Fun at the Junior Festival
In delightful October sun, Oxford Hawks Hockey Club hosted the Hockey youth of Oxfordshire with a festival of flowing hockey, fun with excellent organisation.
Hawks Hockey Festival: noun (Hawks: Old English hafoc bird of prey) (Hockey: early 16th century origins unknown) (Festival: from Latin festivus ‘feast’) (pronunciation hork-s hok-e fest-e-val)
- An annual event or celebration occurring in early October after 4 weeks of intensive training
- Always held in glorious sunshine
- Celebrating the best of Oxfordshire u8/u10/u12 hockey with over 500 players
- Essential ingredient is sense of fun with modicum of competition but always medals for all
- An organisational feat only accomplished through the combined efforts of all the club from coaches to junior leaders to parents with too many thank you’s to hand out.
- Feast accomplished by the inimitable Jan Roche and her catering team providing 100’s of burgers and coffees
- An exercise in traffic management and good humour when trying to find car parking spaces within ½ of the club.
- An exercise in time management executed to the second by Tim Spittles
- A project involving several super computers to schedule the event.
The glorious sunshine on Sunday bought out the best in Oxford Hawks in terms of both standard of hockey played and as a celebration about what is best about the club. Thank you again for support from all areas of the club. This has set a great foundation for the season ahead.
The U12’s entered 6 sides and with an emphasis on team-work and an opportunity for the Boys and Girls to integrate as team players.
This proved to be a great success and the results reflected the strength in depth of the U12’s.
It also showed the potential for the rest of the 2013/2014 season.
Russell Warner and Bear Smith would particularly like to thank the respective team managers for their support on the day and the excellent umpires who allowed the players to express themselves.
We would also like to thank the Parents and Guardians who joined us for the event and supported the players with gusto and regular visits to the refreshment facilities!
It goes without saying that thanks also go to the organisation teams who operate like a well oiled machine. Thanks also to Clive Jones for the photos.
As the Festival was in full swing the Vision of the President was available for all to see.
As he took his seat in the stands to watch the Ladies play Buckingham, you could see he had a tear in his eye witnessing the Colts section in action at the outstanding Hawks facility!
Upwards and onwards!!
