Sounds good Ray, informal club racing and enjoyable.

As far as the more serious yacht racing is concerned, Paul Freshney made considerable efforts in his last years as Editor to persuade the MYA people to contribute to the magazine to pubicise this aspect of the hobby but there was very little interest on the part of MYA members. There were a few articles but they quickly petered out. Much the same with the MPBA speed merchants. There have been a few contributions since Lindsey took over but it would seem that the competition modellers don’t see the magazine as relevant these days. It was very different in day gone by!

Colin

Interesting point.  I think most of us are the last of a dying breed as far as model boat builders, or even modellers in general, goes.  At my own club the yotties seem to keep themselves to themselves and even started to meet at different times outside the normal club times, causing a bit of a rift.  All a bit sad really when they can’t all play together nicely.

The yacht builders, who did used to integrate with everyone else, have now mainly passed away and the yotties now all buy the same models mentioned above.  I don’t think any of them build nowadays.  I think one interesting aspect of this is that the current crop of yotties don’t seem to value their boats as much as others and are always chopping and changing and buying the latest and greatest.  The builders on the other hand had their models for years and seemed to take the racing side far less seriously.

I’m very proud to be the owner of a scratch built yacht made by a superb modeller who has now sadly passed but I don’t race it because I’m totally useless with it.  I do enjoy simply sailing it though and don’t feel the need to compete with anyone else.  I actually bought it because I have always thought it is one of the most beautiful examples of hull woodwork I have ever seen.