How Can I Start Sailing At Spinnaker Sailing Club?
Published 09:26 on 6 May 2025
We have a range of ways we can help you either learn to sail or develop your confidence and refresh old skills for those of you who may not have sailed for a while!
Beginners - I've Never Sailed Before
Our lake offers a fantastic place to learn to sail with a range of boats to use, easy access to the water and a team of professional instructors. We run our beginner lessons in a few different formats, so hopefully one will work for you. We have seperate groups running for adults and children, or for families who would like to learn to sail together we can arrange bespoke lessons.
If you would like to learn to sail in a short period we offer a range of 2 and 5 day beginner courses, all leading towards Royal Yachting Association Certificates. For children these courses generally run Monday to Friday in the school holidays allowing children to work towards their RYA Youth Sailing Scheme Stages 1 & 2 in a single week, there is also the option to join for just the Monday and Tuesday to achieve the Stage 1 Certificate. We also have our Sunday morning programme of Spinnaker Youth Training which is booked in blocks of 6 weeks. There are multiple groups running within Spinnaker Youth Training based on ability, and the RYA Beginners group follows the RYA Stage 1 & 2 syllabus.
For adults we run a similar mixture of courses but at slightly different times. Mot of our 2-day adult courses run at weekends, or over bank holidays, with 5 day options running Monday to Friday. We also have a beginners group which runs on Tuesday evenings in June and July with 6 x 2-hour sessions allowing you to learn to sail after work.
I'm An Adult Who Has Sailed Before, But I'm A Bit Rusty
We have a range of improver groups ideal for those who my be a bit rusty and want to develop their skills with the support of an instructor. Most of these run on a Tuesday Evening, from 6pm to 8pm, and there is no set syllabus. Our instructors base their sessions round what the group want to learn. In the last few weeks we've looked at a diverse range of skills including better sail setting, sailing backwards and better tacking (turning). We also regularly find that for those who can remember the basics attending one of our 2-day RYA Level 2 Dinghy Sailing courses on a weekend is a great way to remember the basics and develop a few new skills to boost your confidence.
Alternatively for those who re rusty but confident we have our Social Sailing sessions on Thursday mornings which are an ideal way to get out in a dinghy by yourself, with the comfort of knowing an instructor is on hand to assist with rigging and provide safety cover just in case you need a little help.
What Can I Do After I've Learnt?
The big advantage of developing your sailing skills as a beginner/improver at Spinnaker Sailing Club is that you can continue sailing with us long after you've learnt! As a sailing club we not only offer lessons but have an active racing programme, social sailing sessions and our aim when you learn with us is we give you the skills to sail independently and enjoy time on the water whether it's cruising, racing or challenging yourself to go as fast as possible!#
For more information please get in touch with out team in the office, have a look at the Training pages on our website or come down and visit us!
Last updated 09:26 on 6 May 2025
