J109 National Champion Andrew Algeo of the Royal Irish Yacht Club will have his first regatta in his new J99, Juggerknot II (IRL3990) at Spi Ouest Regatta, this Friday, and it looks like the fleet of 436 boats gathering at La Trinite Sur Mer, will be the biggest in six years.

A very interesting class IRC B line up means the Irish boat will meet stiff competition from the get-go. Afloat reported on the arrival of the new J99 into Dublin in January.

A J99 sistership will be also competing in La Trinite. Called J Lance 14 she is sailed by French pro–sailor Didier Le Moal, so there's going to be plenty of pacing opportunities for the new Irish marque that has a summer of Irish-based regattas awaiting her.  

Here is the full class line up at Spi-Ouest with boat types and TCCs also listed: 

IRC B - Spi Ouest

ID.		Bateau	Voile	Skipper	Club	Bateau	TCC
124		AD HOC	FRA44058	Jf. Cheriaux	C N LORIENT	JPK 10.10	1.0010
211		ANAVEL	FRA43914	H. Cardon	Y C CARNAC	JPK 10.10	1.0050
127		APLYSIA 3	43918	C. Faure		SUN FAST 3200	1.0000
146		CAVOK	FRA53119	P. Gach	Y C CROUESTY ARZON	POGO 30	1.0450
149		CLIFDEN	FRA44059	F. Jooris	Y C TRINITE	SUN FAST 3200	0.9950
199		CRESCENDO	FRA39098	P. Sauzieres	S N TRINITE S/MER	JPK 10.10	1.0000
284		DELNIC	FRA9210	B. Rousselin	S N TRINITE S/MER	JPK 10.10	1.0040
221		EDM SERVICE	FRA39201	B. Daniels	S R ROCHELAISES	SUN FAST 3200	0.9940
355		ENEDIS	FRA44737	J. Rigalleau	SNSablais	SUN FAST 3200	1.0000
332		EXETERA	FRA21859	A. Rougeulle	S N TRINITE S/MER	X 36S	0.9990
181		FOGGY DEW	FRA37310	N. Racine	S N P H	jpk 10.10	0.9990
135		HAKUNA MATATA	35914	Jf. Nouel	C N PORNIC	SUN FAST 3200	1.0000
158		HEY JUDE	FRA9624	P. Girardin	S N TRINITE S/MER	J 120	1.0400
192		IOALLA	FRA1382	G. Prietz/Y. Le Trequesser	S N TRINITE S/MER	X 382	1.0140
394		J LANCE 14	FRA53145	D. Le Moal	S R ROCHELAISES	J 99	2.0000
171		JACKPOT	9679	H. Mehu	S N TRINITE S/MER	J 109	1.0040
136		JIBOULIX	25577	Jb. Prot	S N TRINITE S/MER	X362S	1.0060
137		JUGGERKNOT 2	IRL3990	A. Algeo		J 99	1.0170
410		LEMANCELLO	FRA43904	Fx. Mahon	C N FERRET	SUN FAST 3200	0.9930
138		LINGOBJECTS	FRA9804	B. Le Marec	S R ROCHELAISES	OFCET 32	1.0120
139		MUSIX	FRA43893	P. Baetz	S N TRINITE S/MER	J 122E	1.0430
183		PEN KOENT	FRA53160	E. Le Men	Y C VAL ANDRE	FIRST 40.7	1.0410
141		RACING BEE 2	FRA43933	Lm. Dussere		JPK 10.80	1.0420
314		REALAX	FRA21706	Jy. Le Goff	S N TRINITE S/MER	A 35	1.0210
421		TIGER 5	3303	M.Menesguen		MMW33	1.0070
125		TIP	FRA39430	G. Pages	YC LA GRANDE MOTTE	SUN FAST 3600	1.0520
151		VALORIS&BENEFITS	FRA43673	J. Bouic	S R ROCHELAISES	A 35

Didier's previous very successful boat was another J Lance, a J112e which won both the IRC Europeans and IRC Worlds last year. 

Other interesting boats in the class will be a J112e, Musik, a very well sailed Beneteau 40.7 Pen Koent, a number of A35s, a number of JPK 10.10s, Jpk 10.80s and Jeanneau sunfast 3200s.  These three last designs will perform well if the conditions turn out strong, but will not be great if conditions are light and the long range forecast looks light.

Algeo previewed his new J99 for Afloat in January here and he gave one of the reasons for downsizing to the newer but smaller J model as local crew availability. 

On board for Algeo's maiden sail in France as part of the Irish crew is North Sails Ireland's, Nigel Young.

