B2H: Our Socials (including the Halloween Hat Party)

Back to Hockey is not just about hockey itself but includes that part of a club that makes it flow - it’s a playing platform but a social enterprise as well.

Having been a member of this great club since 1976, (48 years now, and there are other current members who have been here longer - remember Paddy Trip, for one, who we saw on Legends Day) I have never seen it deviate from being the most friendly, accommodating and well run club you could find in English hockey. The social side has been a great contributor to the club’s successes that we see today. Back to Hockey spent last season getting up to full steam with our planning and development, basically for on-pitch activities, and this season we are putting in more effort to develop our social side. To see what we have in store for our group read on...

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Midway through last season we appointed Emma Hawksley to the position of B2H Social Secretary and she organised a number of events as well as galvanising our group to have the largest table at the club’s End of Season Dinner 23/24 and culminating in our own End of Summer League Dinner at the Antelope Pub for twenty-two members where performance prizes were awarded for both the Women’s and the Men’s team.

We held other events throughout the season such as a Halloween Hat Party – with a prize for the best training kit Halloween costume and we even had a little GU10 helper in Angelina to prepare the pumpkin display with lights. Next there was the Easter Bunny Ears Party – with a prize for the best Easter training kit costume, won by Tom Filipinski, presented at the Après Hockey session in the bar afterwards as usual for these events. Following on from this was the Christmas Hat Party – with a prize for the best Santa costume. Our weekend Dutch Trip to HC Rotterdam in April was a great social success. We have to thank our B2H sponsor for providing the novelty head gear and prizes for all these events, on an ongoing basis.

So to the current season. Not only are we planning to repeat the events of last year, we are introducing further support to our social ambitions with a ‘Player Of the Month’ award for our two training groups, with custom printed mugs for the warmer months and embroidered Beanie hats for the colder ones. We hope that the use of these outside the club grounds might spread the conversation about B2H. These awards will be presented at an Après Hockey session in the bar to encourage members to take part in this social gathering. It is always great fun alongside our discussions about hockey tactics. We might have the option of going to the Le Touquet Hockey Festival in France next June, courtesy of contacts Simon Choteau and William Rowlandson, who have played together there for many a year and are now SHC members.

We have plans to hold a repeat of last season’s 150^th Anniversary Tournament but indexed to the 151^st Family Charity Day Tournament where we intend to collect for the club’s chosen charity, supply custom printed charity playing shirts, making it a true family day for all the kids, and maybe include a Junior mini tournament to keep the kids entertained. This would be in the summer term with a BBQ lunch. Grand designs!

Support for the cub’s published social events is also high on our agenda and we have our own graphics designer member who creates our internal flyers to motivate and encourage our members to take part. We have attended the club’s Welcome Drinks Party and are already advertising internally for the club’s Halloween Party.

If you would like to join in with us and be part of our growing B2H family, then contact Roger on backtohockey@surbitonhc.com.

Next week’s article is ‘What’s on Next Part #3’. Look out for it to find out what is on the agenda leading up to Christmas.