Ulley Sailing Club Where small really is beautiful! Aiming to make - PDF document

Ulley Sailing Club Where small really is beautiful! Aiming to make sailing affordable and accessible for all What makes us special? • Volunteer run – everything from training to cleaning to cooking our trademark communal lunches • Friendly – everyone welcome of all ages and abilities • Low cost - with everything provided to get newcomers sailing immediately • Working together - with resilience and ingenuity • Sociable – all memberships include social membership for a spouse/partner More info given on the Slides’ Notes Pages • Beautiful surroundings – and easily accessible • Located in beautiful Country Park – so non-sailing partners are happy to come as well. • Only a small water but not an active reservoir so its size is constant throughout the year. It is easily accessible (next to a main road) and it has an asphalted car park – not a muddy field! • We pride ourselves on our friendliness. Enjoyable sailing is our priority. • We keep membership fees as low as possible and our extremely enthusiastic instructors provide training for members that is either free or very low cost. • The great majority of members arrive as novices but we produce sailors of National standard (e.g. current RS500 National Champion). • We encourage social interaction between all our members – both sailing and non- sailing - including our trademark Sunday lunches ( no need to bring sandwiches!). • Great Team Spirit! • Because the water is small, the winds are challenging! 1

Context find out more at www.ulleysailingclub.org.uk • Celebrated 40 th anniversary together with 2012 Olympics! • Located in Ulley Country Park, Rotherham, in deprived area with very low sports participation • Share premises with school and community groups • Survived 4 seasons’ disruption after Numbers of Memberships* 100 2007 floods 80 Non-Sailing • Membership at record levels by Honorary 60 2011 and near present capacity Student Crew 40 • Resourceful 12 strong Committee Single meets at least monthly 20 Family* • Became RYA Training Centre - April 0 '07 '09 '11 '13 2013 * One Family membership = multiple Members. • Premises belong to Rotherham MBC. We have sole use of the club house and water only on Saturdays, Sundays and Wednesday evenings. During the week, it is used by the outdoor activities centre run by Wickersley Sports College – a local comprehensive school. Some rooms are for general hire by groups or individuals. • Only the ‘galley’ (a small kitchen and bar) and the Race Control Cabin are exclusively ours. • Dam wall was in danger of collapsing during the floods of June 2007 – made national headlines! RESERVOIR CLOSED! Not certain that we would ever return to sailing at Ulley. • Committee decided to move the whole Club to South Yorkshire Sailing Club • Set very low fees to retain membership during period of great uncertainty. Retained use of clubhouse for social activities. • Pressurised RMBC to let us resume restricted sailing activities at Ulley in 2008, following their decision that the dam would be repaired not demolished. Low water levels and Country Park not open to the general public. • No sailing again during repair works in 2009/10. • Grand re-opening and re-launch at August Bank Holiday 2010. RESULT: Held on to our previous membership and reached record membership levels by the end of 2011. 2

Surviving the storms • We lost our water BUT we kept sailing as a club and as Team Ulley • All our safety equipment was stolen BUT we made successful bids for funds to get better 4-stroke engines and tractor • The king post broke on our club Enterprise in the WLYC 24 hour race BUT with team spirit, ingenuity and a bit of scavenged pallet, we kept our 20 year unbroken record and finished the race • Vandals threw our home-made pontoon bridge into deep water BUT we arranged for the local Sub-Aqua Club to rescue it for us • We lost our water but we kept our great TEAM SPIRIT! • Succession of break-ins, resulting in loss of safety boat, three 2-stroke engines and a tractor – plus miscellaneous gear. • All replaced with better versions, largely thanks to successful bids for grant funding. • King post broke on Club Enterprise during Southport 24-Hour Race, 2010. • Steward’s reaction: “That’s the end of your race!” • Members’ reaction: “You don’t know Team Ulley!” • Site scoured and part of pallet found. Shaped and fitted in approx. one hour. RESULT: Race completed! • We had designed and made a removable bridge from the shore to our floating pontoon as a safety measure, to discourage access when we are not operating. • Unfortunately, this bridge was not returned to the boat park at the end of one day and vandals threw it into deep water. • We have good relations with the local sub-aqua group, who were glad to come and recover it.

