Christmas Newsletter 2023

Greetings from our President Elaine Paige OBE

Hello everyone,

Can you believe it’s already time for our last newsletter of 2023? Here at the Dan Maskell Tennis Trust, we have had another busy and successful year, continuing our work to support disabled people to play tennis through our grant aid funding programme. I’m excited to tell you our Big Give Christmas Challenge helped us to add to money raised this year, and coupled with funding from the Wimbledon Foundation, the LTA Tennis Foundation and you, we were able to help a record number of players once again.

At the last Trustees meeting of the year, I was delighted to meet with some of our dedicated Vice Presidents and Trustees in an all too rare face to face catch up! We have so many people working hard to assist the Trust and it was wonderful to share time with some of them. On that note, I must thank all our Vice Presidents, Trustees and Chairman, as well as Gilly and Liz who keep the office ticking over, for all their continued hard work throughout 2023.

We are already looking forward to next year! Our annual Golf Day Fundraiser is being planned so keep the date free and I also hope to share with you some new initiatives very soon. And please don’t forget we always need your help to assist us to support disabled tennis players. We appreciate Christmas can be an expensive time but there are lots of ways to donate to the Trust – for example via easyfundraising when you are doing your final shopping. If you wish to help, please visit our website  where you can the information.

Finally, I would like to wish you all a very Happy Christmas and happy healthy new year.

With love

Elaine's website

Big Give Fundraiser

We recently took part in the ‘Big Give Christmas Challenge’ which was an online fundraising campaign that saw donations made to the Trust doubled. We were so grateful to those supporters who donated and helped us to raise over our target of £4000. We have an amazing set of regular supporters who give to our fundraisers and enable us to continue our work, to whom we are continuously grateful.

Recreational Wheelchair Tennis Doubles Event

Next year we will see some exciting changes to our long running and popular Recreational Wheelchair Tennis Doubles event. With some changes and uncertainty at the Oxstalls Sports Park in Gloucester, we have made the decision to move to a new venue for 2024. We are pleased to announce that the event will take place at The Shrewsbury Club on May 11th and 12th 2024. More details will shortly follow but please mark the date in your diary.

Golf Day 2024

While you have your diaries out, please also mark down our annual Golf Day Fundraiser which is to take place on Thursday 13 June 2024 at the RAC Club in Surrey. The venue proved to be a stunning setting this year and so we are delighted to be returning in 2024. We hope to see many of you there for what is always an enjoyable day.

Grant totals for the year 

2023 has been another busy year for our grant aid funding programme, with an incredibly full set of applications at our final meeting of the year. The Trustees were delighted to be able to promise just over £86,000 in funding to a mix of individuals and groups, covering coaching, court hire, equipment and 27 tennis wheelchairs! We particularly want to thank the LTA Tennis Foundation who provided us with a grant to help us meet this incredible demand.

Wimbledon Foundation 

The Wimbledon Foundation has also helped us to promise so much in funding with their continued support of the Dan Maskell Tennis Trust. We are always so honoured to receive recognition and funding from such a prestigious Foundation.

ITF interview with Geraint Richards

The ITF have recently featured our own Trustee, Geraint Richards, in their UNIQLO interview series. Geraint has a long history in disability tennis and we would like to share with you more about one of our fantastic trustees. You can read the interview here.

Tennis Industry Association Christmas Lunch and the Club Report

As the official charity of the TIA UK, we were delighted to take a table at their annual Christmas Lunch at Queen’s Club.  We were also given the opportunity to raise funds with a small auction conducted by our regular star auctioneer, Marcus Buckland, who was also the host for the TIA UK.

The TIA UK also offered us a profile in their recently published Club Report and we took the opportunity to promote the Big Give Christmas Challenge.

 https://www.tiauk.org

Some special thank-you's

We would like to conclude 2023 by saying a big thank you to everyone involved with the Dan Maskell Tennis Trust. We have incredible support from many individuals who run fundraisers for us or make personal donations to our many campaigns. We also get great support from our partners at the LTA who we work closely with to continue to develop disability tennis in the UK. We also must thank our dedicated Trustees and Vice Presidents who volunteer their time to help govern the Trust, presided over by our loyal and committed Chairman, Sue Wolstenholme and President Elaine Paige, who both put endless drive and passion into promoting the Trust and the work that we achieve.

Dates for 2024 Funding applications

2024 Meeting dates and application deadlines:

Meeting 1 - 4 March 2024 - applications for this meeting will close on 4 February 2024

Meeting 2 - 14 May 2024 - applications for this meeting will close on 14 April 2024

Meeting 3 - 13 August 2024 - applications for this meeting will close on 7 July 2024

Meeting 4 - 25 November 2024 - applications for this meeting will close on 27 October 2024

Christmas office closure

The office will be closed from Thursday 21^st December, reopening on Monday 8^th January 2024.

It only remains for us to wish you all a very Merry Christmas and all the best for 2024.