And so the work continues ...

So the summer season ends for ERSA in October time, usually with the Tri Regions being the final race of the season. It’s good to get some downtime after that race to re-charge the batteries after a very hectic season. Traditionally not much happens visibly in ERSA during the Winter months because so many people go in different directions. It is however a good time to catch up on many things and prepare for the following season.

2011 was an excellent year for ERSA numbers at all the races were up on the previous year, bucking the trend of the national races. But more importantly the feedback from parents and racers alike was that they had a good time and enjoyed themselves. Something we really have to remember going into 2012 and it has been at the forefront of thinking over the Winter.

So far this Winter season has proved incredibly busy behind the scenes are ERSA with several of us working on different areas. One of the key developments for 2012 will be the introduction of the ERSA Schools Championships in April. It’s take a while to get there but we will be definitely running the races this coming season. In fact it is the first one of the season! There is a lot of work going on to make sure we have notified the schools soon enough and so far the response has been amazing much better than I had expected. Still plenty of work to do there with the organisation but we are getting there and the entry forms will be heading out very shortly. Our sponsors will be involved in the race especially Team Evolution and I was hoping that we could also get some more funding support from SSE, but unfortunately it seems very unlikely to happen. I know funds are scarce in the sport but I do question where they are going when we are supposed to be developing grass roots skiing. I know of another region who did very well and successfully gained some funding but so far not much luck on that front. It’s an odd position to be in really when there is so much talk about grass roots snowsports and it’s development yet getting money for the most basic is not easy, maybe I am missing something! I also tough that the Alpine committee who holds the budget for English Alpine skiing was supposed to help develop grass roots skiing but see nothing of it.

Elsewhere we have continued our partnership with Team Evolution for 2012. It worked incredibly well in 2011 and the feedback from everyone was very positive and the feedback from TE was equally good. It means we have the chance to further development the relationship in 2012 and improve what we offer everyone. There are now so many choices out there for parents and racers to consider for their Winter training and it is good news with so many good coaches about now. 2012 will also see Bartletts involved in supporting the region working closely with TE, thanks to Sally and Terry for their support. Neil at Racer Ready has continued to provide his support with many photographs which we have been able to publish on the website so much appreciated there. Hopefully with a bit of luck we will have one other major player onboard before the start of the season but that is still in progress.

One area that has been disappointing and very frustrating is the communications channels with some parts of SSE. It is definitely something to improve on for 2012,. I will continue to scratch my head on that one.  What has been a welcome introduction are the Sports Development Officers which has provided us with a better coverage of snowsports.

Not sure where all the time goes though, I had loads of good intentions over the Christmas period to get lots of updates done to the website with but all the other work taking place time shot by and I didn’t get started! So last Saturday night I finally got around to making some updates to the online race entry system. The online system was introduced last year, I cut it fine to get it ready as didn’t start it until late and then had lots to get done, but it is there and it was amazingly successful. Most people now use it to enter races, there were very few problems and it certainly helped to improve the races. The odd snags which did come up were very easily fixed. One of the main aims of the system when I wrote it was to write something that could be maintained by someone else in the future, used a generic solution and was easy to read and that was certainly achieved. I have quite a few things I want to do to the site to improve it based on the feedback from the users and the critical ones will be there for the start of the season. There are some nice to haves on the list and I will be aiming to get those in during the season, especially around the results area.

Other thins coming this year are CWO course, same number of races as last year, changes to the format of indoor races and some of the outdoor races, introduction of the Team Evolution Pro-Dual Slalom

So still lots of things to do and frustrations to manage but hopefully we will get there I just wish I had more time! Anyway enough rambling for now just makes a change to post something up here about progress to date.

Oh and just to cover things of these are my personal thoughts only!!