#icra – Nominees for ICRA's Boat of the Year for 2012 include the reigning champion boat, Pat Kelly's Storm, a J109 from Rush and Howth. Also in the running is Martin Breen's Reflex 38 from Galway Bay Sailing Club sailed this season as 'NUI Galway' but ICRAs Denis Kiely says the ultimate winner of the award to be made at the ICRA conference on November 17 will be the boat that demonstrates an 'extraordinary' year. The 2012 nomination list released by ICRA is below.
There are three Royal Cork boats nominated and two from the Royal Irish Yacht Club.
George Kenefick's modified quarter tonner Tiger is in the running too after its performance in Howth at the ICRA National Championships in May and its Corinthian win of the Quarter ton Cup in the UK
Dave Cullen's modified half tonner King One is also nominated. The Howth yacht captured a huge haul of trophies at Ramsgate week.
'What did each boat do that lifts it out of the pack and places it above all others in 2012 will be a deciding factor says Kiely.
'If there is something special that deserves to be recognised then a headcount of wins in various regattas may not be the determining factor' he adds.
Kiely says there are two stages in the judges decision process. Does the boat have a good season record at national level i.e. performance in a series of top level regattas, and then what is special that makes it worthy of the overall accolade?
Kiely points to the fact that when the original Boat of the year award was made to Voodoo Chile in 2006. 'It was its Round Ireland race win that made it special - a 32 ft boat winning the RI overall. Of course she also had a big programme besides this that but it was the RI win that was special that year' he says.