Rebuilding the ship In 2010, while we had no water, members volunteered to: • refurbish the galley and redecorate the club-house • renovate our race control cabin • rebuild our safety jetty • re-fence the boat park using reclaimed materials • Installed new units and new tiling in the galley. Redecoration of the rest of the club house should be done by the landlord (RMBC) but it’s easier and much quicker to do it ourselves! • The race control cabin was re-roofed, rotten wood replaced and the whole thing painted inside and out. • The safety jetty is next to the Race Control Cabin and used to be made of rusting scaffolding poles and planks. It was replaced by a substantial gabion and concrete construction. • When our safety boat was stolen, it was taken through the flimsy wood fence around the boat park. RMBC had no funds to replace the fence, but a committee member sourced some second-hand steel palisade fencing and we installed them ourselves over three weekends.

Relaunching the club and attracting new members • Maximum publicity by press, radio and television, posters and leaflets, website and social media • Celebrating excellent role models, from Olympic, national and regional champions, to young charity fund-raisers and our own volunteers • We joined in the park’s reopening Gala in August 2010 with a BBQ and trips on the water and have held Open Days every May since, offering free sailing tasters to over 100 people each year • We offer low-cost half-day Sailing Experiences – with discounts on subsequent membership. These start with crewing with one of our RYA-qualified volunteer instructors and aim to get people helming themselves round a simple course. (More info in the Notes Page for this slide.) The Experiences have been run on virtually every spare Saturday in the main season since 2011. Fewer days available since became a RTC, but still attracted 63 people in 2013 including special group sessions for local Explorer Scouts and for Home-Educated Children. Waiting list for 2014. Popular as birthday presents! • Use of the club’s modern RS Visions, Qubas and team kit means “all you need to bring is your enthusiasm” • Since the floods of 2007, we have maintained a high profile in the local press. • This was greatly helped by Paul Goodison, an Ulley member since childhood, winning Gold at the Beijing Olympics of 2008. His home-coming party was at Ulley was televised by Look North. • In 2010 our bosun received a Lifetime Achievement Award at both the Rotherham Sports Awards and the South Yorkshire Sports Awards. • In 2010 and 2011, a youth member had great success in YHYSA Travellers Series and NSSA Regatta. • In 2011, two of our younger sailors raised over £9000 for Brain Tumour Research by sailing the WLYC 24 Hour Race non-stop and also took the prize for top Yorkshire boat. • Half-day Sailing Experiences in 2013 cost just £15 per adult, £10 per junior or £30 for a family of four. Half of this refunded if they then join the Club. • Participants are kitted out with spray tops, waterproof trousers and buoyancy aids. • Sessions start with a classroom briefing followed by an on-shore introduction to the boats. • An instructor then takes them out on the water to teach them the basics of dinghy sailing, before they start sailing solo. • The aim is that they have at least an hour of sailing a simple course (e.g. figure- of-eight) by themselves.

Getting people on the water 1 - Safety and Training • Safety boat – all safety officers are trained and must take refresher in month before their duty • Many members qualified First Aiders - 2 courses this year both full • Our first RYA levels 1 and 2 courses were all full • Our RYA Ladies that Launch initiative was oversubscribed • Sailing training offered free to members – especially new recruits – every month • Weekly blackboard training in winter • All our instructors are enthusiastic sailors and give their services for free! • Safety is always a priority. • No on-the-water activities without a manned safety boat. • Safety boat crews must have Level 2 Powerboat or pass our in-house training every year before their safety duties. • Still feeling our way as a RTC, so initial Level 1 & 2 courses limited to 6 participants. • Safety-boat and sailing training is offered to all members, free of charge, on the third Saturday in each month during the main sailing season – safety boat in the morning, sailing in the afternoon. • Blackboard training is offered in the clubhouse every Wednesday evening from autumn to spring. The bar is open afterwards!