End of Season Dinner

[ValleyMan]

At just after 7.00pm, the great and the good began to roll up the red carpet into Martin James’ Health Club fighting their way through the assembled paparazzi (Mat brought his camera) to take their places at the annual Dynamos End of Season Dinner and Award Ceremony.

The international reach of the Dynamos was evident from the guests that had flown in from as far a field as Whitland, Tenby and Clunderwen.

After a few welcoming drinks the tension mounted as 29 took their seats for the main event. Seating plans had been carefully planned along strictly ethnic lines (this was to avoid the expense of translators, although Kim and I being bilingual joined the Tenby table.

After what seemed like a hundred starters, the natural pause in the flow of food heralded the start of the proceedings with a welcoming address and a review of the year from Chairman Rees. It has been a good year for the Club with membership now up to 40 with generally well supported Wednesday and Sunday rides. Leighton was thanked for setting up the web site and forum which has now become the organ of the Club. Getting slightly off-piste, an impromptu award was presented to the Secretary (yes me) for something to do with poor timekeeping, being crap at hills and generally being a liability on a bike (I think this perhaps stemmed from my attempt at the Merlin Ride this year.

It was then my honour to bestow the annual awards on those in the Club who had excelled in various categories throughout the year. A full transcript of the awards ceremony is available upon request but is summarised below:

• The 2011 Fashion Award sponsored by Vogue Magazine awarded to Mat Greener for an outstanding contribution to the promotion of the Club through the innovative use of colour.

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• The 2011 Most Improved Rider Award sponsored by Weight Watchers awarded to Huw Morgan for demonstrating that dedication and one less pie pays off in the end.

  The 2011 Consistency Award sponsored by Senna Laxative Tablets awarded to Roger Allan for excelling at coming second.

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• The 2011 Cycling Proficiency Award sponsored by Specsavers awarded to Kim Griffiths for giving us all a jolly good laugh.

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• The 2011 Leadership Award sponsored by Garmin awarded to Andrew Rees for boldly going where no man has gone before (even if he didn’t mean to).

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• The 2011 Overseas Sports Personality of the Year sponsored by lastminute.com awarded to Carlton ‘Ironman™’ Coates In recognition of his inspiring demolition of the Ironman Wales course.

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• The 2011 Contribution to the Club in a Supporting Role Award sponsored by Sinclair Mercedes Bodyshop, Cardiff awarded to Kerrie Johns for displaying consummate driving skills whilst in charge of a small commercial vehicle.

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With the awards concluded, the excellent food continued to arrive washed down by more than a couple of bottles of wine. The socialising continued late into the evening concluding with the WAGs downing a couple of rounds of flaming Zamboukas, which was all very amusing to onlookers, less so to those that had to settle the bar bill.

Many thanks to Matt our Social Secretary for arranging the evening, to Martin and his staff for the excellent food and hospitality and to everyone who came along to support the event.

Finally congratulations to all our award winners who set the bar so high and to those who were disappointed not to have quite made the grade, better luck next year!

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