Club announced as Finalist in UK Awards

As part of changes to the RYA Scotland Annual Awards we integrated our Club of the Year with the RYA / Yachts and Yachting Club of the Year 2020 award supported by Gallagher and announced the finalist for Scotland at Scotland’s Boat Show.

Several commendable nominations were put forward with Prestwick Sailing Club being selected by the UK panel to go forward as a finalist for the public vote in the UK awards and recognised for their commitment to boosting membership.

Paul Gilmore of Prestwick Sailing club commented. “We are amazed at become a finalist for this award. We have done a lot of expansion and development over the past few years which we have received a good few compliments around and can only hope for the best. We will start getting everyone behind us as the voting opens and as long as we can push and develop Prestwick a lot more we’ll keep going.”

Neil Beveridge added. “Everybody in Scotland can vote for us now!”

We asked Neil what makes the club special.

“The main thing has been our team of instructors who are all club members and have come through our training, learnt to sail here and are now paid instructors. They have a great rapport with groups like the Sir Thomas Lipton Foundation, which we ran for two weeks this year. The kids come off the water with massive smiles having had a great time on the water and on the beach.”

“Sarah Green has been great at encouraging women and girls to get on the water. This has resulted in the club getting awarded two new boats from Hartley to compliment the sessions and expand into some race coaching next season.”

“On the back of the Sunsail award, Ian Walker spoke at the club last month, at a very well attended evening and included a special coaching session on the water. In addition to the sailing and powerboat training in 2020 we are adding some paddle board sessions as the people who took part in taters this season absolutely loved it. We are also looking to attract more of the community to come down, get involved and try sailing.”

Find out more about the RYA / Yachts and Yachting Club of the year 2020 here.

The RYA Scotland Annual Awards are welcoming nominations until the 31st of October with awards across volunteering and achievement. Nominate Now.