Research Baseball Club was founded on the 23rd of March 1955 at “Yarramie” Thompson Crescent, Research, and was one of the two founding clubs in the then Diamond Valley Baseball Association. The club moved to its current location in the early 1970’s and added “Lower Plenty” to its name, and became known with the baseball community as the “Research Lower Plenty Roadrunners”.With this move, our player numbers grew, and by the mid 1970’s the seniors fielded 3 teams and a Winter junior program was established. In 1977 our first clubhouse was built by the then Shire of Eltham.

The club continued to grow throughout the 80’s, 90’s and into the 2000’s with a great deal of success along the way, including two Division 1 premierships during this time.

The continued development of our juniors saw the addition of a Summer program in 2015 meaning we were now the only club in the City of Banyule offering baseball 12 months of the year, another first for the club.

In 2019 the club established its first ever women’s team, the only one in the Diamond Valley at that time. In 2021, we fielded our first women’s summer team, becoming the first club in our region to offer women’s baseball in winter and summer.

In conjunction with the City of Banyule, Research Lower Plenty Baseball Club constructed an indoor hitting facility, another first, giving us the flexibility to train, rain, hail or shine any day of the week.

The following year, the club moved into a brand new modern clubhouse. Maintaining its original name, the Ian Hulmes Pavillion, we are a club that is proud of what we offer our players and their families. For our club the essence of community sport is a place where young men and women can train and play, catch up and talk, observe, laugh and most importantly, belong.