Micheal O Suilleabhain may well be the name that goes into the records books.

But he will be the first to point out that not only was it a team effort, in fact, it was an entire Kinsale Yacht Club effort to start putting together an exemplary challenge – initially in times of pandemic and post-pandemic - for the J/24 Europeans 2022 at Howth, when the event itself was still a distant speck on the uncertain future horizon. But a widely-supported campaign on the ICRA K25 model was launched and maintained, gradually building momentum until they reached the big one itself.

There, many proven international stars were so busy keeping tabs on their familiar rivals that the rapidly-improving young Kinsale crew went into the final race with a fighting chance, and they emerged firmly in the podium frame, clearly also the best-placed Irish boat.

After ten races, the J/24 European Championship hosted by Howth Yacht Club, concluded in a tie at 65 points, with the third-place team only one point back. That third-place team was made up of six junior sailors from the Kinsale Yacht Club, which has worked to create a squad of under 25-year-old sailors or U25s. Along with finishing third overall, one point out of first, Carroll’s team finished second in the Corinthian Class and first in the Youth Class. Micheál O’Súilleabháin was on the helm.

This was the first year sailing a J/24 for this young team. Crewmember Mike Carroll said, “Since we only started in the J24 class this summer, we didn’t know what to expect from ourselves at the event. We had some poor results earlier on in the regatta, but as the event went on, we improved and achieved a good level of consistency that we were happy with. We couldn’t afford another poor result as there was only one discard across the 10 races. We had a mix of all sailing conditions during the week, which led to it being a high-scoring event. Given that most boats had at least one or two bad scores, it allowed us to climb high in the results without needing to win races. What happened on the water exceeded our expectations.” By finishing second in the last race of the regatta, the team moved from sixth to third.

Kinsailor competing at the ten race J/24 European Championship at Howth Yacht Club Photo: Christopher Howell

The young team faced down some serious challenges, which they overcame. A week before the Europeans, while racing in the J/24 Easterns, they broke their mast and had to secure a loner. Their new UK Sailmakers mainsail was damaged when the rig came down, and they finished the Easterns with their delivery main. UK Sailmakers Ireland made an invisible repair in a few short days and had the main ready for the Europeans.

“The sails were fantastic”

Dave Sullivan, the team’s coach said, “It’s just brilliant that a team of kids from Kinsale can get a boat, set it up, and deliver a world-class performance -- all in less than a year. Phenomenal really; we are most proud of them.” The team came about as part of the Irish Cruiser Racing Association Under 25 initiative designed to create a pathway for junior sailors to progress into the adult sailing scene. Sullivan said that members of the Kinsale Yacht Club held a fundraiser to buy, ship to Ireland and prepare a J/24 for the club’s juniors to use. He took on the role of the team’s mentor. The original goal was to compete at the 2022 European Championships and the boat will stay available for juniors at the club for years to come.

Kinsailor is a Kinsale Yacht Club Under 25 initiative

Barry Hayes, President of UK Sailmakers Ireland said, “Our loft is doing everything to help young sailors excel. They are the future of the sport. Therefore, we are doing our best to help them get the best sails, learn how to use them so that they move up to the podium as quickly as possible. From centreboard to keelboats, UK Sailmakers is dedicated to helping the next generation of sailors.”

About the UK Sailmakers J/24 class sails, the team members said, “The sails were fantastic.”

The Kinsailor J24 crew with their prizes in Howth including Mikey Carroll, Jack O’Sullivan, Lellie Collins, Francesca Lewis, Rory Carroll and Micheál O’Súilleabháin

The four men and two women on KINSAILOR were:

• Mikey Carroll
• Jack O’Sullivan
• Lellie Collins
• Francesca Lewis
• Rory Carroll
• Micheál O’Súilleabháin

2022 J24 European Championships results

The old salt who looked out at the weather this morning (Saturday) in Howth and remarked that in the west of Ireland this would be called “a high stool day” was echoing the feelings of most participants. But the J24 European Championship fleet went out racing nevertheless, even if the east to south-east breeze with its sometimes heavy rain was in a weird and weaving sort of mood which produced some very peculiar performances by overnight leaders.

