1 July 2012 | Tennis Queensland

The WESTS Mowing Team  has worked tirelessly behind the scenes of  Western Suburbs Tennis Club (Townsville) for many years.  The team is comprised of four loyal members:  Brian Carr, John ‘Franko’ Frankling, Geoff Jones and Reg Kettley. 

According to Geoff Jones(Life Member,Western Suburbs Tennis Club),  “Brian is in charge of the team, and started when the back courts still had grass surrounds.  Franko has been around forever, and Reg is now a fixutre,  adding a social side to the chore. 

The WESTS Mowing Team was established 20-25 years ago, and the current four members now have a combined age of over 250 years. “It is a group where we find it extremely difficult to recruit new members and it seems that not many people like to speak to us at length just in case this mowing caper is contagious.  We have had a couple of interested helpers that have fallen from the squad over the years like Doc, John Belcastro and Graeme Frakes, to name a couple.

Over a year, the team meets an average of every three weeks, depending on the state of the tennis court surrounds.  “Brian keeps a check on the area and phones us on a Friday night to say we are meeting” said Geoff.   Generally, meetings start at 7am (on a Saturday), in order to complete around the clubhouse before any parents and children start arriving. 

The primary reason the team mows is to help out the club.  “It definitely comes back to club pride”, says Geoff.  “Every now

and then people come up to us congratulating us on what we do.  In fact, in the warmer months people have come out of the woodwork and offered us drinks.  We do sit down afterwards and give each other a pat on the back, or if necessary chide someone because they pushed the mower in the wrong direction or missed a blade of grass.   Bernie Koppe of Rising Sun Honda keeps our stable of  Honda machinery in good running condition, most of the time at no cost to Wests.  He just reconditioned the gear box in the ride-on himself, and possibly saved the club $1,000 to $1,500.  Since he is so good to us in doing this, we asked him to supply team shirts “. 

“ If anyone says the area looks good, that is enough for us.  Also, we enjoy each others’company and the post mowing sessions are always very enjoyable”.