Chipstead Sailing Club

The Firefly has one of the strongest two person racing fleets in the UK.

Important facts you need to know about the Firefly include:-

The Firefly is the one of the cheapest two person dinghies in the UK. Race-ready second hand boats can be picked up for under £1000 and sometimes a bargain can be had for a few hundred; a new boat from Rondar Raceboats ready to go is approximately £6500.

The Firefly is 12′ long, suits a crew weight of 17-24 stone, and has no spinnaker.

Although the Firefly is a strict one-design boat, there are two construction methods, hot moulded ply and Glass Reinforced Plastic (GRP), and 3 basic deck layouts. There is no boat speed advantage to the variants, it is merely a matter of your preference for comfort and maintenance.

The Firefly has great fleet racing, where inches count all the way round the course. There is an active open meeting circuit covering the whole country and a week-long National Championship held each August which is the highlight of the year.

The Firefly is the ultimate team racing boat used at the 2015 ISAF World Team Racing Championships, as well as being used for over 50 years at the world-famous Wilson Trophy, the British Open Team Racing Championship.

The Firefly is also the boat of choice for Schools and Universities for teaching and Team Racing.

The Firefly is one of the classes originally chosen to race at Chipstead Sailing Club and continues to provide active class racing on Sunday afternoons and joins in handicap racing on Wednesday evenings, Saturday afternoons and Sunday mornings.

Although the Firefly is a brilliant sea boat it is also ideally suited for lake sailing.

It is also well suited for parent / child racing with many open meetings being won with that combination. If by any chance you cannot find a crew for a race, under local rules at Chipstead you can sail single handed and still have a result to count for the points series.

If you like cheap close racing, the best team racing, excellent socials and a friendly class, buy a Firefly, join the class association, and come and join us!

Last but not least! The Firefly class is as much about socializing as it is about sailing. With a current member list ranging from all ages – 8 to 80, a perfect balance of men to women and a super-friendly bunch of people, you are guaranteed to have fun, both on and off the water

If this sounds like the boat, class, fun and set of friends you are looking for, please contact the Chipstead Fireflies class captain, Neil Banks, on This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

For more information on the Firefly scene nationally, you can look at the class webpage, www.fireflyclass.co.uk

If you are interested in the history of any Firefly Chipstead’s own Peter Lanham has developed the Boat Register on the National Firefly Association’s website which contains details of just about every Firefly built and counting.