BEHIND THE SCENES ON CENTRE COURT
Alan Chalmers
- Region:
- South East
- Notice Period:
- Short (maybe less than one month's notice)
- Type:
- Hobby
- Fee:
- Paid: £100 including travel
- Category:
- Sports
- Updated:
- 27th December 2021
I served for 40 years on Wimbledon's Centre Court as the steward with responsibility for overseeing the seating arrangements and security of the competitors' guests of players actually on court. This involved taking care of 4 change-overs per day. To do this adequately, i had to have intimate knowledge of all the supporters if each of the top players who played.
I also had the pleasure of hosting the many A grade celebrities who came up as guests, my first being Frank Sinatra and over the years i got to meet and chat with for example Peter Ustinov, Burt Lancaster, Lewis Hamilton, David Beckham, Kate Middleton's family and many more.
My talk is in two parts, firstly about the All England Club and how it runs the Championships, and secondly I relate many anecdotes about the huge number of great champions i have met, not just the current ones, but more interestingly the great champions of past eras going back to 1924.
The talk is in sections and can be delivered in any timescale from 45 minutes upwards.
Views: 1729 | Enquiries: 38About Alan Chalmers
For 35 years I have been a dealer in racket sports literature, and have staged over 100 exhibitions at tennis events in the UK and Europe, thus I am a natural tennis historian.
From 1976 to 2015, I served on Wimbledon's Centre Court as the steward with responsibility for overseeing the seating arrangements and security of the competitors and their guests. With my staff of six Service Stewards, we managed four changeovers a day, maintaining a tight control on access to that area of seats, always much in demand.
We also hosted a large number of A grade celebrities who came as player guests. Amongst those were Frank Sinatra, Burt Lancaster, Peter Ustinov, David Beckham, Lewis Hamilton, Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman and Kate Middleton's family. In my time on Centre Court I was present for more than 2200 matches!
My talk, BEHIND THE SCENES ON CENTRE COURT, starts with a description of how the All England Club organises itself and the Championships. I then describe a large number of anecdotes organised on a decade by decade basis starting with the 1970s. I can thus tailor a talk to any length of time (one hour preferred) with more or less material and you can choose the period to be covered..
I am a stand-alone speaker with no technical requirements and can give the talk in formal and non-formal venues. I prefer to keep within Surrey, Hampshire and Sussex and charge a fee of £135 per talk inclusive of travel.
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