The Youth Sailing Scheme introduces young people, between 8 and 16, to sailing at a pace scientifically designed to produce the best results. A lot of emphasis is put learn through play and giving the students as much time on the water as possible practisin the skills

Below is a break down of the 4 stages:

Stage 1

This is a complete beginner’s course, but by the end of the course the participant will be able to successfully launch and recover a dinghy and master the basics of sailing, including steering. No experience needed!

Stage 2

Building on the basic sailing skills from Stage 1, Stage 2 introduces sail handling skills, rope work and, vitally, collision avoidance! It’s recommended a participant goes through Stage 1 before hand, but both courses can be run together.

Stage 3

After becoming a confident sailor in Stages 1 and 2, Stage 3 spends more time on the shore looking at sailing theory, launching techniques and rigging. However there’s still a lot of practical sailing, with successful graduates being able to sail a triangular course and recover from a capsize. This is the equivalent to Level 2 of the Adult national syllabus.

Stage 4

Honing in on all the skills over the past 3 stages, Stage 4 moves onto larger double handed dinghies. Once a participant has passed through Stage 4 they can sail and manoeuvre a single and double handed dinghies round a triangular course leaving from beaches and pontoons in a variety of conditions. After this course it’s off to the National Sailing Scheme and its specialist courses.

As with most of the Dinghy and Keelboat courses the Youth Sailing Stages are mainly run over 2 days (i.e. a weekend), but they can also be broken down into chunks. While it is most common for these courses to be run using single handed and double handed dinghies they can also be taught on Keelboats and Multihulls.