Witham's Paul Is Lincolnshire Volunteer Of The Year
by Karenza Morton.
Date: 21 November 2011
Witham Sailing Club’s Paul Burton has been named the RYA East Midlands’ Lincolnshire Volunteer of the Year after helping drive the most memorable year in the Boston club’s recent history.
But the 38-year-old Boston-born father of two admits he now cannot wait to try to make 2012 even better!
This year Paul, who works as a self-employed domestic electrician, has been instrumental in Witham SC gaining recognised RYA Training Centre status, enabling the club to run RYA courses in sailing and powerboating to provide an invaluable income stream, and helped put in place pathways for newcomers to stay involved in Witham SC and the sport long-term.
Principal of the club’s Training Centre
After obtaining a number of senior instructor qualifications, Paul is now Principal of the club’s new Training Centre and is responsible for overseeing quality learn to sail and powerboat tuition for the local community, as well as helping other volunteers train to become instructors to help support further activity and club growth.
Over the next year three times as many people in and around Boston will be able to learn to sail at Witham SC thanks to all the work that has gone on at the club, including obtaining grants for additional new equipment and facilities, over the past 12-18 months.
Paul says he cannot wait to see club activity unfold on a bigger scale than ever before.
“Witham has greatly changed from when I first rejoined in 2000. Twenty years ago it was largely a cruising keelboat club, which was not a problem in itself it just meant that when people either sold their boats or stopped sailing there was no sustainable flow of members coming through the club to preserve the club’s long-term health.
“Now the popularity of dinghy sailing means we are having to create more and more dinghy spaces! We have 41 family members who are very active, and we regularly see 20 dinghies racing on a Wednesday evening. Not many clubs nationally can say they get 50 percent of their members, and 75 percent of the dinghies in the park, out racing once a week.
“It has been amazing seeing the RYA Training Centre work. As a club we decided to pursue attaining RYA Training Centre two years ago. Seeing new members come in and existing members wanting to learn new skills is so satisfying.”
Paul, who is also vice chair of the RYA East Midlands Region and an RNLI volunteer, added: “Sailing is an active sport that genuinely anyone can get involved with. My whole family sails, my wife, my 13-year-old son, Joe, and 11-year-old daughter Lucy. Sailing can be very cheap, a family could join Witham SC for £65 and sail as much as they like using club boats for £1 a week. Sailing also has a great social side; I’ve made many great friends from sailing.”
Sail for Gold
Witham SC is also signed up to ‘Sail for Gold’, the RYA’s UK-wide programme to bring the 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games as close to home as possible for everyone and celebrate the build-up to London 2012.
Howard Nelson, RYA East Midlands Chair, said: “Paul has worked tirelessly to help provide the Lincolnshire community with even more extensive, quality opportunities to regularly get out on the water and with 2012 looming, the number and scale of these opportunities are set to increase. Paul fully deserves his RYA East Midlands’ Lincolnshire Volunteer of the Year Award.”
For more information about how you can get into sailing in Lincolnshire visit www.rya.org.uk/regions/eastmidlands
