Dinghy fleets in Plymouth

I have recently started sailing at Roadford, and it is a very friendly club and my girlfriend and I have been made very welcombe. It is a good sized piece of water and it takes us between 45 min to an hour to drive from Plymouth, which is about the same time that it would take to get to Salcombe, but Salcombe Yacht Club was more expensive. Although I have worked in Salcombe for the past 5 years as an instructor and love sailing there I've never realy enjoyed racing there, ( I'm too young for a Solo , and we used to have a red N12 but we wanted a spinnaker )

I would love to sail in dinghies Plymouth but Roadford is a great place to sail and the club is one the most wecombing that that been to. Well worth a look when deciding where to sail. If people would like to car share from Plymouth we would be happy to.     

Hi guys

There is a huge void in plymouth where an active dinghy fraternity once existed.

I've sailed in Plymouth for about 22 years now and watched the slow ebb of interest.

The problem is multifactorial and has certain factors that are unique to Plymouth and also some that reflect the national state of sailing within the UK.

Plymouth problems

1. Too many sailing clubs.

Each club has a small but relatively active dinghy membership = too little talent spread too thinly. No mentoring. Each wants a slice of the action and are reluctant to co operate.

2. The clubs are spread around the city.

We have approx 4 dinghy sailing clubs on the Tamar and 4 clubs on the Plym, each have their own race evening and cater for a wide range of dinghies and classes. Sounds ideal? unfortunately you will find that there will be only be about max 4 boats out in a particular class typically lasers, ents etc.

3. The Mount Batten sailing centre.  It's massively overpriced for the economy of West Devon.The centre is a profit making organisation, and provides a centre for most waterbased activities and organisations. It is clean tidy and has a bar most sailing clubs would die for. However it is too expensive to attract the casual dinghy racer, and the members it does have, it screws every penny out of them in an attempt to make a profit.

for example

Non affliate family member £348 Pa. + dinghy storage fee on top of this £175 -£247 or £300 for a cat.

For this sum it provides a warm shower and somewhere to park your car and boat. The centre uses a public slipway, so we are invaded by the birmingham diving fraternity, and share it with the teaching sailing boats based at the centre. All these visitors only pay £5.00 to use the shower.

So launching and recovery can be a complete 'mare as there can  be 2 x big diving ribs and up to 10 picos being launched / recovered on the slipway at one time.

It doesn't organise or hold any racing. For this you have to join another sailing club in Plymouth ( an extra expense, and the clubs are based across the other side of Plym river, which will take you 30 mins to get there, so you don't feel inclined to visit your sailing club)  This is typically Mayflower SC - which only provides races 1x a month between april - sept. Or the  RPCYC - Wednesday eves, for med handicap, and doesn't set courses futher south than Drakes island. So no good for fast assymetrics, as the wind is fickle too shifty and very frustrating when we could have 2 miles of upwind/ downwind sailing. The racing also starts at 18:40 which is too early for us.

I organised an open meeting at plymouth a few weeks ago and MSC provided excellent windward /leeward racing outside the breakwater. The visitors from across the country thought that the racing and sailing was brilliant, but the MSC clubhouse derelict, smelly and a disgrace. The fleet was split between the MSC and Mt Batten sites providing a logistical difficulties and loss of the usual B14 open meeting fun and games.

In spite of these difficulties there are signs that interest in dinghy sailing is increasing. I've been trying to grow a group of assymetric dinghies based at Mt Batten. We now have 5 B14's, 3 of which are very active, we also have the student 49ers which come and go, 3x Rs 800's and some Iso's Rs 700's, musto skiff, I 14  Rs 400's / 200's, L4k's etc.

I'm sorting a group email system so we can organise our own sailing ( + training for B14's ) typically on Wed - thur - friday eves and weekends when available. The Mayflower racing - although only 1x month -  fits well into the national B14 circuit and the Southwest B14 circuit which MarkE from Starcross organises. There are also other local events during the summer within 15miles that we could also try if we felt the need. we won't race with RPCYC as the courses and price of joining don't suit us I feel that quality of racing is much more important that quantity, hence at the moment we sail and practice amongst ourselves rather than get the plymouth B14 fleet to travel. However this may change next year.

If you feel you want to sail, train and race assymetrics in one of the best sailing locations on the south coast, get in touch when you come to Plymouth.

If you want to race tactical orientated but slow dinghies, there are about 22 clubs around the plymouth area where you will be welcomed, not to mention travelling to other clubs around the region. My choice would be Starcross or Roadford.

I just see the future of sailing is going to be based at a very local level, and I'm trying to grow our own B14 / assymetric fleet.  Soon it's going to be just too expensive to travel across the country looking for a decent race.

RodB