Yet as far as the oldest and the youngest skippers were concerned, it was a lovely sunny day with perfect sailing conditions. The most senior skipper racing, 83-year-old Rear Admiral USN (Retd) Denny Vaughan of Seattle, finished the ten-race series as he’d begun, with a win for Easy Street which shifted him back up to ninth overall in the results at a provisional level, as protests are pending but they don’t directly affect Easy Street.

Meanwhile, the youngest skipper racing, former Optimist and Laser star Micheal O’Suilleabhain of Kinsale with his youth crew in Kinsailor, was right there with the Admiral in second. But while the Admiral admits the brisker breezes at mid-week were challenging, the young toughs on Kinsailor had revelled in it all, and took full advantage of a world-class learning experience to turn in a telling scoreline of 21,2,6,6,(27),5,11,3,12,4,2 which rocketed them into the overall lead in the Youth Division at the finish of the series, and even more importantly gave them the Bronze in the Open Division.

This final race produced some off-the-wall placings for top boats. Jmania from Athens provisionally retains the title after a count-back against Cacoon (David Hale) from Poole with both on 65, with Jamania having been held back to 25th in the final contest while her closest challenger Headcase was 24th.

But Headcase had to carry that 24th into her total which leaves her at 5th overall, whereas Jmania dumped the 25th to keep her Gold by a whisker. And as for Kinsailor, she finished in style, just one point off the two front runners.

Results below (Protests Pending)

A distinct change in sailing conditions today (Friday) - from a sunny nor'easter to a grey sou'easter - seems to have suited the Irish contingent in the J/24 Euros very well indeed, with the afternoon ebb making for distinct delineations in the fleet. The syndicate-campaigned Headcase, whose squad represent every Irish Province except Munster - who of course have their own J/24s - was in particularly sparkling form.

They logged two straight wins after ding-dong battles with other Irish boats in a day of racing which was heart-warming for those club movers and shakers throughout Ireland who have been trying to encourage their younger members into economical J/24 involvement. But quite why the formerly dominant international visitors failed to show as well as they've been doing through the rest of the week is hard to say, as the effects of the ebb in Howth's racing area are fairly straightforward.

Overall, Jmania from Athens continues to lead even with today's 23rd (discarded) and 8th, but it's now Headcase in second overall, albeit by 48pts to Jmania's 42. Determined Race Officer David Lovegrove has the scores for nine very good races already up on the leaderboard thanks to pushing through three races on Thursday, so if it's at all possible to get in Race 10 on Saturday morning before the top comes off the weather, he'll do it.

But those who cherish the notion that ten races completed will see a second discard kick in are apparently nursing a futile hope, and the permutations for Headcase to overtake Jmania (it sounds like a narrative out of a madhouse) are probably just too convoluted to be fulfilled.

Results below

“Regatta weather” has provided the perfect sunny racing conditions for Day 3 (Thursday 1 September) of the J24 Euros ’22 at Howth Yacht Club.

But any notions of lolling around in leisurely style were soon dispelled by the determination of race officer David Lovegrove to register three sets of results while the brisk east-to-nor’east breeze kept up. And by the time the fleet returned to harbour, they certainly knew that they’d been sailing through intensely competitive racing conditions.

With seven sets of results now in the can, they already have an acknowledged championship posted even if the expected deterioration in conditions through Friday and Saturday is so total that none of the remaining three possible races is sailed.

But some boats which have been finding the pace with more confidence as the championship progresses will undoubtedly be looking for further bites at the cherry.

However, the Greek star Jmania will probably be more than happy to leave things as they are, as they posted a solid 3,6,2 to put them on 24 points after the single discard, well clear of Germany’s Stefan Kersunke on 30, who won Race 7 after being very much among “the others” with a happily discarded 18th in Race 6.

