by SquashPlayer

Price Racket Balls

 

BREATH OF FRESH AIR 

Martin Bronstein talks to England Squash Area Manger Justyn Price who has been given National Responsibility for Racketball.
 

Justyn Price has packed a lot of sport into his 24-year life. Not only as an elite athlete, but also on the other side of the fence – administration. To some people administration is dirty word, but listening to Price talking about his life over the last ten years gives the word a new lustre.
 

He started with Southampton Football Club, where he learned the importance of marketing (a skill woefully lacking in British sport) and working with the community. After three years he knew that he wanted to spend his working life in sport administration and realised that in order to achieve that goal he would have to go to university. So he left Southampton and enrolled at Durham University, three years later graduating with an honours degree in Sport in the Community.
 

There followed a spell in badminton and then, at the start of 2007, he joined England Squash as an Area Squash Manager. And what an area – nothing less than the 33 London boroughs and the Home Counties surrounding them. His remit was pretty extensive, too:

“My job is to encourage and enable more people to play squash and racketball,” he says simply. But what that job entails is endless programmes and initiatives, an enormous amount of travel around southern England and more late nights than he cares to admit.
 

“Last week, I had a meeting on Monday night, a conference on Tuesday night and another meeting on Wednesday night. On Thursday I managed to get home [a house he shares in Winchester with his fiancée, Felicity, a trainee solicitor] by seven,” he recounts, candidly admitting that the constant driving is not one of his pleasures.
 

Despite this onerous-sounding workload, Price – fresh-faced and boyish – exudes enthusiasm for the challenge ahead. It is obvious that the task of getting people to participate in sport is one that he feels is worthwhile. And after a year in squash, he is even more motivated than when he started.
 

“The squash community is full of passionate people. Of all the sports I’ve worked in, the squash environment is the one that I have enjoyed being in the most.

“I came into this sport with limited knowledge of its specifics, but at every turn there has been someone who will take me on court and have a hit, or explain technical terms to me. Experienced players will volunteer as pupils when I’m working for my coaching awards. There are always people around who will give you their time and hospitality. They’ve brought me in plates of curry or put me up for the night. What I hear in every multi-sport club is that it’s the squash players who keep the bar in business and support social events. And senior players are keen to help the juniors, which I find so encouraging,” he says, almost with wonderment in his voice.
 

While there are times when he can handle bat and ball, there are others when it is budgets – discussions with local authorities or proposals to Sport England for funds to get a particular project going. There are committees everywhere and meetings without end. Price accepts it as part of his job and knows that he will not change the climate overnight; a small victory in a leisure centre could pave the way for bigger victories down the road. In one case, a £2,000 grant helped to get people playing squash at a west London leisure centre during their lunchtime.
 

“We were exposing these people to squash for the first time, giving them a chance to play for £1. That’s the important point, getting people into a court who would never otherwise have had that chance,” he explains.

A major initiative of England Squash is the ‘Mini Squash’ programme, which is designed as an introduction to squash for children aged 5 to 11. Along with this programme is the ‘Mini Squash Teachers Award and Leaders Award’. Much time and effort has been expended by England Squash in pushing Mini Squash, and I wondered (a little cynically) whether it has been worth the effort. Price’s response was immediate.
 

“Oh yes. Last week I had a call from a squash coach at Ebbisham Club in Surrey telling me that some players who had started with Mini Squash had entered a junior squash tournament and had beaten players who had been playing proper squash for years. Without Mini Squash these new players would never have been in the tournaments and you can be sure with that sort of success they will be staying in the game,” he claims.
 

As if the meetings and the programmes are not enough to fill his week, Price has to write and produce a weekly newsletter, which, according to his brief, “will include England Squash news, tournament entry forms, club news … advise about local authority funding oppor-tunities and training courses …”). Price will also help organisers with graded events as well as exhibition matches and local roadshows. And somehow he finds time one evening a week to coach juniors, inventing all sorts of games (points earned on length and targets, for example) to keep the kids involved and enthusiastic.


Price travels around with a huge sports bag full of squash and racketball rackets, balls, and other training equipment in his left hand; in the right, he carries a bulging laptop case containing –in addition to his laptop – all his paperwork relating to ongoing projects. Whatever information you want, whatever query comes up, Price has it on his laptop, which goes wherever he goes.
 

And what of racketball? I lived in North America when racketball made its appearance (played on special court with no tin) and saw it rocket to huge popularity (it was played on a Perspex court before squash was) and then just as quickly virtually die out, the courts being adapted to squash usage. I was less than impressed when England Squash embraced racketball. Price responded to my jaundiced view with his usual intelligent enthusiasm.
 

“I’ve worked as a personal trainer and a speed, agility and quickness trainer and in many other areas of sport; There are many new ways in which to package a sport. The average person has a stereotyped view of squash, but if you mention racketball people say, “They play that in America, don’t they?” There’s no pre-conceived image. So we have a sport that we can market and frame as whatever we want. It could be the ideal alternative to aerobics, a daytime activity when squash courts aren’t being used. It could be the winter game instead of squash when the cold yellow-dot ball isn’t bouncing. It could be the ideal sport for companies wanting to arrange lunchtime social sessions. Racketball is a great leveller: you can put a good squash player on court with someone willing to run and they would have a great time,” he says, adding, “Squash and racketball appeal to different people. There’s always daytime availability of courts, so why not use that time to make money and bring in a whole new group of people?”
 

Justyn Price came into squash less than a year ago and has embraced it fully. There is nothing false or obsequious about his enthusiasm. He recently travelled to New York to take part in the Derek Sword Trophy, paying his own fare to play for the London team again the New York team.
 

Journalist Alan Thatcher, who was the driving force behind that tournament (Sword was a Scot who lost his life in the 9/11 disaster) and is chairman of the Kent SRA, which falls within Price’s area, dropped his journalistic cynicism when asked about Price.
 

“He’s a breath of fresh air, full of commitment, ideas and passion. With his help we’ve put in a massive Mini Squash programme involving hundreds

of schools. And it’s working,” Thatcher enthuses.

 

‘It is obvious that the challenge of getting people to participate in sport  is one that he feels is worthwhile’


Price carries a sports bag in one hand and a laptop in the other


Justyn Price in discussion with David Peck of Colets in Thames Ditton, England's Men’s Club Champions
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