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24th August 2022

Groundbreaking Diploma in Sporting Excellence Returns for English Youth Sailors in 2022

School students in England starting Year 12 this September who are interested in racing keelboats and want to have a future career in sailing or sports science have the change to apply for the RYA’s Diploma in Sporting Excellence programme for 2022.

The Diploma in Sporting Excellence (DiSE) is a two-year education programme and a unique sporting qualification designed to meet the needs of student-athletes who exhibit the potential to achieve excellence in their sport.

DiSE supports young sailors in the talent system in England to combine sport and education so that they have the skills, knowledge, and competence to pursue sporting excellence alongside developing the skills and qualifications for a post-sailing career.

And it may provide a model for the advancement of youth sailors in other RYA regions, such as Scotland and Northern Ireland.

The programme provides a comprehensive syllabus to support young sailors to gain an additional qualification (worth 64 UCAS points) and achieve their full potential within the RYA sailing/keelboat pathway. The programme aims to increase the accessibility and diversity of the sailing participation base and talent pathway.

Each year the RYA bids for programme places through Sport England and Department for Education. This year we were successful in securing 12 places in an ever-continuing competitive process with all Olympic and non-Olympic sports.

“We are tremendously proud of the impact and difference this programme has made within the youth classes and keelboat sailors,” said Jack Grundy, RYA performance manager and DiSE programme lead.

“This programme has helped sailors’ next steps within the maritime, performance pathway and higher education options. More importantly, it has given them further development in all the small things like nutrition and psychology that help them mature into professional sailors for the future.”

The programme aims to increase the accessibility and diversity of the sailing participation base and talent pathway | Credit: Paul Wyeth/RYAThe programme aims to increase the accessibility and diversity of the sailing participation base and talent pathway | Credit: Paul Wyeth/RYA

Ellie Thomas, a 420 sailor on DiSE, added: “The DiSE programme has been hugely beneficial to my sailing. The training camps have been amazing with some great quality coaching. The theory sessions have helped me to understand what else goes into being successful within sport. The programme has run smoothly due to the great organisation, and it has been great to be a part of it.”

To be eligible for the DiSE programme, a student must meet the following criteria:

  1. Be aged 16 to 18 and starting Year 12 in September 2022, in full-time education (or aged 19 to 24 if they have an Education, Health and Care (EHC) plan), when they start the programme.
  2. Aspire to progress onto the British Keelboat Academy or other future performance programmes.
  3. Be studying at a state education institute, or if a student attends a fee-paying school, they must be in receipt of one of a 50% scholarship. See the application form for further details.
  4. Ideally have a minimum of five GCSEs at a minimum grade of 4 (or above), including Maths and English.

The programme only only 12 places, and these are being run exclusively on a keelboat programme in line with Sport England’s aims and impact of DiSE. Therefore, the technical and tactical sessions will be on a keelboat with other students who you may not have met before.

The technical and tactical element (sailing) will usually take place over eight weekends, with delivery over 18 months. The theory will take place at camps and remotely. Access to laptops will be required.

The programme will commence in late October or early November and is more than just sailing; successful applicants will be required to complete coursebooks and will have access to 1:1 sessions with a sports psychologist, sports nutritionist, mentor and coach sessions which are a part of the Diploma. You will also be required to record all sailing and training hours outside of the programme.

Click HERE for the application form, which requires parental/guardian consent.

Applications must be submitted by 11.59pm on Sunday 4 September. If you have any issues with submitting the form, email [email protected]. You will be notified by Friday 9 September if your application has been successful.

Published in RYA Northern Ireland
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Volvo Dun Laoghaire Regatta

From the Baily lighthouse to Dalkey island, the bay accommodates six separate courses for 21 different classes racing every two years for the Dun Laoghaire Regatta.

In assembling its record-breaking armada, Volvo Dun Laoghaire regatta (VDLR) became, at its second staging, not only the country's biggest sailing event, with 3,500 sailors competing, but also one of Ireland's largest participant sporting events.

One of the reasons for this, ironically, is that competitors across Europe have become jaded by well-worn venue claims attempting to replicate Cowes and Cork Week.'Never mind the quality, feel the width' has been a criticism of modern-day regattas where organisers mistakenly focus on being the biggest to be the best. Dun Laoghaire, with its local fleet of 300 boats, never set out to be the biggest. Its priority focussed instead on quality racing even after it got off to a spectacularly wrong start when the event was becalmed for four days at its first attempt.

The idea to rekindle a combined Dublin bay event resurfaced after an absence of almost 40 years, mostly because of the persistence of a passionate race officer Brian Craig who believed that Dun Laoghaire could become the Cowes of the Irish Sea if the town and the local clubs worked together. Although fickle winds conspired against him in 2005, the support of all four Dun Laoghaire waterfront yacht clubs since then (made up of Dun Laoghaire Motor YC, National YC, Royal Irish YC and Royal St GYC), in association with the two racing clubs of Dublin Bay SC and Royal Alfred YC, gave him the momentum to carry on.

