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Displaying items by tag: Tom Egan

The Canoeing Ireland Awards Gala on Saturday night, which marked achievements in the sport in 2019, had plenty to celebrate. Liam Jegou, who will represent Ireland in canoe slalom at the Tokyo Olympics and Robert Hendrick, who qualified the boat, were both honoured.

 Paralympian Patrick O’Leary, who also qualfied for Tokyo, was presented with his award by Miriam Malone, the chief executive of Paralympics Ireland. Malone and Karen Coventry of Special Olympics Ireland were keynote speakers at the event in the Spa Hotel.

 The roll of honour on the night was long: Jenny Egan was chosen as best senior female paddler of the year in both canoe marathon and canoe sprint; Peter Egan was the chosen senior male in marathon canoeing. The senior Freestyle winners were Aoife Hanrahan and David McClure; Aisling Griffin and Michael Barry took the honours in the Paddle Surf category; Ciara Gurhy and Oisin McKay took the Canoe Polo honours. In the Wild Water category Odhran McNally (kayak) and Darragh Clarke (canoe) were honoured.

 Oisin Feery, who starred for Ireland at the Special Olympics World Games in Abu Dhabi, won the Special Achievement award; the Event of the Year was Meelick Riverfest; the Team of the Year, the Ireland under-21 women’s Canoe Polo team. The Community Impact prize went to McMahon Cup.

 The Volunteer of the Year award went to a man behind many of the medals won by Ireland in Canoe Marathon and Canoe Sprint, the indefatigable Tom Egan.   

Published in Canoeing

About the 29er Skiff Dinghy

The 29er is a one-design double-handed, single trapeze skiff for youth sailors.

There is an active class in Ireland, just one of the 38-countries from across all continents now racing the high-performance skiff.

The 29er is one of the latest dinghy classes to arrive in Ireland and has a 50/50 split between boys and girls.

The class like to describe the boat as "The most popular skiff for sailors who want to go fast!".

Derived from the Olympic class 49er class and designed by Julian Bethwaite the 29er was first produced in 1998.

Two sailors sail the 29er, one on trapeze.

The class is targeted at youth sailors aiming at sailing the larger 49er which is an Olympic class.


The 6.25-metre high rig features a fractional asymmetrical spinnaker; a self-tacking jib decreases the workload of the crew, making manoeuvres more efficient and freeing the crew to take the mainsheet upwind and on two-sail reaches.

The 15.00 m2 spinnaker rigging set-up challenges crews to be fit and coordinated, and manoeuvres in the boat require athleticism due to its lack of inherent stability and the high speed with which the fully battened mainsail and jib power up.

The 74kg weight hull is constructed of fibreglass-reinforced polyester in a foam sandwich layout.

The fully battened mainsail and jib are made from a transparent Mylar laminate with orange or red Dacron trimming, while the spinnaker is manufactured from ripstop Nylon.

The mast is in three parts - an aluminium bottom and middle section, with a polyester-fibreglass composite tip to increase mast bend and decrease both overall weights, and the capsizing moment a heavy mast tip can generate. Foils are aluminium or fibreglass.

About the ILCA/Laser Dinghy

The ILCA, formerly known as the Laser, is the most produced boat in the world, with 220,000 units built since 1971.

It's easy to see why the single-handed dinghy has won the title of the most widely distributed boat of all time.

The Laser is a one-design dinghy, the hulls being identical but three rigs that can be used according to the size and weight of the sailor.

The class is international, with sailors from 120 countries. The boat has also been an Olympic class since 1996, being both the men's and women's singlehanded dinghy.

Three rigs are recognised by the International Laser Class Association (ILCA):

  • ILCA 4: sail of 4.70m2
  • ILCA 6: sail of 5.76 m2
  • ILCA 7: sail of 7.06 m2

29er skiff technical specs

  • Hull weight 74kg (163lb)
  • LOA 4.45m (14.4ft)
  • Beam 1.77m (5ft 7in)
  • Crew 2 (single trapeze) 
  • Spinnaker area 15.00 m2 (181.2sq.ft)
  • Upwind sail area 12.5 m2 (142.0 sq.ft)
  • Mast length 6.25m (20.5ft)

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