£3,000+ prizes for stories and photos of inspiring encounters at sea

Entries are open for Yachting Monthly’s annual environmental journalism award, the 2026 Brian Black Memorial Award sponsored by Coppercoat

Back for a sixth year, Yachting Monthly is running the Brian Black Memorial Award in partnership with Coppercoat. The award commemorates Brian and Lesley Black, trailblazing sailors, environmentalists and journalists. This year, there are over £3,000-worth of prizes to be won for the best article and the best photos of the marine environment on the theme of ‘Our Inspiring Seas’. 

 

The judges are looking for article and photographs that capture an inspiring encounter that you have had with marine wildlife or the marine environment more generally that impacted, inspired and changed you in some way. The photo competition is open to adults with a separate category for young people aged 16 or under. 

Judges include multiple circumnavigator Mike Golding, TV presenter and environmentalist Monty Halls, as well as conservationist Dr Bob Brown, Brian Black’s daughter Sarah Brown and the editorial teams of Yachting Monthly and Digital Camera World.

How to enter + Ts & Cs

Submit an entry to the article competition

Submit an entry to the adult photo competition

Submit an entry to the junior photo competition

Inspiring encounters

For the article, they would love to hear about a sailing voyage that lead to such an encounter, written in such a way that is itself inspiring and takes the reader with you on your voyage. Don’t just describe what you saw; help the reader feel, see, understand and be changed and inspired by your experience, and makes them want to go out and do something as a result of having read your article. Your piece of writing should about 1,800 words long and presented with 20-30 images. The images should be supplied with captions in the body of the text article, and you should also supply a photo of yourself, along with a 100-word biography, and images of your boat, crew and life on board, as well as of the marine environment

For the photo, this should be a single image that captures the essence of your encounter with the marine environment or marine widlife, accompanied by a 300-word explanation of what, where, why and how you took the photo, and why the image has impacted and inspired and changed you. The winning photo won’t just show something beautiful, but will reveal or challenge an aspect of the viewer’s relationship with the marine environment. You should also supply a photo of yourself and a 100-word biography.

Prizes

Thanks to the support of Coppercoat, the prize for the winning article will be £1,500 in cash, along with publication in Yachting Monthly and yachtingmonthly.com, and an interview on The Sailing Podcast. The prize for the adult photo competition will be camera equipment equivalent to a value of £750 and of £500 for the junior competition. Yachting Monthly will also be making a donation of £500 to marine conservation charity Sea-Changers.

Why storytelling matters

Seven-time circumnavigator and multiple record holder Dee Caffari MBE said:

‘The ocean has shaped my life. Every mile I’ve sailed has shown me just how powerful, beautiful, and fragile our oceans are. The ocean inspires adventure and challenges us in equal measure, which is exactly why we must respect and protect it. I consider the ocean both my office and my playground, but the truth is we are all deeply connected to the ocean. That means we all share a responsibility to care for it, so it can continue to inspire and be enjoyed for generations to come.’

Ewan Clark, director of Coppercoat, said:

‘The team at Coppercoat is delighted to support the Brian Black Memorial Award. The concept of using sailing boats to explore the natural world, and to do so with minimal impact on the environment, is absolutely aligned with our values. At Coppercoat, we remain convinced that our product is still leading the market when it comes to low-impact antifoul, and independent tests have shown that Coppercoat’s impact.’

Mike Golding OBE commented: 

‘The world’s oceans are all connected, and the way we treat them has a global impact. Education, one person at a time, showing them what impact their actions can have on the environment below the water’s surface, can have a huge impact, and transform whole ecosystems for the better. For that reason, journalism and storytelling is crucial in making visible and accessible something that is often remote and inacessible.’ 

How to enter + Ts & Cs

Submit an entry to the article competition

Submit an entry to the adult photo competition

Submit an entry to the junior photo competition

About Brian and Lesley Black

The Brian Black Memorial Award was established in 2020 in memory of Brian and Lesley Black, who passed away in 2019 and 2018, and the award was started by their family and Yachting Monthly. Brian was a journalist, film maker, broadcaster for many years in Northern Ireland. He was a passionate naturalist, and a daring sailor who regularly took his small boats up to high latitudes, and documented climate change before that was a household term. His wife Lesley was a trailblazing sailor in her own right, who was the first female commodore of a northern irish yacht club, and sailed independently and with Brian on many adventures.

About Coppercoat

Award sponsor Coppercoat has, for the last 35 years, offered an award-winning alternative to self-ablating antifouls that are expensive and time-consuming to apply annually, while also leaching uncontrolled amounts of the toxic biocides into the marine environment. Tests by sailing magazines, commercial operators and for offshore installations have repeatedly found Coppercoat to be the best-performing product with a negligible impact on the waters it is in. The company constantly works to improve its product, packaging and operations to further reduce its footprint, and is delighted to support this initiative to promote healthy seas.

Ewan Clark, director of Coppercoat, said:

‘The team at Coppercoat is delighted to support the Brian Black Memorial Award. The concept of using sailing boats to explore the natural world, and to do so with minimal impact on the environment, is absolutely aligned with our values. Our product is still leading the market when it comes to low-impact antifoul, even more so now that it uses a 100% plant-based bio resin, reducing its carbon emissions by 34%. Independent tests have shown that Coppercoat’s Impact on the surrounding environment is negligible with a leech rate less than a 10th of conventional antifouls.’

Charity donation to Sea-Changers

As part of the award, Yachting Monthly and Coppercoat will be making a donation to Sea-Changers, a UK marine conservation charity, managed by a small team of volunteers who love the UK’s seas, shores and wildlife. It gives grants to UK marine charities and non-profits for conservation and research projects. The charity works with businesses and individuals to raise funds via bespoke corporate partnerships, online giving, eBay auctions, sponsored events and individual donations.

TERMS AND CONDITIONS

• Who are we? The prize draw is organised and run by Future Publishing Ltd (that’s us!) at Quay House, The Ambury, Bath, BA1 1UA.
• When you can enter: You can enter from 00:01 on 26 March 2026 and entries close at 23:59 on 30 August 2025. If you send your entry late or if it’s not complete, we can’t accept it.
• Who can enter: Open to anyone who lives in the UK. To enter the Junior photo category, you must be 16 or under. If you are under 16, you will need parental consent. Anyone who works for Future or our other companies can’t enter.
• How many times can you enter? You can only send one photo entry and one article entry. If you send more than one, or if you send entries in different ways, for example, one entry by post and another by email, we will only count the first entry we receive.
• Your entry must be your own work! We will not accept entries which are produced or created using artificial intelligence (AI), or other automated software. This means that any entries you send to us must be work that you have created yourself.
• How many winners? There will be one winner in total for each category of the competition.
• How we pick and tell the winner: We will pick a winner by chance from all winners who entered correctly. We’ll email you (or your parent or guardian for anyone under 16) within 28 days after the prize draw ends to let you know that you’ve won, and to ask for an address in the UK to send the prize. If we don’t hear back from the winner after 28 days, we’ll pick a new winner.
• About the prize: Future will send the prize to you. Sometimes, if we can’t get the exact prize, we may send a different one that is just as good or even better. You can’t swap the prize for money, or for another prize.
• You don’t have to buy anything to enter the prize draw! Entry is free.
• Agreeing to the rules: When you enter, it means you (or your parent or guardian for anyone under 16) agrees to these rules, and the full prize draw rules at: www.futureplc.com/competition-rules/, and the privacy policy at: www.futureplc.com/privacy-policy/. If you need any help or have any questions on these rules, please contact us at the address above.

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