By special arrangement with management, any clouds stayed over the land and the sun shone strongly at sea all day as the breeze kept up | Credit: Christopher Howell

The local multi-denominational talent in Headcase looked to be digging themselves out of something of a trough with 2,1 in the first two races. But just as things were looking hopeful for their nationwide support club, the wheels came off in Race 7 with a 19th — yet despite that they now lie fourth overall.

When you’re looking at a scorecard from seven races, fresh permutations emerge, and the “Kids from Kinsale” with Kinsailor logged a very respectable 5,11,3 today to move themselves up to 6th overall, putting them ahead of the defending champions from the Italian Navy in seventh. They in turn are on equal points with another navy man, that very seasoned sailor Admiral Denny Vaughan from Seattle, racing Easy Street.

Conor Haughton’s Jade from Wicklow dicing with Admiral Vaughan’s Easv Street from Seattle | Credit: Christopher Howell

It should be noted that the wonderful admiral is cheerfully racing on at 83 years old. So it’s likely that his personal age is only a few years short of the total combined age of the Kinsailor crew. This is decidedly thought-provoking, to say the least. But it’s altogether in keeping with the remarkable variety of people racing in this fascinating championship.

Results HERE.

Racing continued today (Wednesday) in the J/24 Euros at Howth with a moderate-plus northeast breeze in which there was no doubting the north in northeast. In such relatively crisp conditions, you’d have expected the hardy souls from more rugged regions to set the pace. But on the contrary, it was Jmania from Athens - where the current daytime temperatures are comfortably above 30C - that was out in the Irish Sea making hay.

Owned by Konstantinos Tridimas and Kynthia Skotida with ace driver Selios Sotitiou on the helm, Jmania clocked an 8th and first to move into a one point overall lead ahead of Denny Vaughan of Seattle in Easy Street, who logged a very useful 11th and second. The international spread was emphasized by Germany’s Stefan Karsunke posting a 4th and 8th to move into third overall in a tightly packed leading group.

The Italian Navy’s defending champion La Superba (left) found form today (Wednesday) with a win in the morning race Photo: Annraoi Blaney

The Italian Navy’s defending champions with the modestly-named La Superba lived up to the name in the first contest to take a win, but were crab-grassing in the second at 15th. Another star performer who was seeing how the other half lives was overnight leader Kurt Dammeier from Seattle, who had to face up to a 14th and 18th, which shifted him from first overall down to eighth.

One place ahead at seventh overall is Ireland’s current best, JP McCaldin from Lough Erne with Il Riccio, who rose through the ranks with a second in the first race, but was then brought back to earth with a 16th in the afternoon event.

On a vertical learning curve – Andrew Mannion’s Jeb Stuart from Lough Ree dealing successfully with Irish Sea conditions and a couple of international challengers. Photo: Annraoi Blaney

The Irish favourite, the syndicated Headcase, had a morning to forget with a UFD in the first race, but the mojo was back up and working in the afternoon to take second behind Jmania. However, Headcase currently lies 14th overall, and though there are in theory six races still to be sailed, sailing conditions for Friday and Saturday don’t look so good. Yet apparently it takes lot to shake the J/24s out of their belief that there should only be two races per day, but we’ll see how it goes.

Meanwhile, the racing in this series has already been extremely educational for the young Irish folk who have been encouraged into top level J/24 racing. And if by “extremely educational” you mean “hard lessons”, who are we to argue?

Results here

While Admirals are expected to lead, the accepted naval strategic thinking would have it that the leading is meant to be done from Staff Headquarters, either ashore or on some vast ship, rather than out on the water in a small boat. But Rear Admiral Denny Vaughan USN (Retd.) seems to have decided that being retired permits him to leave the orthodox thinking of the manual behind on the bookshelf, and get right into the thick of things in the front line out on the water.

For having come all the way from Seattle to race his J/24 Easy Street (the very name should be a warning to other competitors) in the J/24 Euros at Howth, the Admiral went out for the first race in a sunny east to northeast breeze this morning (Tuesday), and didn’t he win? He did indeed.

