greg_harm said:
markSTI said:
Porschekit said:
Hi All,
For those of us that can't make it to Brands Hatch this coming weekend I thought I'd check to see if anyone fancies a run out in the North East?
So, Sunday 2nd September 9 'ish to 3 or 4 'ish?? I'll start the list below and you can add your details if you want to join in. Subject to how many add their name by Friday 31st August, we can decide where to meet and where to run. e.g. if most are from Teesside we can head south, if from Hexham etc we can go north. let's see.
We can decide a route subject to numbers, but I won't arrange any lunches or anything, wherever we stop we can get a cuppa and snacks. Or bring your flask !
I'll start the list; cheers, John. (p.s. I'll also post on 911UK.com to get the numbers up - we might get a few more members!)
1. John (Porschekit) 997.1 -Sunderland
2. Graeme (Cueball) 996 Aero-kit - Thornaby
3.
4.
I'd watch it John, I was ostracized from the club by our great and glorious leader; my crime? Daring to organise an alternative run out when there was an Official Porsche event on that some R3 members were attending (Lotherton, not even a R3 event). You'll be accused of undermining our leaders for offering an alternative to a static event.
Come on Greg this is the exactly the same situation or have you changed the goal posts yet again? What's the difference between this one and Lotherton? I await your response with baited breath.
Mark
Good Morning Mark,
Great to see you’re still keeping a close eye on the forum and haven’t quite given up on us yet.
You allude from the fact my original comments on your post (which you then edited afterwards) regarding you organising a run on the same day as Lotherton, was not actually about the drive you had chosen to do but actually more about your “sitting in fields” statement. This post is still available elsewhere on the forum and my response remains the same. It simply expresses my personal view of what I and many others find to be the benefit of any static event.
You say “I was ostracized from the club by our great and glorious leader”, yet you are the one who has chosen not join in any Club activities since, never once have I asked you not to come along or get involved. You have not been ostracised. I believe in both my emails to you regarding this subject I expressed how keen I was to move forward and enable you to find a resolve to your issues and reignite your passion for Club life.
As I personally continue to be the cause of your distress and disgust, I would once again ask you take this matter up with Chris Seaward, General Manager where any further responses can be mediated and moderated by the Cornbury House Team rather than myself, thus hopefully allowing you to find a resolution to this problem it really would be a shame for you to miss out on any more events or experiences this great club has to offer because of me.
To clarify there is a difference between an “alternative” event and an event that clashes. There is no issue with someone organising a run out when other members have already committed, booked and paid for a weekend away; this is an alternative event. What confuses members is when another one day event is organised on the day of a planned one day event, or a weekend away is organised that clashes with a weekend away that is already on the calendar. With so many weekends available throughout the year we've always tried our hardest to make sure events don't clash.
Best wishes
Greg.
I think I'll let the email you sent and my retorts to do the talking.
Posted 30th of July
Hi Greg,
Hope you are well and that you enjoyed Silverstone.
I was hoping that you may have been in touch after my text, but I thought I would write this to express my disappointment toward your post on the forum regarding an alternative option to the Yorkshire Porsche show.
Firstly, when I saw the post it was on the last couple of minutes of my break and I did not read it in full. I believed that you had taken offense at me saying 'sitting in a field' in the post for which I apologised if it had caused offence; I then changed the wording of my post. I did think that the little I had read was out of character as I know you like to discuss things face to face.
I decided to read the forum posting in full the next morning, before leaving for work, and was rather shocked and disappointed at what you had insinuated.
I could not believe that this had come from yourself (a close friend) and seemed totally out of character. You know that Region 3 means a lot to me and Wendy, to insinuate that I was trying to "steal” members away from the Yorkshire show is rather disappointing and ridiculous to even suggest it; a competition it certainly is not, it's an alternative!
I know the Lotherton Hall show is an annual event, but not specifically an R3 event, and on this basis, I decided to put a post up for those members who did not want to go and are always posting about going for a drive out somewhere and a bite to eat.
We have nearly three hundred members in our club and at last time of looking on the forum only 17 cars from R3 have committed to the Yorkshire show (according to the forum). This leaves an awful lot of members not going, I was simply providing an alternative of which I have been censured for in your post.
