Passage Racing and the R.O.R.C.

The immediate appeal of passage racing was a strange phenomenon of the immediate post-war period.  In 1947 began the first of these races, to Poole and Round the Island, which were to add such lustre to the R.L.Y.C. membership: names such as Adlard Coles, Humphrey Barton and Jack Giles, Vernon Sainsbury, Mostyn-Williams, HG May and Max Solly; Bill Martineau, Errol Bruce and Brian Macnamara; Jack Bryans, Gerald Potter, Claude Knight and Maurice Hope; Christopher Biddle, Sir Peter Bristow; Roger Pinkney, Bill Fryer and  and Ted Barraclough; the McMullen family - then Club is privileged to include such names, but it is invidious to attempt a comprehensive record when space is so restrictive.  Suffice to state that the RORC whose Commodores include the names of the RYC members AV Sainsbury and WM Vernon, flourishes with the years, as witnessed by the world-wide fame of the Fastnet and present -day ocean racing.  Outstanding cruises were made, some round the world, that of Anne and Tom Wroth in 1953 being particularly memorable.

Lymington develops into a major Yachting Centre:

The explosion of boating during the 50s and 60s was a phenomenon peculiar to our Island Race. Whether the compulsive urge to sail, drive or paddle any craft that can float is a condition for the psychologist; or, more probably, an escape from the pressures of over-crowded Britain and the Bureaucrat, the fact remains that, statistically, for every foreigner, 200 more Britons take to the water.

History declared that Lymington should develop along recreational lines and geography has conveniently decreed our estuary to be the gateway to France. Accessible with Yarmouth as one of the twin havens at the neck of the Needles Channel, it was inevitable that Lymington should attract the keel-boat. Marinas, boat yards and ancillary industries have sprung up in response to the demand which by 1990 will have reached astronomical proportions. There can be only one over-riding question: when to cry, "Enough is enough" ?