new Rtn Robert Linnell, pictured right receiving the JVP medal from President Colin.  Rtn David Marshall was re-elected Treasurer, and Rtn Ian Valentine was confirmed as Secretary, no-one else applying for the job!

Responding to the earthquake disaster in Haiti, our treasurer reports that he has sent off a Club cheque for £1,470 to cover the cost of 3 Shelterboxes, one being the box discussed at last Wednesday's meeting, the other 2 being funded by a private donation from a Club member. 

More information can be found on the Shelterbox Web Site.

Members of Ascot Rotary Club and Ascot Inner Wheel joined 20+ Rotarians from across our District at Charters School, Sunningdale, today to take part in a "hands on" Public Relations workshop "Getting Your Message Across" organised and presented by the D1090 Communications Committee (chaired by your webmaster).  Presenters included District PR Officer Judith Diment, District Web Master Liz Yardley and the Managing Editor of the London Eventing Standard, Doug Wills, with support from John McCarthy, a website expert.

Participants included District Governor Terry Kenyon and RIBI Marketing, PR & Comms chairman, Tony Bacon.

It looked like a case of "Oh no, not again!" this morning when we woke to find yet another 2 inches of snow (5 cms. for our younger members) had fallen overnight.  After a series of phone calls we decided to go ahead with our Curry Evening at the Rajvoog Indian Restaurant in Sunninghill.  However, as it seemed only a fraction of the expected numbers would be able to attend, we would have a fellowship evening and reschedule the Charity Dinner for a later date.  Nevertheless over 20 Rotarians, partners and guests did turn up, and  owner Mogsud Khan served us a very enjoyable meal.  Afterwards he told us more about the Access Bangladesh Foundation, and announced that in spite of the low numbers and our promise to return at a later date, the proceeds of the evening would still go to the Foundation.  CLICK HERE for more pictures.

The meeting discussed the Haiti earthquake situation and agreed to propose funding a Shelterbox, subject to confirmation that we have sufficient funds in hand.

Snowed in! For the first time in many years the Wednesday meeting had to be cancelled due to adverse weather conditions.  This was particularly unfortunate because it was the date for a Special General Meeting.  The SGM has now been deferred until our 20th January meeting.

Picture shows your webmaster's drive, somewhere under the white stuff in front of the lamp post.

Kicking off the New Year on a clear but frosty morning, the 14th Sunninghill Wheelbarrow Race gave competitors a chance to don fancy dress and gallop around the streets of Sunninghill, all in aid of the Ascot Day Centre.  This year , due to the stupendous efforts of the Wheelbarrow Race Committee, we had 16 teams in the race.  The fastest team, with a time of 9 minutes 42 seconds were last year's winners "Taking the St. Michael's", closely followed by "Round Table Runners" (10:46) and "The Swinley" (11:04).  The fastest ladies, with a time of  18 minutes were "Santa Mania", and the prize for best fancy dress went to "Men in Black".  The special prize for raising the most sponsorship money went to "Taking the St. Michael's" who raised £304, narrowly beating "Silver Surfers" at £301.

Afterwards spectators ajourned to La Cloche at the Carpenters to enjoy a hog roast,  the raffle was drawn, and of course the prizes were awarded.  The profit from the event so far is around £4,000 and with the Auction to be held at the Jade Fountain on 28th January, this should be enhanced to £5,000 to £6,000.

CLICK HERE for more pictures