The Milebuilding Club

The great strength of the Milebuilding Club is quality training on the Solent – mostly delivered one day-sail at a time

We schedule sailing every weekend – all year-round – plus regular longer mile building trips away for passage making experience

No formalities – just turn up and sail!

What is Mile Building?

Mile building is the process of building experience, sailing skills and confidence over a period of time. Mile building on the Solent is an especially rewarding activity because the Solent is busy, shallow in parts and strongly tidal.

It is often said that if you can sail the Solent you can sail anywhere;  maybe – maybe not, but when tackled as a member of the Milebuilding club it is undoubtedly a great place to build and consolidate essential sailing skills.

The Milebuilding Club

The Milebuilding Club has a long track-record of taking not-quite-there-yet sailors and moulding them into competent, savvy skippers with the all-round skills to confidently run their own yacht or successfully tackle the Yachtmaster exam.

Would you like to learn to sail on the Solent? Perhaps you would like to get into yacht sailing but don’t fancy intensive 5 day live-aboard courses – or have you taken a ‘skippering’ course only to be left feeling that you just aren’t there yet in terms of skills and confidence?

Day Sailing – Regular Year-Round Sailing

Regular day-sailing from Southampton. Weekly bite-sized sailing adventures that are easy to integrate into your diary. We sail Thunderbolt, our Bavaria 38 from Shamrock Quay, Southampton. Easy to get to – free parking.

Sailing is organised by email and online calendar. Once you have joined the club there is no deposit to find and no formalities each time you sail. The small membership means great availability and our ‘easy-in, easy-out’ terms make the club a low risk, high value route to solid all-round sailing competence.

Mile Building Trips Away

• Mile building adventures which add value to your membership and miles to your logbook
• Two formats – weekends away from Friday evening to Sunday afternoon or four day trips from Sunday – with just a modest daily charge
• Lots of time at the wheel – lots of time to trim sails – lots of time to reflect
• An opportunity to experience passage planning – passage making and night sailing
• Stay aboard Thunderbolt overnight in different marinas

Milebuilding Club Terms – at a Glance:

• Trial sail day: £150 – refunded on joining when membership runs from trial sail day
  
• Membership fees: £225 / month
  
• Joining deposit – 1 Month membership fees (returned on conclusion of membership)
• Notice period: 3 months
• Day-sailing – daily charge = £15 / day
• Trip away charges vary – contact us for details

Cost effective? Assuming a club member sails just one day per week on average, the cost per day is less than half that of a five-day ‘skippering’ course.

Milebuilding Club Values:

The Milebuilding club is built around two simple values

• Quality, informed training
• A cordial and comfortable atmosphere

Everything we do is informed by these core values. Consequently membership offers best value to those who are open to instruction and who enjoy the company of like minded fellow sailors

Who is the Milebuilding Club For?

• Complete beginners who want to get it right – right from the start
• Newly minted Day Skippers, who need to put some polish on their skills prior to chartering or moving on to boat ownership
• Ex boat-owners, who will appreciate the capped costs, no compulsory maintenance commitment and not having to find crew. You don’t even have to buy the milk – just turn up and sail!
• Essentially anyone who would like to sail and build skills with a focused, cordial crowd

What it is:

• A way to build solid sailing skills
• A club for new sailors who would like to sail regularly without fuss and formalities
• A club for sailors who would like to avoid a boat-ownership ‘runaway-costs’ nightmare while consolidating skills and making new sailing friends
  

What it isn’t:

• Elitist
• Complicated
• Something new – this is our 11th year
• A syndicate, shared ownership, yacht charter or corporate entertainment
• Lads days out – we’re here to sail – see Milebuilding club values above
• Beer & bullsh*t – see above

If you are a new sailor take the time to read our blog article on sailing etiquette. It was written to bring new sailors up to speed with those crucial onboard social skills and domestic niceties that make for a painless entrée into the sexy and glamorous world of yachting…

©The Milebuilding Club 2023 – All rights reserved