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ICRA 2021 Committee Announced at Online AGM

6th March 2021
The 2021 ICRA Committee
The 2021 ICRA Committee Credit: ICRA

First elected in November 2018, Richard Colwell will continue to lead the Irish Cruiser Racing Association following today's AGM into what is hopefully a busy 2021 summer sailing programme.

Speaking at today's online meeting, ICRA Secretary Denis Byrne announced some changes to the 11-person 2021 committee. 

Colwell paid tribute to the work of Cove Sailing Club's Johanna Murphy from Cork Harbour, the outgoing South Coast Offshore Racing Association (SCORA) Commodore and also to Race Judge Cxema Pico who have both retired from the committee.

Coming onboard is the new SCORA Commodore Daragh Connolly from Royal Cork and also Saoirse Reynolds from the National Yacht Club in Dun Laoghaire Harbour.

John Leech of Lough Derg continues as Treasurer and Dave Cullen of Howth continues in the Communications role.

Published in ICRA
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The Irish Cruiser Racing Association (ICRA) Information

The creation of the Irish Cruiser Racing Association (ICRA) began in a very low key way in the autumn of 2002 with an exploratory meeting between Denis Kiely, Jim Donegan and Fintan Cairns in the Granville Hotel in Waterford, and the first conference was held in February 2003 in Kilkenny.

While numbers of cruiser-racers were large, their specific locations were widespread, but there was simply no denying the numerical strength and majority power of the Cork-Dublin axis. To get what was then a very novel concept up and running, this strength of numbers had to be acknowledged, and the first National Championship in 2003 reflected this, as it was staged in Howth.

ICRA was run by a dedicated group of volunteers each of whom brought their special talents to the organisation. Jim Donegan, the elder statesman, was so much more interested in the wellbeing of the new organisation than in personal advancement that he insisted on Fintan Cairns being the first Commodore, while the distinguished Cork sailor was more than content to be Vice Commodore.

ICRA National Championships

Initially, the highlight of the ICRA season was the National Championship, which is essentially self-limiting, as it is restricted to boats which have or would be eligible for an IRC Rating. Boats not actually rated but eligible were catered for by ICRA’s ace number-cruncher Denis Kiely, who took Ireland’s long-established native rating system ECHO to new heights, thereby providing for extra entries which brought fleet numbers at most annual national championships to comfortably above the hundred mark, particularly at the height of the boom years. 

ICRA Boat of the Year (Winners 2004-2019)