Scaramouche Sailing Trust: 2025 Charity of the Year

Sailing Today selected the Scaramouche Sailing Trust to be our charity of the year for 2025. Milly Karsten discovers what they are all about.

Greig City Academy’s sailing programme is well known on the Solent and around the country for inspiring young sailors and providing dedicated support for future success on and off the water.  It has proved that sailing can and does change lives and that the sailing community is ready to embrace that change. We take a look back at ‘Project Scaramouche’ and bring you up to date with the school’s leading role in encouraging inclusivity in sailing and the opportunities that Scaramouche Sailing Trust continues to create.

In 2017, a team of state school children and their teachers from one of the most deprived boroughs in London sparked the media and sailing world’s attention –  on board Scaramouche they had completed the prestigious Fastnet race, coming an impressive 144th out of 362. 

In their recent 10th year report, Greig City Academy (GCA) and the Scaramouche Sailing Trust underlined the diversity at the heart of programme, describing how ‘1100 students come from a wide range of ethnic backgrounds, 63% have English as their second language, and 33% are eligible for free school meals, well above the national average’. While being far detached from the sea, and leisure boating and racing communities in every sense, these inner-city students have taken the sailing world by storm and continue to break down barriers across the sport and industry. 

How it Began

Three years before Scaramouche’s Fastnet, in 2014, two Greig City Academy teachers introduced sailing as a new outdoor education activity, beginning with weekend dinghy sailing in Poole Harbour (120 miles drive). The students took to it instantly, and as popularity grew one of the teachers, Jon Holt, saw they could take it further. He found Nimrod, a neglected 22ft cruiser in need of a little love, on Ebay and persuaded GCA to buy her.

With Jon’s guidance the students did her up, but Nimrod was no racing boat, so they set their sights higher, looking towards the Fastnet. They needed a racer in good shape, and they needed to start building up sea miles. With support and advice from the likes of Tracy Edwards, Chay Blythe and Lawrie Smith, Jon kept the momentum going and convinced the school to invest further, this time in a 45ft ex-Admiral’s Cup racing yacht – Scaramouche. 

Scaramouche: Solent Racing and the 2017 Fastnet 

With some professional help, Scaramouche was ready to go, and so were the students. On the Solent, with Jon and support from others, they quickly began gaining seagoing experience, triumphing at Cowes Week and Round the Island, attracting attention and getting stuck into fundraising. Project Scaramouche, as the campaign was dubbed, received much needed encouragement from the sailing community in the form of donations, coaching and boat improvements, along with sponsorship from Pioneer Underwriters, helping the students meet all the requirements for the 2017 Fastnet. 

Surpassing expectations, coming in the top half of all the starters, the achievements of the Scaramouche Project in the 2017 Fastnet were recognised throughout the sailing community. Not only had a group of students competed strongly in one of the most prestigious offshore races, but they had done so from a state school in a relatively deprived and diverse area – a far cry from the somewhat non-representational community of the yachting and racing world.

After Scaramouche’s First Fastnet 

But the 2017 Fastnet was only the beginning. The Academy’s programme and the outstanding achievements of the students continued to snowball and gain momentum. In 2019, Scaramouche and her crew completed their second Fastnet, becoming the first and only state school to participate back-to-back. In 2021, Scaramouche Sailing Trust, the charity set up to support the programme, became the official charity of Cowes Week, with the GCA’s participation increasing to five different crews. By 2022, the GCA’s quarter-tonner (Cote) and one of their mini-tonners (Riot), were fully fledged members of the racing circuit, with Cote’s students winning the IRC Nationals and their Round the Island class, and Riot’s triumphing in the Christchurch Bay Race. 

Over the last two years, the sailing community has begun to see some of GCA’s star students hitting the biggest leagues, with Jesse Opoku-Ware and Christopher-Joel Frederick excelling at Cowes Week and Kai Hockley becoming a household name, winning the 2017 Musto Young Skipper Trophy ahead of his selection for the first ever Team Emirates GBR SailGP internship. 

