For those of you that made it last night, thanks for coming.

Before I get to the details of the meeting, let me remind everyone that the Bar
Crawl is tomorrow night, Saturday, January 8th. We're meeting at Colonial
Tavern at 6:00. We'll then be going to Hard Times (at 4 Mile Fork), Hooters,
Buffalo Wild Wings, and finally back to Colonial Tavern. It's a
recruiting/fundraising event. I should (hopefully) have deals worked out with
each of these bars to provide us with a percentage of our tab while we're there.
We'll also be going around talking everyone we can to let them know that we have
a rugby team and to find out if they are, or know anyone who is, interested in
playing rugby. My thought was that we should rent a 15 passenger van for the
night so that only one person had to drive, but it wasn't a very popular idea,
so we'll be carpooling. Now, on to the meeting details...

Several things were decided on last night. We are going to start having
informal practices on Saturdays, starting on January 15th. It should do us all
some good to get a little bit of fitness in before practice officially gets
underway, so come out if you can. Starting in the last week of February, we
will begin practicing twice a week (Someone help me out if we decided on which
days. I'm still not sure...), and we'll also continue with the voluntary
Saturday practices any time we don't have a match or tournament. The Saturday
practices are going to be at the Mary Washington pitch (directions provided
below) starting at 11:00 AM. The location of the official practices is TBD,
since we don't have a pitch yet. If anyone has any leads on finding one, either
follow up on it, or let me know and I'll follow up on it.

For this spring, Jeff Frankston has volunteered to be the match secretary, and
he is going to begin trying to schedule scrimmages and looking into tournaments
for us in the spring. It is also very likely that we'll be trying to join with
other teams to play in B-side games. Our entire Spring season is probably going
to be away, mostly because we don't have anywhere to play in Fredericksburg yet.
Also, please let me know if you have any leads on a game pitch in
Fredericksburg.

Over the summer, we plan on playing sevens with practice being the same two days
a week, and we plan on entering as many tournaments as we can.

For the fall season, we should be entering either the VRU or PRU as a
competitive D-III team.

Topping our priority list right now should be recruitment, finding a practice
pitch, and fundraising. The more money we raise, the less we'll have to pay for
out of our own pockets. We have a deal with the Colonial Tavern that allows the
team to collect 10% of anyone's tab anytime you go in there. To get the
discount for the team, you have to show them a signed rugby card. You'll have
to get those from me. I plan on trying to work out a similar deal with several
other bars around town.

Find out if your employer would be willing to sponsor our team. A lot of
companies will do it. It can't hurt to ask. I'll also be asking a variety of
other businesses in Fredericksburg about sponsorships. If you have a good lead
that we can talk to, go for it, or let me know, and I'll give it a shot.

I already have a promised donation (pending on us actually getting a team
together) that should allow us to at least purchase a team set of jerseys.
There's a lot of other equipment to buy, and there's a good chance that we'll
have to pay to practice on a field, so we'll probably need money for that.

For now at least, that's about it, I think. If I left anything out, someone
please fill us in. Thanks.

Joey Pendergrast
Rappahannock Rugby Club
www.fredrugby.com
(540) 372-4044

Directions to the Mary Wash. Pitch:
The field is at the intersection of Hanover St. and Adams St. in Fredericksburg.

From Central Park:
------------------
Head towards downtown Fredericksburg on Rt. 3 East.
Just after the Rt.1 overpass, turn left onto William St.
Make an immediate Right onto Hanover St.
The field will be a couple of blocks down on your Right. Look for the goal
posts.

From King George:
-----------------
Head West on Rt. 3, towards Fredericksburg. Veer left, staying on Rt. 3, (not
Rt. 3 business).
Turn Right onto William St.
Make an immediate Right onto Hanover St.
The field will be a couple of blocks down on your Right. Look for the goal
posts.





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