Annual General Meeting March 2025

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Thames Valley Harriers

Annual General Meeting

17 March 2025: 18.30pm

Linford Christie Stadium Clubhouse

Minutes

Andrea Broughton chaired the meeting.

1 Apologies

Apologies were received from Sarah Garrett and Gary Telfer from the Committee.

2 Minutes of previous AGM

The 2024 minutes were approved.

3 Chairman’s Remarks

Overall, 2024 had been another busy year, very eventful and above all very successful for the Club. 

Andrea congratulated our club members who had competed internationally and who had really done themselves and their country proud. She singled out our Olympians, who competed in Paris in 2024: Molly Caudery (pole vault), Bianca Williams (4 x 100m relay silver medallist) and Muhammad Kounta, representing France in the 4 x 400m relay. 

Andrea also highlighted our inspirational combined National Athletics League team, which triumphed again to win the national title for the fourth year running in 2024. This is a tremendous achievement and a credit to the club even if it went to the wire this year. Andrea thanked the supreme dedication of the whole team, putting so much hard work in training and talent into practice! She also thanked those who have supported the team in terms of organisation and general support and particularly Manuel and Phil, who worked tirelessly to ensure that the organisation of the team went smoothly.

As NAL champions, TVH was also invited to send a team to the Manchester International meet at the end of August, where our athletics performed outstandingly. 

TVH were also Southern Athletics League champions in 2024, securing the top spot after the final SAL meet in Winchester in August.

We also hosted an open meeting in June, which was a great success, and we were honoured to welcome Olympian discus thrower and TVH member Jade Lally. Home events always involved an army of volunteer officials, organisers and helpers behind the scenes – Andrea thanked them all.

Other significant achievements of 2024 included the TVH Senior Women becoming the National 6-Stage Road Relays Champions (England and UK Championships) in April. This was the first time in TVH’s history that the women have achieved this title.

Andrea also mentioned our many young athletes who competed in English Schools, Youth Development and Middlesex Young athletes leagues. So much hard work in training, massive achievements, huge improvements and personal bests across the board.

Andrea reported that TVH’s strong cooperation with the Czech Centre continued during 2024 – TVH co-hosted the Emil Zatopek Run, on Wormwood Scrubs for the third time, in September. The weather wasn’t kind that day, but at least the rain held off during the race events. The aim of the run is to raise money to support young athletes in our community to get into and stay in our sport. The 2024 event raised over £1,200 and the first five beneficiaries of the fund have been confirmed. Congratulations to all five young athletes, who will each benefit from financial support for athletics-related expenses.

Andrea welcomed the many new members who have joined this year – including many from Imperial athletics under our ongoing arrangement with Imperial – who regularly train in our training groups and compete in Club events. 

Andrea thanked everyone who makes all this possible: the many coaches, team managers, officials, volunteers and supporters, parents, helpers, Lumar, who is our gym supervisor, Marion and Dave Huffer and Barrie, who look after the clubhouse bar, our committee, the communicators, event organisers, and caterers. I’d also like to mention the work carried out by Jacques, Alex Mundell and her team in updating the Club’s website, the newsletter communications, our regular match reports, the Instagram posts, and other communications.

Andrea also thanked TVH’s donors, many of whom give very substantial sums to the club, and who generally like to remain anonymous. We’re very grateful to them as their support is vital to the continuing running of the club.

She thanked the committee for all their hard work and dedication over the past year, including Gary’s continuing efforts to train and develop coaches, and the new committee members Niki and Alice, who has taken over from Richard Charney as treasurer and will be giving her financial report a bit later. Kat will be stepping down as administrator but will remain in touch and we wish her well. We always welcome more people who want to get involved to support the committee.

Andrea also extended good wishes to John Smith, who is currently unwell and who has been an extremely loyal and committed supporter of TVH for many years. She also wished Barrie Saunders a speedy recovery from his hip replacement surgery. Barrie still contributes massively to the club and Andrea noted that his achievements were recognised at the England Athletics awards in 2023 for services to athletics and running.

Andrea also paid tribute to Alistair Hay, who sadly passed away last year. He was a member of TVH from 2005 to 2013 and we were very lucky to have him. He was a much-loved regular on the TVH Southern and National Road Relay team during his time with the club.

Finally, our open meeting in June also doubled as the opening event for our new clubhouse windows, which have made a significant difference to the look and feel of the clubhouse – thanks very much to Marion Brydson, who coordinated this. More widely, and as you will no doubt have noticed, Hammersmith and Fulham Council have carried out demolition work on the changing rooms here at the stadium and have replaced these with portacabins. We are now awaiting final sign-off for the track refurbishment, but expect it to complete during the work by Kensington Dragons up until the end of July. 

