Southport 24 Hour Race

The West Lancashire Yacht Club 24 Hour Dinghy Race, has always been more commonly known as the Southport 24 Hour Race.

The race is a national endurance race for classic sailing dinghies (Enterprise, GP14, Lark and Firefly) held in Southport, Merseyside, England. and is organised by the West Lancashire Yacht Club.

Entries are invited from recognised clubs and class associations.

A report of the 53rd Southport 24 Hour Race was published in September 2019 by the Southport Reporter and a video report of the race was published on Youtube.

The race had a long history, dating back to 1967, and had always been held in September. The race was not sailed in the year 2000 due to the fuel crisis and again in 2020/2021 due to the Covid 19 Pandemic. An early race in the mid 1980s was stopped during the night because of the fierce weather conditions. The Club formally withdrew the race from the sailing calendar in January 2022 quoting difficulties with the organisation.

The average turnout, which had stabilised in recent years, had been between 60 and 70 boats, although the 50th anniversary race, held in 2016 attracted 82 entries. Recent entry numbers had been held up by the fact that many of the competing clubs had entered two, three or even four teams. Races in the early years had seen as many as 100 entries with a waiting list.

The race started at 12 noon on the Saturday. The competing teams then raced their dinghies around the marine lake (a man made feature containing 2 islands for the next 24 hours, finishing at noon on Sunday. Crew changes only being allowed in a specially dedicated docking area. Most entries were teams of up to 12 members. Competitors were not permitted to sail in more than one team during the event. However, there was nothing (other than exhaustion) to prevent a crew of two from sailing the whole event in one boat; 2 people sailing non stop was successfully sailed by Adam McGovern and Chris Robinson of Hollingworth Lake Sailing Club in the 2007 race.