The 2024 edition of Saltex will be the final show for Derek Walder. Having been involved for over 42 years with the show, Walder will now take up retirement.
Walder started in the early ’60s in horticulture at a large estate in Sussex before getting involved with a golf course. He joined what was then the National Association of Groundsmen and got involved with Saltex in 1969. Earlier this year, he turned 87.
“There’s so many memories meeting so many people, that when you sit and suddenly think what’s happened and where we’ve come from and what we’ve done with the exhibition, you suddenly realise that it’s more than a generational gap from Motsborough to the NEC and winds are in between,” he says when recalling his journey.
One thing he has clearly noticed is that both the industry and the profession have changed over the years.
“When I walk around now, when I’ve got five minutes, I see these very complicated scientific instruments that you just put on your pitch and it tells you everything from the soil moisture to the nitrogen and phosphate content. When I was still working as a groundsman, we had a little kit with a few test tubes in it and you dug a piece of soil out and you had to go to a lab and all that combined. Nowadays, when you switch on your television on a Saturday and you see these pitches, they’re as good on the last day as they were the first day.”
Geoff Webb, the CEO of the Grounds Management Association (GMA), the organisers of Saltex, hailed Walder for his involvement and passion.
“Derek just epitomises that what people won’t know is just how much voluntary work Derek’s done for the association and in particular for this trade show.”
Walder started off as a volunteer but became Operations Manager for Saltex in 1979. He was instrumental in Saltex’s move back to Windsor Racecourse in 1992 and oversaw the move from Windsor Racecourse to the NEC, Birmingham in 2015.
“I think that if you cut Derek in half, he’d be like that classic stick of rock. He has got attachments to Brighton, and I think it would just say ‘Saltex’ right through the middle of it. One of the things that I find just brilliant about Saltex itself is that passion that Derek and the volunteer team of ground staff bring to Saltex is a real ownership model you see these days about getting together, sort of as with crowdfunding.”
In 1988, Walder was awarded a BEM in the Queen’s Birthday Honours List for services to groundsmanship, while the GMA awarded him a lifetime achievement award in 2014. In that same year, the Association of Event Organisers awarded him the “Unsung Hero” award.
Asked about his plans for the future, Walder said: “I have no idea yet.” With Saltex around the corner, his hands and mind are still busy pulling off that more impressive event.
Sportsfields.info and Sportsfields.Mag are official media partners to Saltex. Keep an eye out for our team or check the various magazine racks to get our latest Grass/Hybrid turf edition of the magazine, for free or receive it on your desk by subscribing here.