Flitwick & Ampthill Tennis Club are region's LTA Club of the Year

Flitwick & Ampthill Lawn Tennis Club have been selected as the Regional Winner of the Club of the Year for the Central & East region in the 2021 LTA Tennis Awards.

Over 500 clubs were considered and now as a regional winner they will be put forward to the LTA Tennis Awards 2021 National Ceremony on June 24, which due to Covid-19 restrictions will be a virtual.

Chair Barbara Mabbitt said: “This is a huge honour for the club and it makes me feel incredibly proud of everything we have achieved and strive to achieve in order to ensure our club continues to improve and grow.”

Marketing manager Stephen Rolt explained: “2020 has been an extraordinary year for the club. At this time last year we had a membership of 226 across juniors and adults, and we had eight courts, four of which were carpet and floodlit, three tarmac and an acrylic.

Now, a year later, and our membership is 288 and of our eight courts, seven are now carpet, six of them floodlit, with one arylic.

“This is a fantastic development of our facilities in one year and all our members are enjoying tennis with much more quality court availability, and over longer periods of the day because of the additional playing options.”

He said with the club’s reception open six days a week there is always a warm welcome and two new membership categories enable parents just to play with their children or adults to have a 30-day trial.

“The next stage of our club development is to provide an indoor playing facility to enable our members to play tennis regardless of the weather conditions,” he added.

“Planning permission for our proposed construction is currently being sought and if successful the indoor courts will be be made available to non members.”