4 Safeguarding

Kevin and Sam introduced themselves as welfare officers for the Club. Welfare issues could arise at any level, between young or old people, between athletes, coaches or volunteers. Our safeguarding codes which are on our website are there to protect not just young or vulnerable people but also others such as coaches. Kevin and/or Sam had got involved in 3 or 4 issues over the past 2 years and were always happy to help. A new welfare@ email address was being set up which could be used to contact one or both of them, as people wanted. Kevin and Sam had the support of the Committee but also had the ability to get assistance externally if that was required.

5 2024 Competition Review: Manuel Da Silva

Manuel seconded what the Chairman had said and gave his own review of the year. There had been a lot of our success and we seemed to be going through a golden era where we were winning a lot of things. Other clubs asked us how we did it. As a result we were attracting more top athletes who were great at turning out for us on occasion.  

Manuel said he also recognized how hard it was to get teams together because everyone, athletes, parents etc, had conflicting demands on their time.

That said, more people had competed at English Schools, and more medals won, than ever before, which bode well for the future. Cross country was doing well and winning the national women’s road relays last year was an exceptional performance. It was the first time we had competed at Manchester against international teams and we had come away with medals. 

The club was thriving and there was lots going on but there was an ongoing need for parents, officials, and volunteers to get involved to help it happen, and for people to share their ideas on how things could be improved.

Manuel was discussing with Gary an awards date: there were now two years of awards to present (2023 and 2024) and Niki and he would be organizing a presentation for both.

6 Financial statements

Alice introduced herself as the new Treasurer and thanked Nick for his work on the audit. She summarized the key points in the figures as:

  • There had been a 30% reduction in income, mainly because of a fall in donations.
  • Expenses were also down, mainly because of a reduction in NAL expenses.
  • The deficit of £12k had been filled by donations from previous years.
  • There had been capex of £15k on the windows, which would be depreciated over 20 years.

There was then a longer discussion on fundraising and issues related to the kit:

  • It was noted England Athletics might be a good source of funding, including for the pole vault.
  • The PA system would probably be looked at when the stand came down.
  • The new track should be good enough for NAL competitions.
  • The new track was expected to be an overlay on the foundations work which had happened 20 years ago.
  • The two main options on the kit were Kukri and adidas.
  • It was expected there would be a couple of calls and then a decision made over the next couple of weeks.
  • 31 May was the date of the first NAL match but kit was required for all competing athletes.
  • All suppliers seemed to be able to offer an online shop and rebates.
  • There was also old Ronhill stock around if necessary.
  • All in ones had been asked for by some members.
  • It was suggested the Club should try to get sponsorship for its kit or for the NAL team.
  • It was thought having a new track and new kit plus the ongoing NAL success would be a good moment to raise money from people.
  • Money was also needed for the ongoing annual deficit and it would be important to raise before the current reserves ran out.
  • The Club was asking for donations alongside the annual renewal process.

The meeting approved the accounts and thanked Richard for his work over the years as Treasurer.

7 Amendment to the rules

The meeting approved a change in the Rules so that up to 6 (not 3) people could be on the Committee without a nominated role: currently they were Marion, Tim and Niki.

8 Elections

The meeting approved the election or re-election of:

Andrea as Chair

Alice as Treasurer

Sarah as Membership Manager

Manuel as Head of Competition

Gary as Head of Coaching

Jacques as Communications Manager

William as Secretary and Club Administrator

Marion, Tim, and Niki as general members of the Committee

Nick Kirk had stepped down as auditor and the Committee was empowered to appoint someone else for the 2025 accounts.

Andrea also noted that this will be the final year of her 3-year term as Chair and that if anyone is interested in stepping into the role in a year’s time, they are welcome to get in touch with her. 

Lisa da Silva and Molly Caudery were elected as life members. Manuel would liaise with Andrea about holding an event to present something to them.

9 AOB

A more user friendly Club fixtures list would be added to the website by the end of the week.

Paul asked Manuel to look at what pole vault competitions there would be for U15/17 pole vaulters. It was noted there was still a need for more team managers at that level. The Committee would look at this when it met on Monday.

It was noted the Club was still overly reliant on a few individuals to open the Clubhouse and bar area up in the evenings. It was agreed the Club was not presenting itself in the best way as a result. The Committee had asked for more volunteers to do this and would consider again.