Junior Competition

An opportunity for Dad, a Mirror dinghy and Arthur Ransome bedtime reading ...

Junior sailing should be a mix of racing, adventures, messing about and being with friends. Once it gets out of balance for a particular group ( and all are different) then the fun may stop.

Originally posted by 423zero I can only speak from my own experience, I have yet to come across a club that doesn't make sailing fun and educational.

On the whole agree, but the element of fun can quickly evaporate when basic sailing competence is reached and the only obvious pathway “forward” for kids is race training in plastic boats and squads for all. Most kids are competitive in some way but for many it has to be on their own terms which is fine, different kids respond to pressure differently. As Jim c quite rightly points out on another thread, the youth racing pathway system ie squads for all leads to a large number of kids having reached their racing zenith aged 16, having done worlds on multiple continents in several hundred boat fleets in strict one designs, fully supported by parents etc. Nothing else will be the same again, particularly if you start having to pay for it yourself.
I know from my experience coaching more recently that due to the world we now live in, youth sailing / training / racing is far more “sterile” than it was in my day, which is good for risk avoidance but perhaps less so for fun.
Maybe high class one design championship / regatta fleet racing is too available too soon for kids, like getting them straight on the smack before starting them on the soft drugs.
My squad experience still had a lot of fun and I made a lot of mates, but when the whole thing becomes less fun, the results tend to suffer too. I’ve still always liked titting about up rivers and creeks, making and fiddling with boats and their bits which makes me unusual for my generation or younger ie millennials. Seems to me that the sailors who get into sailing in a sustainable manner race fairly lightheartedly at club level as kids and young adults, whilst also titting about with mates in the water or in and around the sailing club, and if they want to, elect to race more seriously at open or national level on their own initiative often in non “pathway” boats, whilst retaining a link to generally smaller home clubs. Clubs themselves differ a lot in the value proposition offered - end of the day sailing is a highly social activity, probably culturally harking back to seafaring days of old and lantern swinging and rum drinking.
The sailing at Cowes week, let’s be honest, is just a tedious and expensive (for the owner) precursor to a lot of drinking and bullsh*t talking in the bars with a load of other down for the weekend types.
So I would venture that the sailing clubs that offer a welcoming social side and something for all age groups tend to get a higher retention rate.

There is something in the ransome and mirrors etc . What kid, or frankly adult doesn’t enjoy some sort of playful, piratical, holiday element to their sailing.
There is a newer swallows and Amazons film that my 5yo is obsessed with even though she is a very fair weather sailor. Has an edgy espionage based plot embellishment.
Most young kids, if you say, let’s go down to the sailing club and do a club race, will generally wrinkle their noses up in disdain. If it’s a nice day and there is a race on, then light hearted participation Can go ok Esp if vs their mates.
Offer a kid a morning of treasure maps and adventures and picnics with mates in boats with names and characters and it’s suddenly a more exciting holistic proposition.

Originally posted by JimC Its a drawback for those of us at the southern artificial reservoirs. Not a lot of exploring potential in a circular dam. Somewhere like Kielder on the other hand...

Good point. I was lucky growing up in “Cornwall’s forgotten corner.”
Still I dare say there is scope for a laugh / decent atmosphere / social scene at any club.
I’d say that quality of atmosphere is inversely proportional to membership fee and club annual turnover.

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