Dear Sailors, Volunteers and Supporters,

We are so grateful for the support this year and have be posting on our social media channels but forgetting to write here and update those who miss out, so thought we’d give you a little summary of our 2021 summer.

This year has probably been one of the most fun, yet busy years, coming out of the pandemic was extremely hard, with many enthusiastic individuals all with different passions, many new sailors and volunteers.

Our biggest success was also our hardest hurdle to get over, where at the end of 2020, many of our old sailors had purchased boats, many of our old team and trainees had stepped over to crew for them. Whilst this was a big hit on experienced hands needed, we were very lucky that many new volunteers and sailors were stepping forwards and we are very excited to tell you some of there stories in more detail soon.

After lock down 3, it was hitting home how much time we had lost, the winter is our time to gain experience for our new sailors. Sail training whilst the Solent is quiet, growing new friendships and confidence on and off of the water.

Either way we came back harder and stronger, we had dolphin away for a re-fit that did successfully bring her mast back and have a lot of work done to her, but sadly wasn’t finished for the start of Cowes week giving us days to prep her. Sailing her in an unfinished condition though we were very proud of her result.

Cowes Week for us is a celebration with friends, if anything its more about the racing than it has been in many years and Cowes Week LTD did an amazing job to pull it off this year.

But for ACF this is about achievements, inclusion of disabled sailors alongside able, showing that disabled sailors with the correct support can be enabled to also make a podium and a valued member of the team.

Also the ability to introduce new disabled and volunteers to a busy environment, where we truly have to work as a team to prep, race, pack up, repair, eat, debrief, plan, learn, BREATHE to make it all happen. And most of all, include each other.

To our amazement we made 3 teams happen thanks to the support of key volunteers, also some how we promoted and re-launched the UK Sonar Class after many years of being dormant to have a successful 16 boats and inspired more for next years event already.

With a huge push to get ready we needed a good rest post Cowes Week, with many sailors disappearing to sort out other areas of life, catching up with friends and family we hadn’t seen in 2 years and generally finding individuals are still getting back off of there feet post the pandemic. Now there is light at the end of the tunnel we are calling this our long Covid, i.e. organisations will be struggling for a while yet to get fully back off of there feet.

Moving forwards though we are feeling excited, stronger, building our new volunteer experiences, new volunteers trained to be powerboat drivers also increasing our abilities to grow. We have a long way still to go but are excited by the journey.

Finding many new sailors touching base with us all the time, if you haven’t heard from us in a while then please do touch base, its not that you are forgotten, you are certainly not. Just we haven’t stopped and are excited to see you out sailing with us again.

Otherwise please remember the best way to say hi is to come and play, remember RSVP’s even if a no or maybe really help with planning as numbers are limited until we can increase the skill of the new volunteers who are working hard to build there experience up.

Further updates;
– All events for next year are up and live, please check, subscribe to your diary’s and RSVP where you can.
- Cowes Week 2022 – hoping to encourage you before Christmas and reward those who sign up early. We are expecting more boats and more fun :)
- UK Class Nationals 2022 – Road/Sail Trip to Shoreham (Sussex Yacht Club), there will only be space for 2 boats worth so selections will take place for those who RSVP.
- Other exciting opportunities to come out this winter so places keep an eye out for them.

Volunteers;- we are developing our main website to show more on volunteering, Due to the growth of many new inexperienced help, we need to focus on growing more volunteers and thus are looking for help in certain areas, such as;

- Fundraising support – (helping to write letters)
- Volunteers for events – such as selling raffle tickets at organised events.
- Shore support – ACF support to help CCYC support us all year but mainly in the winter with Tea/Coffee/Soup etc…
- Experienced Skippers and competent crew are always needed.

We will send out more on Volunteering info asap but don’t hesitate to get in touch via info@acfsailing.org

As always a huge thank you to all of our supporters which we will send some more information out on soon also :)

Yours sincerely,

The ACF Sailing Team