This is either crazy, or starting with supreme confidence – despite the US sail number, this is Joe Murphy’s Jigalo from Howth – she ended the day on 16th overall. Photo: Annraoi Blaney 

That may have been a wake-up call for the proven European hotshots in the 34-strong fleet. And in that first race, all was largely as it should have been, as the syndicate-sailed Headcase from Ireland, definitely a favourite after a trail of success across the Continent and in home waters since June, was in second place.

Bur shrewd observers would have seen that the Americans were there again in third, with Denny Vaughan’s clubmate Kurt Dammeier racing Amuse Bouche. And the even more knowledgeable would have noted that the recently-crowned J/24 World Champion Mike Marshall of North Sails was in Dammeier’s tasty crew lineup.

That would seem to have been shown in the afternoon race, when Amuse Bouche logged another sensible third while things went completely pear-shaped for Headcase, as she was back in 19th. As for Easy Street, she’d also had some slippage, as the Admiral was back in tenth. So overall the leaderboard after Day 1 is headed by Amuse Bouche, two points ahead of James Torr from Plymouth, with the Admiral third.

Summer 2022 may be gone by this coming weekend, but it’s still making a great last stand off Howth. Photo: Annraoi Blaney

It speaks volumes for the enduring international attraction of this vintage class that the top ten placings run right across six nations, taking in entrants whose homeport spread is from Seattle to Crete. Meanwhile, armchair admirals – as opposed to admirals who get into the thick of things – are sitting back and wondering if we’re seeing the beginning of one of those utterly sensible campaigns, where the overall winner takes the title without actually winning a single race.

Day One Results Here

The International J/24 European Championship getting under way this weekend in Howth leads inevitably to thoughts of a special drama afloat two months ago. The crunch finish period of the SSE Renewables Round Ireland Race 2022 at Wicklow on Friday, June 24th, was a time of high tension.

Laurent Charmy’s SL Energies Fastwave from France had been the clubhouse leader for most of the afternoon. But in the final counter-tide beat to the finish, offshore tyros Mike and Richie Evans from Howth with their little Snapshot had managed to break away from a group of their closest competitors, and were wriggling along the beach with hyper-short tacks in a sharpening breeze to such good effect that the unthinkable became remotely possible. They might just snatch the lead.

In the end, they missed it by five minutes. But they were soon confirmed as unassailably second. It was a remarkable high seas debut. Yet, in all the excitement of the finish, little was made of surely the most significant aspect of the whole business. SL Energies Fastwave is a J/111, well proven in her short but successful offshore career. As for Snapshot, she’s a J/99, with recognised success in regattas, and now an offshore star as well.

Throughout the Round Ireland fleet – almost entirely in the leading groups – were other boats from the J range, and there isn’t a club fleet in Ireland, and at the main centres all round the Irish Sea, that won’t see this no-nonsense, versatile and effective American-originating marque well represented.

DEFYING ORTHODOXY OF PLANNED OBSOLESCENCE

Yet despite the fact that their global commercial success relies on a continuous up-dating of their extensive range to keep their thousands of customers at the front of the fleet, the little boat which started it all, the J/24 of which more than 5,000 were built, continues to be highly popular, defying orthodox concepts of planned obsolescence.

J/24s racing at Howth, where the first boat appeared less than two years after the class’s debut in America. Photo: Annraoi Blaney

She’s a modern classic if you like. But there’s no denying a J/24 is now something of a cult object, not least because they fulfill the American dream in having been created in the designer-builder parents’ garage - so totally garage-bound, in fact, that they’re not the J/25 simply because there wasn’t enough space to build a 25 footer.

The story begins in 1975. Young Rod Johnstone, then an ad salesman for a sailing trade magazine and an active one-design sailor, decided to build a sailboat he had been working on since completing a Westlawn School of Yacht Design correspondence course in the 1960s.

With $400-worth of fibreglass and wood, plus some rigging and hardware left over from a Soling of his brother Bob, he built the 24' LOA x 9' beam sloop – eventually called Ragtime - during weekends in the three-car garage at his family home in Stonington, Connecticut. During the summer of 1976, with an all-family crew aboard, Ragtime beat everything in sight, and he realized he had created something special.

