Born in 1954 in Wellington, Muir’s family moved to Pukerua Bay in the late 1950s, where his uncle introduced him to the P Class. Muir loved the P so much that he, with father Bill and other family members, built one – Rawhiti (P238).
The Paramata Boating Club (PBC) was close and Muir raced Rawhiti there. He was up against some excellent sailors, including Brain and Murray Jones, Robin Coutts (Russell’s older brother) and the late David Barnes. Muir proved good enough to be selected as the PBC entrant for the 1970 Tauranga Cup.
Not a great lover of school, his mother Shirley (nee Ransom) was emphatic that her son do an apprenticeship to gain a trade qualification. It was wise advice. Deciding on boatbuilding, in 1970 Muir cold-called Alex McKimm at Plylight Marine in Paraparaumu, then one of the country’s largest manufacturers of runabouts. “Alex was impressed that I owned and sailed a P Class, and he offered me an apprenticeship.”
But the forward-thinking McKimm had switched to GRP construction from plywood some years earlier, so Muir found himself grinding fibreglass all day.