RYA Female Futures Group: Charting a new course for Women in Sailing

A new element of the British Youth and Junior Sailing Pathway which has long been a foundation for success for young sailors aged 10-21 across the UK, it also links to the RYA’s Reflections On Water, a national campaign shining a spotlight on progress and people in the world of sailing.

The group brings together 10 women from across sport, science and performance, alongside two senior RYA officials. As part of World Sailing’s Steering the Course Festival, we sit down with three of the group’s members to discuss the initiative and learn more.

Learning from experience

At its helm is group chair Hannah Diamond, world championship medallist, SailGP athlete, and runner-up in the inaugural Women’s America’s Cup. For Diamond, the initiative is deeply personal.

“I was lucky enough to benefit from new opportunities as a female sailor… But feeding back from my own lessons and experiences, I want to make sure that younger sailors coming up now have even more and that they don’t face the same barriers.”

One of the problems the group is tackling is one many sports know well: younger girls enter in large numbers, but as they continue in their journey, many start to drop away.

Paula MacLaverty, Female Futures group member and a coach for Welsh Sailing, saw it first-hand when her son took his first learn to sail lessons. “There were three girls for every boy,” she recalls. “But by the time he moved into a youth boat, the ratio had flipped.

Where had all the girls gone and more importantly – why?”

Those questions pushed her into psychology research and, eventually, onto joining the Female Futures Group. She’s convinced progress is possible. “Attitudes are starting to change. People are now more open to talking about things like the menstrual cycle but a lot more education is needed, for example its effects on training and performance and how these can be mitigated.”

Even basics, she points out: “Ensuring that kit is female specific so that it fits properly and is safe. For example, many events give out t-shirts, but they are nearly always in men’s sizes – how inclusive does this feel?”

An all-angle approach

What sets the Female Futures Group apart is it’s not just about “making space” for women but reshaping the culture itself.

Rebecca Partridge, a Female Futures group member who is a Performance Pathway Officer at British Gymnastics and a Researcher on female athlete health, believes this is critical. “Women and girls have had to adapt to structures that weren’t necessarily designed with them in mind,” she explains.

“This group represents more than just an initiative, it’s about actively shaping the future – embedding female health, wellbeing and performance considerations into the heart of decision-making at every level. It’s an exciting time to contribute towards positive change for women and girls in sport.”

Partridge describes conversations within the group that have surprised her, discussing how in speaking with those with different sporting backgrounds, it became clear that systemic barriers remain, and challenges are echoed across other sports.

“It highlighted the value of cross-disciplinary collaboration in creating impactful solutions and brought to the forefront that it’s not enough to just create a “space” for women and girls, it needs to go beyond this to co-create cultures where women and girls feel truly seen, supported, and celebrated.”

Work underway

In its first year, the group has focused on developing two strands: creating resources on female athlete health and mapping the culture of youth sailing. The aim is both preventative and aspirational: tackle the reasons girls drop out, while also showing them the breadth of opportunities sailing can offer—from elite competition to coaching, marine engineering, and leadership roles.

Diamond sees this as vital. “We’re trying to better understand the current environment and culture within youth and junior sailing so that we can represent the needs of the current cohort of sailors.”

“There are also such a wide range of career opportunities. If we can highlight these at formative stages throughout their journey in the sport, then we can help young women make informed decisions that keep doors open for the future. It’s about showing how the skills learnt from sailing can be in used in so many ways.”

What would success look like?

The group has ambitious targets to make Great Britain the best place in the world for developing female sailors.

For Diamond, this includes “the adaption of the current youth and junior pathway to one which understands, adapts and inclusively represents the needs of female sailors in a way
that allows them to succeed and remain within the sport for life whilst facilitating them reaching their goals whether that be on the water or within the wider world.”

Partridge continues stating: “Every decision point should ask: how does this impact women and girls?”

And for MacLaverty, success might be as visible as it is cultural: “Let’s see more women on the water, in the boat park, on committees. The more visible we are, the more others will follow.”

Learn more about the group

The Female Futures Group is still in its infancy, but its ambitions are clear. It wants to redefine sailing not as a sport where women “fit in,” but one where they thrive—and in doing so, set a global standard.

Future updates on the groups progress will be shared in due course at www.rya.org.uk/news and for more information including The RYA Female Futures Group full list of members check out The Female Futures Group.

Hannah Diamond, Group Chair also represented The RYA Female Futures Group last week at Southampton International Boat Show, with the full talk available to watch online here.

She will also be featured in the ‘Women that changed the course of sailing’ Episode of the RYA’s new 150th Anniversary podcast series, released 18 November 2025.

Text and images courtesy of the Royal Yachting Association.