To suggest that I would organise a run when our R3 show is on at Witton or this would encourage anybody else to do so is absolutely unreasonable and very disappointing considering the support Wendy and I have given the club over the last four years..
Wendy and I organised a run over to Kendal, showing our support for those R3 members in the R18 concourse, and you actually mentioned that we as a large club should offer alternatives on any given date. Now it was OK to have an alternative to the MG show which was in no way an R3 event let alone a Porsche event. You even said in the post that it was good that the club was so big that we could offer the concept for twin events. For reasons I cannot fathom, the goal posts have now been changed and your previous statement has now gone out of the window. What has changed in the space of four weeks?
Not everybody in the club wants to drive sixty miles on a Motorway and then park in a field, no matter how you dress it up. Shows like Lotherton and Newby are of the same format, where we are onsite for hours. If that's what people want to do, great, but not everybody wants to do that and as club, where possible, other members should be allowed to make alternative suggestions.
In the four years we have been members, Wendy and I have been 100% behind the club and have enjoyed and found it a pleasure organising events. Most members appreciate the effort and time put in to organise events but I wouldn’t expect every club member to attend them; its horses for courses, not everybody is looking for the same thing. The thanks we get is a humiliating public dressing down on the forum for organising a run!
The club is big part of our lives but feel our enthusiasm waning after recent events. All we wanted to do is to help make R3 bigger and better by offering to put runs on of which you have actively encouraged during your tenure as RO.
Your retort dated 31st of July
Hi Mark
Firstly, I apologise for not sorting a date to get together for a chat. I’ve spent the weekend catching up on work, family and Club issues. My intention was to message you this evening, but you have pre-empted that with your email.
Regarding your Forum post, I was disappointed that you had organised a run on the same day as a major Porsche Club GB event. Whilst I actively encourage members to organise drives, I didn’t expect such a key member as yourself to organise one on a day that conflicts with such a large Club event, especially as there are so many other weekends available with nothing planned. I was a little surprised too that you publicly likened a static event to “sitting in a field” on such a public forum. I fully understand that you prefer not to attend such events but many members get a lot out of days like these. Negativity can spread all too easily.
Despite being disappointed in what you had written, I accepted that you were only doing what I suggested in organising a drive, so left your post on the forum. I only added to your post when the texts, emails and phone calls started coming in from members, the general content of which was comments like: “it’s undermining you, the Club and the R7 event” and that it “belittles members who actually want to sit in a field all day”. As you point out we have a lot of members (531 to date, including joint memberships) and I have to take their opinions into account too, hence my comment to your post. My intention was not to humiliate you, rather to appease those members who had brought their concerns to me.
I have read through my response and I cannot find in the thread anywhere where I accuse or imply that you are trying to “steal” members from the Yorkshire show, in fact I actually write that I hope you have a great run. I make no apology for my post. All I have done is simply point out, as Regional Organiser, that your comments could be misconstrued and what I consider to be the merits of events like these, the benefits of attending them and how potentially through doing this on the same day at the Yorkshire Show you could easily give other members a reason not to attend either Lotherton or Witton. I wasn’t implying that you would try and organise a run on our own show day, more that when Witton comes around if someone else feels the same way and thinks to offer our members an alternative, they can refer to your post, thinking that a member of such high regard as yourself can create such an event without consequence, then they can too. I would like to think, that in hindsight, you are aware of how disruptive an alternative event on this date could be, especially when deciding to take a route into Yorkshire.
I thought that the clash of events on 1
st July had been put to bed. The R18 concours had been planned for June and by the time R18 decided to change the date we already had 20+ members with their name down on the list to show at Bywell. I had requested a Club stand at the Bywell Show after several members at our January meeting had expressed how much they had enjoyed it at Corbridge. Since R18 changed their concours date at the last minute, this was hardly arranged as an “alternative” event. It’s unfair to compare these two dates. If you recall my words regarding your planned drive to Kendal Concours were; “When looking at the calendar we always try to avoid double booking weekends but inevitably some will clash, especially when members voice that they want to attend particular events as a club, but I'm extremely pleased to say with fantastic team work and communication as a Region we always somehow make it work” In this case, your run was arranged after the Lotherton Event was confirmed, and there was no communication at all. My goal posts remain firmly in place. I also fail to see how you insist that you went to Kendal to support R3 members in the R18 Concours but have chosen not to support them in the R7 concours, that’s quite an about turn.