Enter Everett Pearson, the owner of Tillotson Pearson, Inc, a highly respected boat builder in Warren, Rhode Island. He was quite taken with Rod's design and agreed to produce the boat on spec in return for the U.S. building rights. Display ads in the sailing trade magazine got the word out. That winter, they set up a makeshift factory in an old textile mill in nearby Fall River, Massachusetts, and began popping out J/24s.

Enter the marketing experience of brother Bob, a Vice President of Marketing at AMF/Alcort , the makers of Sunfish sailboats at the time. He had seen the potential in the boat Rod had designed. From 1975 to 1977, Bob had helped to take Alcort from the red into the black, and then began trying to convince AMF to start producing a boat similar to the J/24. When AMF didn't jump, in February of 1977 at age 43, Bob did, and threw in his lot with J/Boats.

Signature of approval – Bob Johnstone of J Boats International signs a J/24 rudder in Howth in 2014. Photo: Brian Turvey 

5,400 BUILT

In all, 5,400 J/24s have been built since, plus hundreds and sometimes thousands of other boats to an extensive range of J Boat designs. It has been another case of the phenomenal commercial and creative power of American brothers working together. Think Gougeon Brothers with WEST Epoxy Systems, for instance, a company so successful that when the brothers retired, they handed it over to their employees as a very tangible way of saying thank you for their loyalty and dedication. And think too of Olin and Rod Stephens of designers Sparkman & Stephens. They were very much a team, and it was Rod's skill and ingenuity with rigs and rigging which persuaded the great Carleton Mitchell to transfer his design loyalties from Philip Rhodes to Olin Stephens, resulting in the 38ft Stephens-designed Finisterre which won the biennial Bermuda Race three times on the trot.
So in owning and sailing a J/24, you’re sharing in a sense in the most positive aspects of the American dream. And as it has been found that quality fibreglass just doesn’t wear out, the J/24 offers an inexpensive route into competitive sailing for impecunious young enthusiasts who aren’t afraid of doing their own maintenance work.

PHILIP WATSON SETS OFFSHORE PACE

The J/24 very quickly came to Ireland, and while club and regatta racing and even some cruising was their main purpose in life, sailmaker Philip Watson in 1978 geared up his new J/24 Pathfinder for the ISORA circuit. After the Fastnet storm of 1979 had resulted in more stringent ballast keel requirements, the lightly-ballasted J/24 – which relies on considerable weight effort from her crew of five – was no longer eligible to go offshore, but in that one golden year of 1978, Watson and Pathinder swept all before them, winning their ISORA Class overall.

Pioneering Pathfinder – in 1978, Philip Watson of Howth with Pathfinder showed the way for J/24s – and won his class in that year’s ISORA series

All that is now 44 years ago. Since then, new J Boat designs of almost legendary status have come and gone from the headlines after dominating the sailing scene for a few years and sometimes more. Yet the little old J/24 is still very much with us with thriving national, regional and global associations, and this weekend in Howth they’re in the throes of final stages of preliminaries for the 2022 Europeans with Organising Committee Chairman Richard Kissane and his group ensuring the smooth running of an event which sees final measuring and test sailing over the weekend. The official practice race is on Monday under the direction of Race Officer David Lovegrove, with the Howth machine set in motion to continue the real racing from Tuesday through to Saturday (September 3rd).

Richard Kissane, Chairman of the Organising Committee, has been leading his team in extra preparations, as the J/24 Europeans have not been sailed since 2020, when they were staged in Greece.

KENNY READ COMES TO TOWN

With the appropriately-named Pathfinder taking the first steps back in 1978, Howth has a long association with the class, a notable early participant in a J/24 championship at HYC quite a long time ago being a young American skipper called Kenny Read.

In fact, Howth has acted as a very effective linkpoint over the decades between the European and American J/24 fleets, with the latter keen to sail here after dominating the 2013 Worlds at Howth, when the American overall winner emphasised Irish-American connections, as he was Tim Healy from Newport, RI.

