CHAIRMANS REPORT

May I wish all our tug of war people a very happy and prosperous new year for 2010.

We had our first competition of this New Year at Rob-Lew in Ballygawley on Saturday 2nd January. A very successful competition hosted by Country Club. Eight clubs from North and South demonstrated some exceptional competition over three weight classes. Our indoor clubs are very busy preparing for the U K`s in Wales in mid-January and the World Championships held in Italy in mid-February. We have two 600 kilo teams representing us in Wales, Richhill as N Ireland A and Country Club as N Ireland B. At 680k we have Finvoy with a little help from Country Club and Ballyhagan with some Richhill and Country club pullers helping out to give us two teams at this weight class. Although Scotland and England are very worthy opposition I would be very hopeful of some silverware from Wales.

The Worlds are always tough and usually full of surprises but we have Richhill at 560k and Country Club at 600k and a select team at 640k and we will strive to compete to the best of our ability and that may result in silverware.

The outdoor season is not far away and now clubs are thinking of their physical fitness programes to prepare for the new challenge. With club support we will kick off some training pulls in April. We have a lot to look forward to this season with some new teams in the mid-Ulster and County Down areas, and we are hosting the U K`s in County Fermanagh in August. We hope to run a judges and coaching course early in the spring and of course the outdoor season finishes with the World Championships in South Africa mid-September.

Again this year we will attempt to encourage our ladies to compete and possibly get involved in the underage competitions. A fixture meeting will take place shortly after the Worlds in Italy.

Patrick Kernan