President's Report 2013

Saturday, 22 February 2014

2013 was a great year for Australopers.  We had a break from organising any national carnival and were able to focus on local events and getting more newcomers involved.  My thanks to the Executive, Committee members and all those members who volunteered to put on great events throughout the year.  In many respects this report is similar to last year’s with a few notable additions.  This shows how we are continuing to be an effective growing club in what many sporting clubs are finding difficult times. 

HIGHLIGHTS:

• Increasing membership to 151 from 145.
• Coming 4^th Australia Wide in the national clubs competition at Easter
• Expanding the two schools / corporate challenge series to 8 events each
• Winning an Australian Sports Commission Grant to hold a new winter series
• Running that 10 event winter series
• Winning the Premiers Physical Activity Council award for that series
• Holding the Tasmanian Long Distance Orienteering Championships
• Specifying and having built a new equipment trailer 

GENERAL:  Australopers continues to be the largest Orienteering club in Tasmania and remains one of the dominant clubs in Australia.  At the time of this AGM we have 151 members on the books, compared to 63 for EVOC and 54 for WROC. 

We are very highly represented at local, statewide, national and international events.  Some of our achievements in 2013 were as follows:

• Easter 3 Days (Bendigo) – 44 members competing
• Australopers fourth in the club competition only 2 points behind equal second (29 to 31) with local club Melbourne Forest racers winning.
• Australian Championships (ACT) – 36 members competing 

Australopers’ strength lies not only in the competitive side but in its broad base. We have a good volunteer base and a strong commitment to event organisation.   Australopers also continues to place a strong emphasis on family involvement and the social side of orienteering. In general terms Australopers has a great bunch of people as members!

Before going on to list achievements by category I want to give particular recognition to a number of club members:

• Sally Wayte who has worked tirelessly as Secretary throughout the year.
• Renny Duckett for his ongoing contribution as Treasurer despite his inability to compete due to injury.
• Rosie for her great contributions to each edition of O Know.
• Martin Bicevskis who with Elizabeth has put in untold hours organising Sportident and Autodownload timing systems at Australopers events.
• KarlBicevskis for organising results.
• Jan Hardy as our chief representative and Chair of the OT selection panel and more recently as Membership Officer.
• Mike Calder who has organised our event volunteer roster.
• Sue and Tony Mount who are always at events to help out newcomers.
• Ross Kelly for his work on behalf of the club putting our feedback into the development of the annual calendar of events.
• Wendy Andrewartha for letting us continue to use her garage as our equipment store.
• Sally Salier and Jim Laver for maintaining that equipment.
• Wayne Griggs for his coaching efforts.
• The Buckerfield Family who while running a very busy veterinary practice always seem ready to stay behind at events and help pack up and collect controls
• Janet and Renny for their help at events and for providing their house for various Australopers functions.
• Kim and Gary Carroll for their work in maintaining a social program
• Nick Bowden as mapping co-ordinator
• Liz Butler for her work in managing the production and distribution of our club running shirts
• And all those members who helped with event organisation including course planning, control placing, registration, control collection and so on. 

FINANCES: The financial report tabled separately will show we are financially sound and in fact have achieved a significant boost to our bank balance during the year.  This was primarily due to our club running the now expanded schools and corporate challenge orienteering series, as well as the new winter street orienteering series plus bonus grants for the winter series and the Premiers award.

MEMBERSHIP:  Membership at today’s date is 151 up from 145 at the end of 2012 and 127 in 2011.  (This includes some unfinancial members we are awaiting rejoining). These figures may be a bit imperfect but the new membership system will in future ensure more accurate statistics.

EVENTS:  In 2013 Australopers organised a large number of events, both local and statewide.  We have had considerable input to the 2013 calendar.  In particular we continued to attract large fields at the Schools /Corporate Challenge series following a broad based publicity campaign and with the continued inclusion of a Primary School competition.  Particular thanks to Martin Bicevskis and Mike Calder for their work with these series.  The peak number of participants at any one Australopers event was 208 at the week 2 Corporate Challenge /Schools event in February. Australopers ran a successful Tasmanian Long Distance Orienteering Championships event on the Brookstead map at Royal George. 

COACHING:  Coaching events were again held for both experienced and beginner members.

MAPPING:  It was a quiet year mapping wise, this also recognising a general shift in responsibility for mapping from clubs to OT.  We benefited from utilising several new maps during the year in particular the new Battery Point / Salamanca Place map. 

EQUIPMENT: We put our new START and FINISH banners into use during the year and most importantly arranged for the construction of a new equipment trailer completed early in 2014.

CLUB UNIFORM:  We continue to be very visible through our club running tops – particularly at national and international events.

CLUB WEBSITE:  We continue to maintain a club website though this is an area that may need some additional effort in future to ensure it is always up to date.

SOCIAL:  In 2013 we held a number of social functions.

CLUB MEETINGS:  Club meetings were held monthly at members’ homes and were well attended.  We continue to try to streamline the business component of meetings so that there is ample time for social interaction.

2013 AUSTRALOPERS OFFICE BEARERS:  My thanks again to 2013 office bearers.

PRESIDENT: Bert Elson

SECRETARY (& PUBLIC OFFICER): Sally Wayte

TREASURER: Renny Duckett

Other Officers

Event Program: Ross Kelly

Event Planning: Mike Calder

MAPPING: Nick Bowden

EQUIPMENT: Jim Laver

COACHING CO-ORDINATOR: Wayne Griggs

NEWCOMERS CO-ORDINATOR: Jan Hardy

JUNIOR REPRESENTATIVE:  

SELECTORS: Jan Hardy / Judy Davis

INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY SERVICES: Martin Bicevskis

NEWSLETTER: Rosie Rutledge      

THE YEAR AHEAD

2014 will be a big year with Australopers members organising a large proportion of the year’s events.  We are looking forward to two more successful Schools and Corporate Challenge series as well as the second Saturday afternoon series in the winter months.

I wish everyone in Australopers a great year.

Bert Elson

President