Bury Lake Young Mariners receive funding from the Tackling Inequalities Fund

Bury Lake Young Mariners (BLYM) based in Rickmansworth, Hertfordshire, has recently been awarded funding from the Sport England and RYA Tackling Inequalities Fund, to help get more people on the water, and to train more instructors.

29 Oct 21

BLYM is a charity run entirely by volunteers, and has been committed to the development of young people through sailing and related activities for over thirty years. BLYM aims to make sailing and water sports accessible to all young, disabled, and disadvantaged people, regardless of personal background. In addition, BLYM is also highly inclusive, encouraging people of all backgrounds and ages to enjoy water sports. In a normal year, they take over 6000 people onto the water. BLYM’s service for disabled people is provided with their co-located partner charity, Colne Valley Special Sailors.

BLYM is an RYA training centre, delivering courses from beginner to advanced levels as well as developing RYA-qualified sailing and water-sport instructors. Most of their instructors learned to sail at BLYM. The experience and life skills developed through participating in these activities, as a sailor, volunteer, or instructor, are often transformational to mental and physical well-being as well as personal development.

The TIF funds from RYA and Sport England will be used tohelp get more people on the water, and to enjoy the benefits of water sports, accessibly and at a low cost. It will further enable BLYM to train sailing and power boat instructors, to help further their projects.

David Ridout, the Chairman of BLYM, outlined how this funding will make a huge difference, with outcomes including significant fitness and mental health benefits, saying: “We are excited that this funding will allow BLYM to work in partnership with the RYA and Sport England to enable people, especially young people from economically-disadvantaged backgrounds, the BAME community or who are disabled or have other long term health conditions, to enjoy the benefits of sailing and water-sports”.

If you’d like to find out more about how to get out on the water and start your sailing adventure visit https://www.rya.org.uk/start-boating or to find out more about Bury Lake Young Mariners visit https://blym.org.uk/