Breezy action – the J/24 Worlds at Howth in 2013, when the overall winner was USA’s Tim Healy from Newport, RI.

Then in 2014, Bob Johnstone himself was in Ireland. Ostensibly, he was on holiday, but as he was the guest of the late Robin Eagleson of Lough Erne, President of the Irish J/24 Class, they made a point of visiting Howth, where Bob obligingly signed the rudder of the J/24 belonging to HYC Hon. Sec. Emmet Dalton – the word is it hasn’t been painted since.

The current Euros are the first since 2020, and there’s interesting American participation in the 35-strong entry entry list, with the furthest-travelled being retired US Navy Admiral Denny Vaughn from Seattle, who is age-defying as he calls his boat Easy Street….

THE ADMIRAL IS CELEBRATED

Admiral Vaughn is having himself a ball in Ireland as he has family links to Donegal, and last weekend during the J/24 Easterns at Howth in the boisterous Saturday night feasting, when the band heard they’d an American Admiral in the party, they trotted out their repertoire of John Denver and Johnny Cash.

As veteran J/24 sailor Flor O’Driscoll of Bray commented: “Only in Howth……”, to which Howth can reply “Only with the J/24s”, for it was in Howth that - at Nobby Reilly’s suggestion and with his energetic backing - the national U25 J/24 programme was instigated to produce some strong nationwide club entries in which young sailors have learned to team together to keep a J/24 in top internationally-competitive trim.

The 2022 campaign is successfully launched – the Headcase crew after winning the class at Kiel Week are (left to right) Ryan Glynn (Ballyholme YC), Sam O’Byrne (Howth YC), Cillian Dickson (HYC & Lough Ree YC), Louis Mulloy (Mayo SC) and Mark Ryan (MSC)

Currently, the pace-setter in this is the all-Ireland-crewed Headcase, which in Howth is in just one of her home ports, but she’s back in town with an astonishing 2022 CV that started with winning the class at Kiel Week, then they won the UK Nationals, then they won their ICRA Class in Cork Week, and last weekend they took the Easterns.

HEADCASE TAKES ON LA SUPERBA

It says something about national characteristics that the top home hope in the up-coming championship is cheerfully called Headcase, yet the boat they most definitely have to topple from the top of the pile is from Italy and unblushingly called La Superba.
Make of that what you will, but La Superba is the Italian Navy boat, and back in 2020 in Greece she won the Euros skippered by a young naval officer called Iganzio Bonnano. He has probably moved on to be an admiral by now, but La Superba is very much up for it again in Howth, with her skipper yet to be named.

The Travellers – Headcase and crew about to depart Plymouth after winning the UK Nationals, with an overnight ferry trip in prospect to make the start of the first race in Volvo Cork Week where she logged a class win. Her all-Ireland credentials are further emphasized with the use of a Galway-registered towing vehicle

IRISH FLEET ON A ROLL

The defenders will find that the Irish J/24 fleet is on a bit of a roll at the moment, and there are interesting helms and crews coming up through the system. We’ve remarked in the past that Munster is the only Irish province not represented in Headcase’s crew, but this may well be because they’re developing their own J/24 U25 squads in Munster, with the Kinsale YC Kinsailors led by Michael O’Carroll coming through in the Easterns to take second overall, while Tadg O Loingsigh with his Tralee Bay squad in Janx Spirit went over to the UK Nats and were very much in contention, their scoreline including a first.

The Howth Peninsula seen from the southeast. The Race Area for the J/24 Europeans 2022 will be just above the middle of this photo.

Munster is further represented by the Foynes YC U25 crew on Jasper led by Mary McCormack, while over on the east coast, after very many years Flor O’Driscoll of Bray (and formerly Cobh) has sold his well-used Hard on Port to his crew led by David Bailey, and they now sail out of Greystones where class leader Mark Usher sets the pace with Hedgehog.

