Project Smash is an initiative to both develop the facilities at Bramford Tennis Club and at the same time, in line with the LTA strategy to "open tennis up" to establish Sport Development programmes which make tennis more accessible to the wider community including those from disadvantaged areas and underepresented groups.
Much of the hard work associated with the project has been going on behind the scenes over the last 18 months as a small team of dedicated individuals have worked tirelessly on behalf of the club on business case production, grant funding applications, planning applications and supplier selection exercises.
Despite a number of early setbacks, the team didn't give up and through a lot of extra research, rewriting of business cases, redrafting of funding applications and just sheer persistence, the hard work finally started to pay off and working with partners including Mid Suffolk District Council, Sport England, Bramford Parish Council and a range of other smaller partners, the team managed to raise over £70,000 towards Phase 1 of the project.
Of course, all grant funding comes with conditions and hence we had to be very clear on how the work we were proposing would benefit not only existing members but also the wider community. In our Phase 1 priorities we were able to demonstrate how an innovative floodlighting solution for Court 1 could be achieved that would meet the stringent planning and envionmental requirements, could increase of court capacity over the winter by 33% and how some of this extra capacity could be used to support a series of Sport Development programmes that would attract people who previously hadn't considered tennis to be an option for them.
In technical terms the solution chosen that could meet all the planning requirements is provided through a company called Carbon8 and is based on 8 x Althima LED heads mounted to a series of retractable poles. The poles can be left at unobtrusive fence height for general play or raised to 4.25m for more serious matchplay.
Installation work for the floodlight solution was completed by the end of the Summer 2024 and we have been able to successfully use the new lights over the winter period. We are sure that everyone will agree that they have been a great addition to the facilities at the club.
Even more good news came with the installation of a brand new, purpose built CLUBHUT. We worked with a local company called Portable Space in Stowmarket to design and install the new hut and it's been used extensively over these past months
More details on Project Smash can be found using the link below
https://clubspark.lta.org.uk/BramfordTennisClub/COMMITTEE/GRANTS
Finally, if anyone has skills in business planning, writing grant applications, project management, financial planning etc and wants to get involved in Project Smash Phase 2 please feel free to get in touch via the club email bramfordtennisclub@yahoo.com