FEBRUARY 2010

I hope our members’ skiing has been as enjoyable as mine. I cannot remember the last time snow conditions were so perfect – and my skiing feels as if it has taken a great leap forward – not bad considering I have just had my 70th birthday!

A lot has been going on in the club. We raised about £30,000 last year by various means – mostly at the City event we held in October, kindly hosted by Smith & Williamson. This year’s British Schoolgirls’ Races in Flaine were fully subscribed and many people told me they thought they were the best we’ve ever run. The children, their teachers and parents were such a lovely, happy lot and made the organisers’ lives so easy and enjoyable. Well done to Anne Taylor and her team.

Due to the insolvency of the SSGB, our Olympic athletes are having a very worrying time and we decided that we could at least help Chemmy as a member of the Club. We gave her £10,000 so that she could concentrate on her racing, rather than her finances. We wish her all the very best of luck and will be watching her every move.

Yesterday I attended Myles Robinson’s memorial service at Charterhouse. He was the son of Sarah, whom many of you know, and who organised our races in Flaine for many years. He died in a tragic accident in Wengen over Christmas aged just 23 and we send our sympathy and condolences to her, Michael and Cara.

Members will soon be receiving our spring mailing and I hope that some of you will be able to join us on our walk in the autumn.

Ski heil. Jill

7th February 2010.

OCTOBER 2009

We can now see the ski-ing season fast approaching;   however, over the summer the Club has not been idle.   We have walked in the Chilterns, not walked in Scotland through lack of support, motored down the Thames, held meetings, awarded in the region of £15,000 to our racers, enrolled new members and the climax was our fund-raising event on the 8th October at which we raised tens of thousands for our lady racers.  This was sponsored by Smith & Williamson to whom we are extremely grateful.  It was a happy and friendly evening.  I would also like to thank all those who took stands and gave wonderful prizes.

I hope our members have got the AGM and dinner firmly in their diaries because it would be nice to see a lot of you there.   As to ski-ing itself, I now firmly wear a helmet so that any brains that have not already been knocked out in falls, may have a chance of surviving.  I have also kept up my exercise regime at the gym over the summer and, for my sins, have taken up spinning (not the making-cloth type, I hasten to add), the one done in the gym on a static bicycle.

Ski heil to you all and I hope to meet up with a lot of you over the winter.

Jill Coke
11th October, 2009.