A DENGIE based sailing club has been shortlisted as a finalist for club of the year for the UK.

Marconi Sailing Club (MSC), based in Stansgate Road, Steeple, is in the running for the Royal Yachting Association and Yachts and Yachting’s Club of the Year award, which recognizes and celebrates the outstanding achievements of UK sailing clubs.

MSC is one of the South East’s leading sailing clubs, and has been selected as a finalist because of its innovative approach to making sailing accessible to all - enabling its new and existing members to get on the water.

One of its top initiatives is associated with its Keelboat fleet. In 2015, the Club recognised that an increasing number of new members wanted to learn to sail yachts and participate in racing, but the club had insufficient boats to cope with demand.

To overcome this, they formed the Keelboat programme – investing in a number of boats to increase capacity.

Now, the Keelboat programme has proven so popular it has seen the formation of club keelboat racing.

This has led to the club building a competitive team that entered the British Keelboat League (BKL) and participated in the BKL Youth Event on the Solent in October 2017.

Peter Ward, who initiated the Keelboat programme, said: “The club’s involvement in BKL has provided great opportunities for members to gain race experience and develop their skills in numerous ways, including as race officials and umpires.

“It has also introduced 50 non-sailing adults to big boat sailing and developed regular race crew for new members in 2017. As a result, 21 new members have joined the club from this initiative alone and now race regularly.”

Michaela Dowley, Commodore of MSC, said: “We are absolutely thrilled to be a finalist for the innovation category, and to be in with a chance of being crowned the RYA Club of the Year. We’ve run many initiatives over the year, but the Keelboat programme is by far one of our most successful.

“Whether they are new to sailing or more experienced, it has attracted new members, created a degree of competitiveness and brought all our fleets together. It is something we are all excited about growing in the future.”

The winner of RYA Club of the Year will be announced and presented with their trophy at the RYA Dinghy Show on Saturday March 3.

To vote, visit www.marconi-sc.org.uk.