HONDA VOLUNTEER AWARDS EVENING
Surrey celebrated the Annual Honda Volunteer Recognition Programme with a fabulous evening at Cobham RFC. 173 volunteers were nominated from right around the county, representing 51 clubs - which is an amazing achievement! Nominations were into three categories; Unsung Hero, Game for All and Challenging Spirit. Once we get all those nominations in, a committee of Surrey CB members reads through them all, then selects the top 6 or 7 which are submitted to the RFU/Honda.
The RFU/Honda then whittle that number down to 1 or 2 per county who are the Finalists. They join other finalists from other counties around the county, and are invited - along with a partner - to an overnight stay at the Marriott Hotel in Twickenham, a lunchtime event, a behind-the-scenes tour of the stadium and a black tie dinner. At the dinner Honda announces the overall winner for the year for each category.
At the Cobham event all nominees got a framed award from the RFU/Honda, an England travel mug and a smart England notepad. Our top six also got a RFU/Honda backpack and the ultimate two finalists got two bottles of champagne each to celebrate!
Our top 6 nominations this year were: Angus Phillipson (Battersea Ironsides), Jean-Charles De Schino (Croydon RFC), Justin Latta, Mel Reilly, Matthew Hearsum (Old Emanuel), David McGuigan, Iain Woodhams, Fhamid Malik, Mike Smith, Jason Perfitt (Old Reigatians), Amy & Kris Atkinson (Old Whitgiftian) and Verne Sylvester (Streatham-Croydon).
Congratulations to the two chosen by the RFU/Honda, who were the groups from Old Reigatians and Old Emanuel!