“It is quite remarkable what has been achieved in 10 years. The momentum is driven by the students themselves with increasing numbers of young people starting ‘give-it-a-go’ dinghy sailing locally. This increase has undoubtedly been inspired by the racing results of our older sailors competing (and often winning) in national open events where there is a level playing field. The different classes of boats available to those that want to stretch themselves, helps ensure that there is truly an opportunity for all.” – Lucy Markby, Development Manager for Scaramouche Sailing Trust

GCA sailing has now become one of the front running student sailing programmes in Britain, across all schools, state and private. What’s more, with the aid of the Scaramouche Sailing Trust, GCA sailing continues to lead the way by helping to introduce and establish genuine ethnic diversity in British sailing.

GCA Sailing Programme Today

From the humble beginnings of Jon Holt’s Poole Harbour weekend sailing trips, to the successes throughout today’s GCA’s sailing programme, this is a story of determination, breaking barriers, and inclusivity, something that the sailing world is ever in need of. 

In the past 10 years of the programme, more than 1000 students have learnt the basics of sailing, developing self-confidence, resilience and practical skills along the way. The programme also has seen, possibly as a result of their involvement in sailing, 260 students progressing to higher than expected levels of tertiary education. What’s more the maritime industry recognises the value that a more diverse workforce can bring. They understand the skills and talents that have been developed through the programme, from seamanship, boat maintenance, skippering as well as the commitment, drive, and team work that sailing teaches. Many of the young sailors have left school and are pursuing careers in the industry from superyachts, to marine recruitment, to instructing.

“The school and wider community are filled with awe at what has been achieved. With the internship being created by Emirates and Sail GP team last year, we have seen Kai (Hockley) raise his sailing game beyond his wildest dreams.” – Lucy Markby, Development Manager for Scaramouche Sailing Trust

Now the Head of Sixth Form, Head of Outdoor Activities, and still helping students get out sailing on the weekends, Jon Holt continues to be a driving force for all round inclusion and progress. For Jon, ‘the most important outcome is that we have shown that sailing is a sport that can lead directly and indirectly to a range of amazing opportunities and careers’. Nevertheless, Jon tells us there are still considerable hurdles to overcome…

“We are currently facing two challenges. Firstly, the cost of time and money to enable people from non-sailing & disadvantaged backgrounds to take part in sailing at all levels is significant, especially for sailors wanting to compete in national events. The second challenge is supporting other state schools to undertake sailing as a sport. With pressure on staff and for funding in the state sector, those challenges can seem insurmountable. However, we now have a programme that incorporates a broad range of sailing activities, and this means we feel we are in a good position to help other state schools develop their own sailing activities.” – Jon Holt

A sailing programme for girls, designed by girls 

With the support of inspiring female sailors like Tracy Edwards, Pip Hare, and Hannah Mills, GCA sailing and the Scaramouche Sailing Trust are currently focusing on bringing young girls to the forefront of the sport. In preparation for next 10 years, they are designing a program, with girls, for girls and have acquired an all-female boat to help bridge the gap between lower level dinghies and the other classes.

Older female students, such as Samiya Miah – Scaramouche’s skipper for the 2023 Round the Island and Silicon Cup events – who earned her Dinghy Instructor certification with GCA and is currently training to become a marine paramedic, are also playing a key role in inspiring the next generation. By serving as a powerful role model, Samiya and other female sailors in the programme offer essential representation and encouragement for young girls of all backgrounds to get involved.

How to Support or Get Involved 

If you are interested in supporting young people who want to experience sailing whatever their background, or help accelerate learning for those with potential and dedication in performance racing, please contact lucy@scaramouchesailing.org.uk

Visit the Scaramouche Sailing website to find out more, or donate online.

The post Scaramouche Sailing Trust: 2025 Charity of the Year appeared first on Sailing Today.