Awards for All grant for Woking Blackhawks

Woking Blackhawks Basketball Club has been given a further boost by the award of £3,900 from Lottery Funded Awards for All.  The grant will be used to help consolidate the recent achievements of the Club through the purchase of kit and equipment, development of the ladies and girls squads and additional funding for development of coaches and officials.

Blackhawks Head Coach Costas Rakitzis has already taken the opportunity to attend the National Coaching Conference at Northampton where Joan Plaza, Real Madrid Head Coach and ULEB 2007 Cup winner, was the keynote clinician.

The funding will provide tangible support for the Club following the attainment of Sport England Clubmark, England Basketball 3 star accreditation, and Active Surrey Gold Club Award over the last year. The intention is to develop the Club into a sustainable organisation providing opportunities for playing basketball at all levels and ages.

“I cannot wait to see our players in their new kit” said Martin Marshall, Club Secretary, who was instrumental in submitting the bid, “The new design is modern, looks good on the court and we hope that the uniformity of the design will promote the Club’s identity for years to come.”

Awards for All England is supported by the Arts Council England, the Big Lottery Fund, the Heritage Lottery Fund and Sport England. The fund awards grants of between £300 and £10,000 for people to take part in art, sport, heritage and community activities, and projects that promote education, the environment and health in the local community.

Club Chairman Keith Farmer commenting on the award said “Through Clubmark and the other awards we have attained this year we have proved ourselves to be a quality club with a sound administration and playing programme. This award gives a much needed boost to our finances and allows us to develop and retain high calibre Coaches and players in order to build for the future.”

Training sessions are continuing over the summer in preparation for the rapidly approaching new season starting in September. The Club will be running 9 squads competing in local leagues and anybody interested in playing basketball can get information off the website at www.wokingblackhawks.co.uk.