before it had opened, they’d already started the 400-berth extension,
and they have another eight marinas planned for that city. There are 200
new cities earmarked for the coast. The rest of the world won’t create
200 cities!
What exactly is Clipper China – a mix of yacht production and
sail training?
It’s the whole gambit. Clipper Ventures is the biggest single provider
of offshore sail training in the world and over the past two decades,
we’ve trained over 5,000 sailors for the Clipper Race. However, the
potential for sailing in China means it could take us just a couple of
years to train the same number here.
We’re working with the China Yachting Association (CYA),
combining forces to bring our offshore sail training expertise to the
Chinese sailing industry, which is evolving in an exciting way.
It started off by them needing recognised training with qualifications.
I didn’t think some of the other enterprises who were coming in were
giving them the right qualifications or training because we’d met a lot of
Chinese who came along with sailing certificates, but had no idea.
I believe the RYA is the strongest programme and it’s tough to get
registered as a school, because their standards are very high. So, we felt
that if the Chinese wanted to do something, it should at least be based
on the RYA programme.
Coupled with that, we’re also seeing Chinese citizens paying with
their own money to participate in the Clipper Race, not just those who
have been selected as ambassador crew.
There’s business potential there because if you take just a small
percentage of the 1 billion plus population, you could potentially have a
sailing community bigger than the population of Great Britain.
We also felt we should give something back as China has been such
a strong supporter of the race, which is why set up Clipper China.
China has plenty of dinghy sailors and people that teach kids, but
little beyond that, such as sailing schools for keelboats and offshore
boats, and that’s what the CYA wants. They also realise there’s an
industry behind it and we’re one of the pieces needed to move this
forward.
We had Tony Castro Design in the UK design these two new boats- 7m and 12m. These boats will be used in the cities where we teach
sailing. Once that’s all up and running, we’ll then create inshore and
offshore events in these areas, as well as city-to-city races, then country-
to-country races. Beyond that, it’s exhibitions, merchandise and much
more.
At the moment, there are races that allow people to participate with
no sailing experience. It will kill the sport because it will kill people. It’s
a dangerous sport, regardless of training. We’ve had three fatalities in
our race over 23 years. It’s three too many, but our overall record is very,
Clipper China’s cooperation with the Chinese Yachting Association was announced in Beijing and will include offshore sail training in multiple citiesQingdao is partnering the Clipper Race for an eighth straight edition in 2019-20
as a record three Chinese-sponsored yachts participateYang Guofeng, Jin Mengni and Daniel Newham on Sanya Serenity Coast,
winner of the 2017-18 race