TAC Trustees report for 2021 At the beginning of 2021 the trustees were concerned as to whether the club could continue as before. We were worried that athletes would not return after lockdown but we decided not to increase subscriptions for the 2020/2021 year. In fact the renewal of memberships was very pleasing and although we managed to reduce the large waiting lists, we do still have young athletes waiting to become fully integrated into the club. We decided not to hold our successful Twilight meeting which tracks athletes from all over country but as we have to pay expenses, we felt it prudent to delay that meeting until 2022. We reviewed with our treasurer trustee the financial checks in place; the model of the club is very simple; 90% of our income is from subscriptions and we therefore budget on a certain number of members each year. The trustees are confident that this model is the correct one for the club. We do not pay coaches although that means we do rely on the senior members to continue their remarkable coaching throughout the year. The trustees were delighted with the accounts as at the end of the financial year as the excess income was about the same as in the previous year. Trustees are conscious not to have two larger sum in the balance sheet, but we have to ensure that should Tonbridge School decide that we can no longer use their facilities, then monies would have to be spent elsewhere. This is a concern that we have every year but luckily the moment the school are being reasonably helpful. As to the athletics, there was another disrupted year due to successive waves of **COVID-19** , most notably the strict lockdown across the early months of the year. By late March 2021, restrictions were eased to allow for a return to club training, and competition, initially in ‘virtual’ format. The first proper fixture which had good TAC involvement was the ‘PB5km’ at Ardingly, which was organised into a series of staggered start times. Fortunately, regulations soon allowed for a more ‘normal’ race experience, and it felt like a fairly standard summer of **Track and Field** action: To mitigate COVID risk, the **leagues** took the decision to group fairly local clubs in each division. This minimised travel, but did lead to a degree of boredom and predictability of the fixtures, and with no jeopardy of promotion or relegation, team managers struggled to find motivated athletes to fill the teams. There were calls for a more organised approach for team management, and this together with a more strategic approach in team selection, has been a focus for club leaders during the off-season. For the record, our 2021 league summaries were as follows: Outside of the leagues, TAC hosted a good number of **open meetings** . Since the **Kent Championships** could not hold all the events, TAC offered to include the missed events in our open meeting programmes, which was successful (although turn out was not great). Our traditional season-closer August Bank Holiday meeting featured the U13 Pentathlon with record entries, to the point where more careful organisation will be needed next year. Whilst there is clearly mutual benefit in hosting the Pentathlons on behalf of KCAA, there have been calls for an increase in the expenses for hosting, which KCAA agreed to at their AGM in November. A focus now on the **leading individual achievements** of the summer: **Tom Bosworth** made his second Olympics in the 20km walk. He didn’t quite have the performance he wanted in placing 25th. He can look back on his season with a great deal of pride, as he collected another 5000m walk national title. Fellow walker **Guy Thomas** had his best and most consistent year of results as a senior, winning the Manchester International and placing 3rd in the UK championships - two TAC vests on the podium! **James West** did not make it to Tokyo, but he ranked 7th in the UK at 1500m, with his 3rd fastest ever time of 3:35. Westy is really part of a super generation of British middle-distance runners. Our former member **Zak Skinner** did make it to Japan for the Paralympic Games, and came oh-so-close to a medal in his favoured Long Jump event. It is a personal ambition of this Chairman to persuade Zak to rejoin TAC at some point soon… **Lewis Church** had his best season yet. In his 3 Decathlons he placed 2nd in the British Championships, 1st in the England Championships, and, with a new club record (and high jump record, 2.05m) of 7575pts, won the Kent Championships. Ranked 2nd in the UK, he was deservedly awarded the **Kent Male Athlete of the Year** . **Kirsty Anne Ebbage** ranked 8th nationally for the U20 Discus. It is a credit to her loyalty to the club that she prioritised league competition over individual glory this year. Perhaps the most impressive veteran performance was **Ben Reynolds’** completion of the infamous ‘Bob Graham Round’ - 42 peaks of the Lake District in under 24 hours! Read Ben’s report here: https://www.tacdistancerunners.com/uploads/4/3/0/0/4300571/ben_r eynolds_bob_graham_round_1.pdf. A big ‘thank you’ to **Dawn Hookway** and **Helen Cohen** who stepped down from coaching at the end of the summer. Between them they have committed several decades of work for our younger athletes. Also worth mentioning is our exciting **‘Project 2:09** ’, an attempt to help some of our promising female distance runners to reduce their 800m times to national class. 2022 marks the club’s **75th Anniversary** . One of the best initiatives of the year was ‘ **TAC takeaways’** , an idea of **Mark Hookway’s** , to get older athletes to provide advice to younger ones: https://www.tacdistancerunners.com/tac-takeaways-mentoringtips.html Tim Fagg TAC Trustees chair 18 { OL (SL