Christmas 2024 - Newsletter

Greetings from our President Elaine Paige OBE

Hello everyone! 

Well another year has flown by, and once again the Trust has achieved so much. I’m always touched reading the case studies about those we have helped and how much of an impact we had on their lives. I loved watching the videos of young Alex performing the coin toss at Wimbledon and was especially proud to be able to announce it during my Radio Wimbledon interview.

I recently attended our final Trustees meeting of the year and was honoured to be re-elected as President for a further 3 years. Being involved in such worthy charities as I am brings me a lot of joy, and I’m glad that I can continue to do this with a charity that supports one of my great passions; tennis.

The Trust has lost some dear supporters this year, however I’m very pleased to announce that we are joining forces with Middlesex Tennis to award a special ‘John James Disability Inclusion Award’ for the next 3 years which will consist of special grant funding and also that we are running our wheelchair event next year in memory of Keith Thom. The Trust couldn’t function without support from so many wonderful people and it is so devastating when we lose one of our close friends.

I’ve been very interested to see the rise of ‘para-standing tennis’ which has been cast into the spotlight by comedian Adam Hills and also to see how Pickleball and Padel are becoming inclusive for players with disabilities. I sense there could be quite exciting times coming up, with more opportunities for players with a large range of disabilities.

I’m already looking forward to next year’s Golf Day and I hope that you pop the date in your diary now, as I have done, as it is slightly later in June than in previous years.

To sign off for the year I would like to wish you all a wonderful festive period, and thank you for your continued support of the Trust.

With love,

Elaine's website

Our 2024 highlight

We have had another brilliant year at the Trust, pledging over £86,000 in funding grants. Our highlight was being asked by the Wimbledon Foundation to be part of the official coin toss for the Men’s Wheelchair Singles Final. We were so honoured to take part, and our chosen grantee, Alex Batt, encapsulated exactly who our charity is set up to support – a young man with determination who said on the video ‘I’ve come to realise that you indeed can do anything when you are in a wheelchair’. It was an amazing experience for Alex and also for the Trust, we really got our story out there thanks to the reach of the Wimbledon Foundation. If you would like to see the ‘behind the scenes’ video of Alex talking about the day, you can watch it here. 

If Alex’s story touched you, please donate to help others like him through links on our website. 

Golf Day 

Next year will be the 25^th Anniversary of our Golf Day! The Golf Day is a crucial fundraiser for the Trust, contributing a significant amount towards our grant aid funding programme. If you have any raffle or special auction prizes that you could donate we would love to hear from you. You can email Gilly. And make sure you save the date – Thursday 26 June 2025 at the RAC Epsom.

2025 Wheelchair offer and application closing dates

In 2025 we will be making a change to our wheelchair offer for those chairs offered through our grant aid funding. We are excited to announce that we will be adding the RGK All Star A2 tennis wheelchair to our offer. Also, we will now have three official wheelchair suppliers; ROMA Sport, EPC and RGK. Our successful grantees will be able to choose which supplier they would like to order through, dependant on which chair they apply for. The closing dates for each round of applications will be:

2 February 2025

13 April 2025

20 July 2025

26 October 2025

A tribute to Keith Thom 

The Dan Maskell Tennis Trust was deeply saddened by the news of our Ambassador Keith Thom passing away in hospital on the 21 October. Keith touched so many in the world of wheelchair tennis, not only with his success on court, but his many friendships, formed so quickly with such a genuine man.

Keith had a long history with our Trust and was introduced to Dan Maskell himself when he was playing at his local club in the 1980s! But Keith’s first real introduction to the Dan Maskell Tennis Trust began in 2007 when he was diagnosed as having bone cancer. During his treatment and after losing his leg, Robin (Dan’s daughter) came to visit Keith with loads of information about wheelchair tennis. Keith soon started playing wheelchair tennis and fell in love with the game. He made many friends through wheelchair tennis and even trained as a coach. He also spent many years raising money at various events at his club for the Trust.

We are happy to announce that we will be running our Recreational Doubles Wheelchair Tennis event in 2025 in memory of Keith. It will be held at Oxstalls Sports Park, Gloucester on May 10 and 11 2025.

Wimbledon (the All England Lawn Tennis Club AELTC)

Over the past 8 years, the AELTC has been developing The All England Club Community Tennis Centre, in Raynes Park.  The Centre now has 6 indoor acrylic courts, 3 outdoor acrylic courts, 16 Championships grass courts, parking, and a two-storey clubhouse which includes changing facilities, a studio and café. The Centre will be an official practice venue for players of The Championships, but on a year-round basis coaching and free play is available to all from beginner to aspiring professional. 

Members of the Dan Maskell Trust recently attended the Open Court Afternoon at the Community Tennis Centre on Saturday 12 October.  This was an inclusive and integrated afternoon of coaching, activities, and information on accessing tennis opportunities for all.  There was wheelchair tennis sessions, para-standing tennis coaching, deaf and VI tennis sessions. We are also delighted to learn that a new weekly wheelchair tennis session is being held at the centre, on a pay and play basis. This session takes place on Tuesdays from 12noon – 2pm. If you would like more information please email Liz. 

We must give another thank you to the Wimbledon Foundation for continuing to support us with a generous funding donation in 2024.

Also did you know there is a new wheelchair exhibit as part of the Wimbledon Museum’s new Grass Roots to Global Game theme recently opened? Our Executive Director Gilly was delighted to attend the opening and we loved seeing tennis wheelchairs on display, raising awareness of our great sport.

President re-election

We are delighted to report that Elaine Paige was re-elected as our President for a further 3-year term and in 2025 will be celebrating 15 years as our President! What a remarkable contribution of time from Elaine. We know that joining Elaine at our annual golf day is a massive highlight for many of our supporters and really appreciate all the effort that she puts in.

Spotlight on our new Trustee

We wanted to introduce you to our newest Trustee, Steph Trill. Steph has a strong tennis background - until 18 years of age she was a very keen player and in fact the photo to the right shows her receiving the British Prep Schools Champion trophy from Dan Maskell himself! When she was just 16, Steph started her coaching qualifications and progressed through to be a level 4 performance coach. She worked as a full time tennis coach in Clubs, Parks and David Lloyd centres.

In 1998 she started to coach wheelchair tennis player Kimberley Dell and coached her leading up to the Sydney Olympics. In 2006 Steph became the National Quad Wheelchair Coach, taking the team to the Beijing Olympics and winning World Team Cup. In 2009 Steph was awarded Wheelpower Coach of the year, amongst other awards. Steph then took some time out, but just before lock down took up Padel. She is now hooked and played in the GB Seniors team that travelled to Las Vegas! She has been the lead on the LTA Developing Tennis Advisory Group - Padel for 2 years. Steph is also the LTA councillor for Sussex and sits on Tennis Sussex Management Group. We are delighted to have Steph join us in her role of Trustee at the Dan Maskell Tennis Trust.

Learn more about our work

We would like to encourage you to learn more about how our funding impacts on the lives of our grantees. We have a case study section on our website, which has some really interesting stories of how different players got involved in tennis and how much of an impact it has had on their wellbeing. We also update our facebook page weekly with stories and photos of programmes taking place around the UK thanks to funding we have pledged. Please do follow us on facebook, we are certain you will love seeing our funding in action!