Cheshire County Athletic Association

Chairman’s report for 2004.

The County Secretary (Brian warren) has summarised the activities of the County AA in his annual report.  I wish to expand on some additional items.

The Future.
Currently proposals for a radical restructuring of athletics in England are being communicated via a series of open meetings by Jack Buckner and his team who are charged with implementation of the Foster Report which was published in May 2004.  A meeting was held at Wigan on 2 February and it was disappointing to note that there only seemed to be representatives from 3 Cheshire clubs at that meeting.  Perhaps the rest have no suggestions to make and will just accept what happens.
If the proposals are accepted then Cheshire clubs will become part of the North West Region in which the role of the Cheshire County AA is not yet clear.  The role of a Northern body appears to be potentially limited to provision of “supra-regional” championships.  The plans are for the new structure to operate from April 2006.
Cheshire County AA have in effect been involved in “Regional” competition through the North west Counties road relays.  These were organised for the second time at Birchwood through the enthusiastic efforts of Julian Spencer and his club colleagues from Spectrum Striders.  Maybe the future will see Regional competitions in other athletic disciplines.  One item not currently in the remit of the New England working group is competition which in effect is the end product of all of our involvement, including athletes,  in whatever role.

The present.
I endorse the Secretary’s welcoming comments to new committee members - we would still like to see more new faces at our committee meetings.  The future has to be in the hands of the younger persons and it is very pleasing to see a former Cheshire Schools and County athlete - Julie Hicken (Banner) - return to help with a number of aspects of committee work and team management.
After progress in 2003 in working with the Cheshire Schools AA, 2004 was disappointing.  A Health & Safety Course at Warrington arranged principally for teachers in that area attracted none from the education sector (in contrast to the previous one at Macclesfield).  Fortunately club officials and coaches provided a good audience.  Possibly the development of the Schools Sports College concept and the creation of partnerships with Local Authority Sports Development and local athletic clubs will be the way forward to work together.
Adrian Thiemicke has again worked hard in developing the Cheshire Road Running GP with more races in 2004 providing a very close finish in the final event for the womens side although the male team winners had been decided well before the final race.  The signs look encouraging for 2005 after 2 events have now been held.
The Newsletter has received some favourable comments.  I have indicated a wish for someone else to take over producing the newsletter.  One response has been to find 3 or 4 people each of whom takes on say a 3 month stint at editing it.  If other come forward to offer to do a period of editing , then the proposer is willing to do his period as editor.  Communication is vital.  We still hear too many comments of “we didn’t know”.  While we have concentrated in recent years on electronic communication, we accept that not all have access to this method (or wish to!).  But we do ask those that receive the information to pass onto those who do not have direct access.

I wish to thanks all committee members and Officers of the Association for their contributions over the past 12 months.  I sense at times that some think the County AA is separate from the clubs - most of the Officers are also heavily involved with their clubs.  So the County AA IS very much the Cheshire Clubs.
We are also indebted to the International Fun and Team Athletics Association, based in Frodsham, for their considerable assistance with “office facilities”.

John Driscoll (Chairman)
8 February 2005