The sailing school based at the London 2012 Olympic sailing venue will be closing
its doors by the end of the year unless a new provider can be found.

LaserPerformance, the
operator of SailLaser Centres, has made the decision to close its Weymouth office, based at the Weymouth and Portland National Sailing Academy (WPNSA).

The SailLaser Centre in Weymouth will cease operations on 1 December
2013.

A WPNSA spokesman said: ‘The WPNSA has received expressions of
interest from both the private and education sectors and are in
preliminary discussions with several potential operators.

‘It is intended for a new operator to be in place and commencing activity as soon as possible in 2014.’

Restructuring

The closure is part of a restructuring of SailLaser’s global businesses, which has seen the company move to a franchise
model.

LaserPerformance has opened new SailLaser Centres on Lake Garda in Italy
and in Berlin, Germany and aims to open new franchise centres globally on an
on-going basis.

SailLaser Weymouth
centre manager Warren Surtees said four or five other companies are currently
in talks with the WPNSA about
taking over as the on-site sailing school.

SailLaser Weymouth
has been an on-site partner with WPNSA at Osprey Quay, Portland for the past seven years and has led
the hugely successful Sail for £5 legacy scheme, which has introduced thousands
of school children to sailing.

Warren said: ‘We’re
due to be off the site by 31 December, my personal goal is to make sure we
leave with all our customers happy, to exit the site with all the relationships
in the sailing industry intact and to help the academy in anyway that I can
with the transition to a new provider.

‘I’m pretty confident
Sail for £5 will continue with the new provider next year.’

Going out with a bang

He added: ‘At least
we’re going out with a bang, we had a good year last year and a fantastic year
this year.

‘We’ve had just short
of 5,000 sailors through this year, and that’s just the figures up to the end of August.

‘We’ve currently offering
Sail for £5 sessions to adults and over 14s for the first time, thanks to
funding from Sport England and Active Dorset, so we’re definitely going out with
a bang.’

The first Sail for £5
taster sessions for over 14s will take place from Monday 14 October to Friday
18 October, 10am to 12.30pm daily.

The next week of sessions will run from the
21 to 25 October, with morning groups from 10am to 12.30pm or afternoon
sessions from 2pm to 4.30pm.

All equipment will be
provided. To book a place call 0845 337 3214 or
email info-weymouth@sail-laser.com

Photos: Pico dinghy sailing on Portland Harbour. Credit SailLaser Weymouth; The SailLaser Weymouth office; The WPNSA