There is no doubt that sailors have also responded with their support from all four coasts. Running for four days, the regatta is (after the large mini-marathons) the single most significant participant sports event in the country, requiring the services of 280 volunteers on and off the water, as well as top international race officers and an international jury, to resolve racing disputes representing five countries. A flotilla of 25 boats regularly races from the Royal Dee near Liverpool to Dublin for the Lyver Trophy to coincide with the event. The race also doubles as a RORC qualifying race for the Fastnet.

Sailors from the Ribble, Mersey, the Menai Straits, Anglesey, Cardigan Bay and the Isle of Man have to travel three times the distance to the Solent as they do to Dublin Bay. This, claims Craig, is one of the major selling points of the Irish event and explains the range of entries from marinas as far away as Yorkshire's Whitby YC and the Isle of Wight.

No other regatta in the Irish Sea area can claim to have such a reach. Dublin Bay Weeks such as this petered out in the 1960s, and it has taken almost four decades for the waterfront clubs to come together to produce a spectacle on and off the water to rival Cowes."The fact that we are getting such numbers means it is inevitable that it is compared with Cowes," said Craig. However, there the comparison ends."We're doing our own thing here. Dun Laoghaire is unique, and we are making an extraordinary effort to welcome visitors from abroad," he added. The busiest shipping lane in the country – across the bay to Dublin port – closes temporarily to facilitate the regatta and the placing of six separate courses each day.

A fleet total of this size represents something of an unknown quantity on the bay as it is more than double the size of any other regatta ever held there.

Volvo Dun Laoghaire Regatta FAQs

Dun Laoghaire Regatta is Ireland's biggest sailing event. It is held every second Summer at Dun Laoghaire Harbour on Dublin Bay.

Dun Laoghaire Regatta is held every two years, typically in the first weekend of July.

As its name suggests, the event is based at Dun Laoghaire Harbour. Racing is held on Dublin Bay over as many as six different courses with a coastal route that extends out into the Irish Sea. Ashore, the festivities are held across the town but mostly in the four organising yacht clubs.

Dun Laoghaire Regatta is the largest sailing regatta in Ireland and on the Irish Sea and the second largest in the British Isles. It has a fleet of 500 competing boats and up to 3,000 sailors. Scotland's biggest regatta on the Clyde is less than half the size of the Dun Laoghaire event. After the Dublin city marathon, the regatta is one of the most significant single participant sporting events in the country in terms of Irish sporting events.

The modern Dublin Bay Regatta began in 2005, but it owes its roots to earlier combined Dublin Bay Regattas of the 1960s.

Up to 500 boats regularly compete.

Up to 70 different yacht clubs are represented.

The Channel Islands, Isle of Man, England, Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland, Ireland countrywide, and Dublin clubs.

Nearly half the sailors, over 1,000, travel to participate from outside of Dun Laoghaire and from overseas to race and socialise in Dun Laoghaire.

21 different classes are competing at Dun Laoghaire Regatta. As well as four IRC Divisions from 50-footers down to 20-foot day boats and White Sails, there are also extensive one-design keelboat and dinghy fleets to include all the fleets that regularly race on the Bay such as Beneteau 31.7s, Ruffian 23s, Sigma 33s as well as Flying Fifteens, Laser SB20s plus some visiting fleets such as the RS Elites from Belfast Lough to name by one.

 

Some sailing household names are regular competitors at the biennial Dun Laoghaire event including Dun Laoghaire Olympic silver medalist, Annalise Murphy. International sailing stars are competing too such as Mike McIntyre, a British Olympic Gold medalist and a raft of World and European class champions.

There are different entry fees for different size boats. A 40-foot yacht will pay up to €550, but a 14-foot dinghy such as Laser will pay €95. Full entry fee details are contained in the Regatta Notice of Race document.

Spectators can see the boats racing on six courses from any vantage point on the southern shore of Dublin Bay. As well as from the Harbour walls itself, it is also possible to see the boats from Sandycove, Dalkey and Killiney, especially when the boats compete over inshore coastal courses or have in-harbour finishes.

Very favourably. It is often compared to Cowes, Britain's biggest regatta on the Isle of Wight that has 1,000 entries. However, sailors based in the north of England have to travel three times the distance to get to Cowes as they do to Dun Laoghaire.

Dun Laoghaire Regatta is unique because of its compact site offering four different yacht clubs within the harbour and the race tracks' proximity, just a five-minute sail from shore. International sailors also speak of its international travel connections and being so close to Dublin city. The regatta also prides itself on balancing excellent competition with good fun ashore.

The Organising Authority (OA) of Volvo Dun Laoghaire Regatta is Dublin Bay Regattas Ltd, a not-for-profit company, beneficially owned by Dun Laoghaire Motor Yacht Club (DMYC), National Yacht Club (NYC), Royal Irish Yacht Club (RIYC) and Royal St George Yacht Club (RSGYC).

The Irish Marine Federation launched a case study on the 2009 Volvo Dun Laoghaire Regatta's socio-economic significance. Over four days, the study (carried out by Irish Sea Marine Leisure Knowledge Network) found the event was worth nearly €3million to the local economy over the four days of the event. Typically the Royal Marine Hotel and Haddington Hotel and other local providers are fully booked for the event.

©Afloat 2020

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