As you say, not everyone wants to attend a static event, (although we have almost 40 cars registered, a similar number to our driving events) which is why I try to organise a variety of activities for R3 members.
I hope that you won’t let this matter spoil your enjoyment of the Club and your car, I wouldn’t want you and Wendy to miss out on any more R3 fun.
If you’d still like to meet up to discuss this further, please get in touch and we can sort out a time & place we could meet for a chat. Alternatively if you feel that my comments are unjust or you feel that I’m failing as an RO then Chris Seaward is always available for members to discuss any issues. His telephone number is 01608 652 911, or you can email
gm@porscheclubgb.com.
Greg
My last reply, which you ignored 1st of August
Hi Greg,
As I initially said in my WhatsApp message, If I had caused offence, I apologise. I was not aware there was a rule where other events could not be offered if you do not like going to static events. Quite clearly I am wrong. I mentioned this run to you at the last R3 meeting during half time of the England world cup game. If you had had concerns then, you should have said something, not put a post on the forum which is full of insinuation and conjecture.Wishing us a great drive is a back handed complement. You could have contacted me and said 'hey Mark do you realise that this is causing a bit of concern etc'. I would have happily taken the post down, you know how easy going I am. The last thing I wanted to do was upset friends. All I wanted to do was offer an alternative to other members. As a 'key member' of R3 as you put it, didn't I deserve that chance? You should have spoken to me first before putting that retort on the forum, I was certainly not trying to undermine or belittle anyone. What is the world coming to if people are so easily offended? Yes, it could have been worded differently and for this I have already apologised and genuinely did not know that you, and its seems a lot of our new and or existing members in R3 would be so offended. Again I sincerely apologise for offending yourself and our members. I genuinely did not know it would cause so much grief as it had never been mentioned before that other runs could not be organised in fact the opposite. I remember Chris Mettham organising runs last year when we were at official Porsche events, you didn't seem to mind then, in fact you actively encouraged them; what this difference now? I was organising a run away for people who are not going to the WOTY, is this now a no no as its an official R3 event? Again I talked about this to you and you seemed fine about it, 'giving people an alternative that may not have the funds to do the WOTY' (your words Greg). Let my draw your attention to your words below.
A: "We have fantastic members who continue to have the desire to help and organise events". B: "We continue to have incredible support for PCGB & other Regions and other events not just those here in R3. To be able to attend and show support at two events in a single weekend as a Region is of course superb". C: "Like I always say, one size doesn't fit all. When looking at the calendar we always try to avoid double booking weekends but inevitably some will clash, especially when members voice that they want to attend particular events as a club, but I'm extremely pleased to say with fantastic team work and communication as a Region we always somehow make it work."
D: "What continues to make this Region so strong is it's camaraderie and members' ability to accept that not every everyone wants the same thing from an event, ............."
These are your words Greg, extolling the virtues of members who organise runs, yet you listened to members tittle tattle when the post went up and went against your own words. Instead of saying to those members that it was okay to do so or ring your friend to discuss it like adults. It's also disturbing turn of events we have so many alleged snitches in the club who come running to you when they disagree with something (I wonder who they are). I wouldn't like to think its people I regard as very close friends? How disappointing that would be.
As you put it, we have been very active members of R3 over the past four years. We have given all to the club and taken great care not to stand on anybody's toes . You also say in your post 'highly regarded members', obviously not that highly regarded as to speak to me in private before your post and all this could have been avoided. The last paragraph in your email just about sums it up. We are/were not faceless members of R3 Greg and considered ourselves one of the backbone members; I thought we were close friends. To suggest going to the Porsche club to make a complaint is hurtful but shows what you truly think of us. Why put that in there? I'm not a snitch and would never go running to the Club. I'm not Nick! Even he didn't get a public dressing down on the forum for the scandalous way he went on; but I did! Well, you and R3 members won't have to worry anymore about me potentially undermining you or belittling them anymore as we are done. The club now seems to be full of back stabbing snitches who can't wait to put the knife in to other members for something as innocent as an alternative to a static event; a genuine oversight on my part. Not something we want to be part of anymore. I wish you all the best in the future. Yes, my good friend of four years didn't even have the decency to reply to the above. Mark
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