This trans-club interaction is reflected in the northwest where Sligo YC and Lough Erne YC - and doubtless Mullaghmore too - all make input into Gossip with the combined efforts of Oisin Brennan, Declan Brennan, Michael Staines and Muireann Toibin.

Getting your boat and crew from Sligo or Lough Erne to other venues in Ireland can sometimes be a bit of a challenge. But an event like the Euros with an international entry puts it all in perspective, as they come not only from Seattle to the far west, but also from the island of Crete in the far eastern Mediterranean. The logistics of getting boat and crew as a private entry from Heraklion to Howth defies contemplation, but Nikolas Kapnisis of Heraklion Sailing Club has been game to give it a whirl with his boat Legal Alien. And such entries will feel right at home among the J/24s in Howth.

Entry List for J24 European Championships

With a fleet of 20 boats and crews drawn from 15 different clubs, including Seattle to the far west and Poole to the nearer southeast, the Irish J/24 Easterns over the weekend at Howth set the ball rolling towards the J/24 Europeans at the same venue in a week's time, with the first championship race scheduled for August 30th.

The all-Ireland resourced Headcase, whose crew of Cillian Dickson, Sam O'Byrne, Louis Mulloy, Marcus Ryan and Ryan Glynn count Howth, Lough Ree, Mayo and Ballyholme among their home places, maintained the steady progress already seen through the summer at several international majors, and came out first on 1,1, (8), 2,1. Next in line were the Kinsale team led by Michael Carroll with Kinsailor with a scoreline which included a first and two seconds to leave them on 9 points to Headcase's 5. Tadgh O'Loingsigh from Tralee Bay was third in Janx Spirit with the first of the overseas challengers, Dave Hale from Poole, fourth with Cacoon.

Full results here

So where are they? The hurricanes, we mean. Or more accurately, the “decaying tropical storms” which occasionally make their ominous and often unpredictable way towards Ireland as the Summer progresses and morphs into Autumn. For as it happens, back in May the more pessimistic among us were led to believe we could expect quite a raft of them this summer.

Certainly it’s some time now since news-room reports appeared suggesting that the “acknowledged international agencies” were agreed that all the signs indicated that the approaching summer of 2022 had the makings of a particularly busy year for hurricanes in the western sub-tropical Atlantic, with some of the usual subsequent fall-out adversely affecting Europe’s weather, of which Ireland is the frontier outpost.

But thus far, on the cusp of the final full week of August, we’ve had a decidedly odd summer, with the European weather machine grinding itself into sufficient high pressure action to keep the temperate Atlantic westerlies at bay. While most of us found the virtually windless heatwave weather from North Africa far too much of a good thing – if it was a good thing at any stage – we dreamt of those typical classic Irish days of perfect-sailing temperate westerlies, which in truth are so rare that we remember each one individually.

A decent breeze with some west in it, a generous portion of sunshine, and you’ve Irish sailing perfection – Squibs in action at Kinsale. Photo: Robert Bateman

Thus our header photo is there because it is the beau ideal of our sailing weather. When we try to sell Ireland as a sailing venue of the best international standard – indeed, as a sailing venue of better than international standard - then that scene aboard the race-winning J/99 Snapshot is exactly the kind of image that speaks volumes in support of our case.

PERFECTION IS RARE

Yet such perfect days in 2022 have been conspicuous by their rarity. Tedious flat calms have never been far away. And when we do get a breeze, the wind likely as not comes from the nor’east, which is good for neither man nor beast. Recently, it has been sending in lumpy grey seas which meant that at this week’s GP 14 Worlds at Skerries, photographer Bob Givens found himself recording images of disembodied heads and sails in which we’ve to assume that people and boats are attached.

Disembodied experience…..GP14s racing in this week’s Worlds at Skerries Photo: Bob Givens

But whatever has caused it, it certainly hasn’t been any follow-on effect from the very few minor hurricanes which have so far reached the Caribbean this year. For it seems that instead of curving north and then northeast, they simply continued heading on west and have gone clean across Central America to make nuisances of themselves in the Pacific.

