DBSC History

Jim Ley - Life Member

Jim Ley joined the Pioneer Boating Club at the age of 11 in 1954 and was an active member until 1957.  The Pioneer Boating Club was the initial name of the Double Bay Sailing Club in its formative and homeless years. He won the first 2 Club Championships.

In the beginning the club consisted of a fleet of 8-10 VJ’s, including Jim in his VJ named Star.  They would congregate on Sundays on Double Bay Beach, near the end of Beach Street, prior to the weekly race. As there was no clubhouse or central boathouse at the time, participants would house their boats in backyards or Jack Jeffries Pier Boatshed in Rose Bay.  Parents provided considerable support especially from Ross Piggin, whose boatshed on the beach was the prerace rallying point and Reg Slieght who would set the course and act as the starter cum safety boat.  The course utilised some of the permanent buoys around the harbour and at times would be accompanied by onlookers on a small ferry.

The club provided a social as well as sailing focal point for the local youth.  Friday nights saw sailing meetings in Ross Piggins boatshed, followed by “cruising” Double Bay on the way home and school holidays were spent on their boats sailing around makeshift courses all over the harbour. 

There was strong parental support for the venture.  Given the average age of the sailors from 12 to 15 it was the parents that constituted the committee, sailing management and ultimately the construction of the clubhouse.  Jim’s mother was heavily involved as well as a number of influential local names such as Messenger, Piggin, Kiernan and the Mayoress of Woollahra, Dutchie Backhouse.

The loss of Jim’s father and mother resulted in him becoming a boarder at Cranbrook School and hence less freedom to enjoy the free ranging life than previously experienced.  Nevertheless, Jim’s formative sailing years at Double Bay underwrote a lifetime of involvement in sailing.  Upon leaving school and studying agriculture at the University of Western Sydney he gained employment in Western NSW where dams were being built and commissioned during the 1960’s in particular, these inland waterways when filled each covered a very large area, the country folk in areas centred around Keepit, Burrendong, Wyangla, Glenbawn, Copeton, Chaffey, Lake Burley Griffin to name a few suddenly had new playgrounds. Farmers and country folk in general were fairly practical people and rapidly took to sailing travelling long distances to the nearest water storage. Jim founded a point score series for the OK Dinghy to be sailed on these waterways around NSW called the Inland Waters Championship, sailors enjoyed getting away and camping in these rural venues.

Jim became involved in building sailing clubhouses at Keepit Dam and Burrendong Dam, the seasons were good and the dams rapidly filled, membership grew very quickly and soon farmers and country folk were travelling to regattas, and yes overseas. Initially when Jim started sailing again it was the Gwen12 that he chose to sail, travelling to regattas all over NSW. Over time the teaming up with crew became a bit hit and miss and the new singlehanded Class of OK Dinghy had appeal for inland sailing.

Jim was transferred from Walcha to Dubbo and made the move with a Gwen 12 and an OK Dinghy which he bought from Rick Priestly at Double Bay Sailing Club, the dam was filling quickly at Burrendong and the Gwen 12 quickly found a new owner, leaving time to concentrate on the OK which was the start of a long association with the class, he won the State Championship, 3rd in the Nationals at Sandgate Qld and 5th in the Interdominion at Takapuna in New Zealand in the old boat. The class quickly became popular with fleets of up to 80 boats in Australia and New Zealand, and being an International class overseas trips commenced, Australians provided 7 boats for the 1973 World Championships in Falmouth England and all the boats were freighted across to England in containers, Jim was very active in gaining sponsorship for this adventure and finished 17th in the series, the fleet was limited to 85 boats.

He won Club Championships at Keepit, Burrendong, Canberra Yacht Club, runner up in the State Championships hosted by Vaucluse Yacht Club in 1978 and enjoyed being competitive in series throughout Australia. He became NSW OK Dinghy class president in 1977 and as a member of Botany Bay Yacht Club hosted an Australian Championship on Botany Bay.

Jim returned to agriculture and did not sail again until 2011 when he joined Lake Chipping Norton Sailing Club, tried a Puffin Pacer with his granddaughter, then a Laser (a bit small), then a 28 year old Finn which he found at Nowra, and managed to win the Club Championship. Now 71 years of age regattas were calling and after sailing the old Finn in the Australian Championships at Cronulla in 2013, his new found friends persuaded him to travel to La Rochelle in France and compete in the Masters, a chartered boat from Devoti convinced him to update when he returned, NB Sailsports just happened to have a nice looking one for him which was diplomatically called ‘Hey Jude’.

He then moved to Woollahra Sailing Club and vowed to sail every week with the aim of building a fleet, and within 2 seasons they had 18 boats, Jim travelled with the Finn to Queensland, Victoria and South Australia and sailed each year in Sail Sydney.

He then competed in the Masters at La Rochelle, Lake Garda Italy and Barbados, Hey Jude logged 22 weeks travel to and from the Caribbean.

Jim suspended Finn Sailing whilst recovering from some fine tuning surgically on the body, and as a part owner of a Sun Oddessy 349 won the 349 Championship regatta at MHYC in 2018 with 2x 1sts and a 3rd, currently running 1st in its division in the RANSA winter Point score and finished 2nd in Division D of the CYC Wednesday Twilight Series for 2018-19.

Jim retuned to DBSC racing with the DBSC Fleet of Big-Boat-Brethren from 2017

by Richard George, DBSC’s Historian