We had our first team get-together this year in the early part of June in the charming town of Ludlow. Having previously had offices in Silverstone and Wolston (near Coventry) we closed the offices in the first half of 2020 and decided to go remote, although we do keep Silverstone on as a virtual office. Now our team is located in a range of places, from Edinburgh to Frome.
We love remote working and all the advantages it brings but there is nothing quite like being together in-person and when we closed the offices it was always part of the plan when COVID rules allowed, to get-together and so we did!
After some initial parking troubles, hem-hem sorry popular market town location, we were all in-situ in the pub, ready for our lunch, pint and our team meeting. Before we knew it, it was time to hotfoot it down to tennis for our WimbleLab inspired take on Wimbledon. Less prestigious, more willing and able. Rich was a very patient tennis coach and when Tom said “We can’t be as bad as the kids you teach?” Rich replied with a winning “You’d be surprised actually”.
So good at tennis
Tennis highlights included Alanah’s 95% serve accuracy, are you sure you haven’t played before Alanah? SJ’s lamping it with a ‘sorry I’ve been lifting weights’. Tom’s looking pretty pro and when asked about it ‘No I don’t play tennis...but I’ve been playing a lot of squash this year’ err Tom pretty sure that’s a contributing factor and would probably count as previous experience. Emily’s reverse return (yep where your back is to the ball but you still get it back over and in court!). Raman’s cheerleader approach to Tom ‘you’ve got this Tom’ when playing doubles, exemplary team spirit with results boosting effects. Chris’ death or glory approach to 60mph serves in court or just completely out of court and Vix’s 100% competitive commitment to the cause, there were slams, leaps and pirouettes!
After some pretty good tennis playing and some ball collection that expanded nearly as far as the Castle, mentioning no names, Chris and SJ (oops!). We were on to our next activity (after a quick pint by the river), two teams, one fact-finding trail and quite frankly some down and dirty tactics. Seemingly if you pit two teams together, add a trail, stopwatch and pub finish, no holds are barred! Tom’s team looked pretty hot out the gates with a detailed team briefing session making very good use of a stone wall. But you can never underestimate a Vix, and competitive mode having been already activated during Tennis, it was now ramping up to maximum levels, as they got started at speed!
The moment of betrayal
We’re not entirely sure what happened but we know that Vix’s team was first to the Ludlow Brewing Company (15 minutes ahead of the other group) with a completed and 100% accurate trail sheet. We also know that Tom’s team arrived betrayed. There were a lot of words exchanged at the table and someone recommended counselling for Alanah and Tom but that’s all we know!
After a change and refresh we were out for dinner at a fun Mediterranean, tapas place where absolutely no bread was thrown at Neil and absolutely no excess wine was consumed. Which of course led to absolutely no hat collection being taken off the wall and tried on. We did leave a large tip and a lot of hats (that we couldn’t put back on the wall for some reason) on the table to make up for it!
Now if we could just get these hats back on the wall
We very much missed Ash, Charlotte and Rich on this one but they’ve got no excuse for the next one now! The plan is to hold each get-together at a team member’s location so that they can show us around their stomping ground. Luckily for us, we’ve got some great locations, Stratford-Upon-Acon, The Cotswolds, Ilkley so wherever’s next, we’re sure it will be just as much fun as Ludlow.