Hurricane Katrina on August 23rd 2005, through the Caribbean into the Gulf of Mexico, and headed for New Orleans. As Katrina made landfall west of Florida, the chances of a later effect on Irish weather were greatly reduced.

However, it would be a big mistake to start to feel complacent. The old Caribbean hands are always ready to give out their bit of hurricane-period passage-making warning doggerel, which goes:

July: Stand By;
August: Only If You Must;
September: Remember;
October: All Over.

It used to be preceded by “June: Too Soon”, but there has been a marked tendency in recent years for the season to start earlier, which means that June is no longer too soon to expect tropical storms. Either way, there’s still quite a bit of potential poke left in 2022’s slow-to-start Caribbean hurricane programme, which affects us directly in Ireland in 2022 as the latter part of our season has us hosting an unprecedented number of international and world championships, all of which – when the weather is volatile - place an extra burden on that mysterious group, the International Race Officers.

They are mysterious simply because they are not as other people. If they are worried by the fact that their decisions on any particular day will directly affect the quality of the sport of sometimes hundreds of people, then somehow they don’t show it, whereas ordinary mortals would worry themselves into dithering incompetence.

Broad shoulders. Bill O’Hara of Ballyholme – currently running the GP14 Worlds at Skerries – has an impressive CV which includes being the Main Man in running the Volvo Ocean Race

But the top Race Officers, they have extremely broad shoulders. And it’s quite something to see the effect their arrival has at the venue for some major event. There, the Organising Committee will have been working at an accelerating pace for months or even years, and nerves are becoming frayed. There will have been increasing contact with the Race Officer. But then he or she arrives in person, on time and cool as a cucumber, and the atmosphere changes or the better. The Main Man or the Top Woman is here. The show will go on.

IRELAND’S MANY RACE OFFICERS

It may well be something to do with the fact that, from 1870 onwards, Irish sailing played a disproportionately important role is the development and codification of the International Races of Yacht Racing. But the reality is that we have an elite group of star Irish race officers who can put on a plethora of majors at much the same time without drawing on talent from outside the island. For although the demanding final weekend of the Shannon One Design Centenary at Lough Ree did bring in the services of Suffolk-based Owen Delany for a weekend of difficult decisions, he is of course of Shannon and Dublin Bay origins.

Thus in a season which has already seen Scorie Walls put in an exemplary performance in her administration of the Mermaid Championship at Foynes while David Lovegrove had to make some difficult but ultimately right decisions in Wave Regatta at Howth, we’re now into a new phase which sees Con Murphy of Dun Laoghaire in charge of the Fireball Worlds on Lough Derg, while back on the east coast, Derek Bothwell will soon be facing up to the J/24 Europeans at Howth after a masterful management of the Squib Easterns there.

Across the bay in Dun Laoghaire, they’ll be looking for the calming presence of David Lovegrove for the SB20 Worlds at the RIYC in September, while the highly-experienced Harry Gallagher of Sutton and Neil Murphy of Howth are no strangers to the hot seat on the Dublin Bay SC Committee Boats.

Con Murphy – currently running the Fireball Worlds on Lough Derg, earlier in the year he called the shots at Bangor Town Regatta on Belfast Lough. Meanwhile, his sailing experience includes holding the Round Ireland Open Sailing Record from 1993 to 2016.

All the top racing administrators are keen sailors themselves in addition to their multi-tasking abilities as Race Officers. In fact so keen are they in their general enthusiasm to help our sport in a voluntary capacity that they’ll use their unique locations to take the occasional well-judged photograph. Having opened with a photo of the Fastnet Rock being raced round on a glorious day, we’ll close with one taken this week by Con Murphy on Lough Derg as Chris Bateman of Cork Harbour and Thomas Chaix of Tralee Bay win the third race in the preliminaries of the Fireball Worlds, an image which perfectly captures the vision of the absurdly beautiful Lough Derg at its sailing best.

Lough Derg at its sailing best, with Fireball winners Chris Bateman and Thomas Chaix getting into their stride. Photo: Con Murphy