The J99 type has been sailed recently under IRC at the Warsash Spring series and so far the IRC optimised J109s are still holding sway. Unfortunately, there won’t be many tricked up J109s at Spi Ouest to see how they go. Unlike the Warsash J99, both J99s that will be sailing in La Trinite will be using Symmetric Configurations (with spinnaker poles) as against the sprit asymmetric configuration of the Warsash J99.

From a Dublin Bay and also a national perspective, it will be interesting to see how she goes.

Symmetric v Asymmetric Spinnakers

Another J109 in Ireland, the new Outrageous of Richard Colwell and John Murphy launches this week complete with a symmetric configuration, with the ability to change to asymmetric, if she wishes. Pat Kelly's J109 Celtic Cup champion Storm changed over to symmetric in 2017 too with well-documented success in the Scottish Series. The all-conquering J112e, J Lance, mentioned above, is also a symmetric setup.  

(Above) Howth J109 Storm sailing to success in the 2017 Scottish Series with an 'experimental' symmetric kite Photo: Mark Turner and (below) Storm using an asymmetric at last year's Irish Nationals on home waters Photo: Afloat.ie

Generally, it is thought that windward leeward events, especially in medium to strong winds suit boats with poles, whereas offshore likely would suit sprit boats.

Royal Irish Yacht Club skipper Andrew Algeo on why he has sold his national championship-winning J109 Juggerknot and replaced it with a brand new J99, Juggerknot 2. 

Juggerknot has been the means to get a bunch of old friends out on the water together and it has worked a treat, most of the time.

Paul Nolan, Gary Haughton, Richard Knatchbull, Ben Cooke and I have sailed with or against each other in one combo or another in boats as varied as RS400s, SB20s, J/24s, Flying Fifteens, 1720s, Lasers and Enterprises going back to the 80s and since. But the activity levels had fallen somewhat in recent years and it was time to kick start our sailing - hence the J/109 in 2016.

Juggerknot champions - the winning J109 crew at the 2018 national championship prizegiving at Howth were Richard Knatchbull, Shane Conneely, Gary Haughton, Paul Nolan, Ben Cooke, Joe Hughes, Rob O’Leary and Andrew Algeo (with trophy)

Juggerknot got us competing again together on the race track, learning a new discipline of sailing, socialising in the RIYC bar and most enjoyably allowed us to rope many others in so that we’re a much a bigger bunch of friends now in team Juggerknot. Add to that that the J/109 is probably the most competitive boat under IRC in these parts, as well as having its own one design scene, and really what could be better?

"There was not enough of us to get the boat to the start at the weekends"

The only fly in the ointment, albeit a sizeable one, is that we haven’t been able to sail as often as we’d like to. We have found that while the spring and early summer is great, there was not enough of us available to get the boat to the start line from mid-July to the end of Sept at the weekends. That’s 10 or more weekends out of a short season.

Juggerknot 2 is launched

Juggerknot 2 will be a J/99 which will suit us better. With an optimum crew number of 7 or 8 we’ll still get the large team out for regattas and every other time we can. Yet the J/99 is a few feet shorter, has smaller sails and is a good deal lighter than the J/109 so we’ll be able to give racing a shot when only 3 or 4 of us are available because the degree of physicality necessary to sail her is less.

"Our first sail will be for Spi-Ouest, La Trinité Sur Mer at Easter"

So we hope to sail more often in 2019, build the team further and race again in IRC1 which we enjoy so much. Our first sail will be near the J-Composites factory for Spi-Ouest, La Trinité Sur Mer at Easter. In at the deep end for sure, but bucket list stuff too...

The Howth crew of Ben Duncan, Brian Moran and Rick Morris on ‘Sharkbait’ are this year’s SB3 Eastern Champions after the six-race series ended on home waters with the local boat tying on points with Cork visitor ‘Sibelius’ (Kieran Dorgan) but taking the title on countback, having two bullets to the rival’s one. Overall results table here.

Brian Carlin SB3 photos from the event on the Afloat Gallery

Consistency was the name of the game, with ‘Sharkbait’ never out of the top four and ‘Sibelius’ notching three third places, a second and a 5^th. Both crews are heading to Torbay in mid-May for the SB3 Worlds so this was a useful work-out, especially in difficult conditions. The north-easterly winds were fresher but steadier than on the first day but the swell was significantly greater, making life tougher on crews and equipment. 

That only five points after discards separated the top five boats overall speaks volumes for the intensity of the competition at the head of the 30-boat fleet. These five dominated proceedings to such an extent that the difference in points after discards between fifth and sixth overall was a massive 26 points.

After leading overnight by a slender margin, ‘Sharkbait’ got off to a dream start to the second day with a bullet ahead of’Flutter’ (Andrew Algeo) and Dorgan in the fourth race of the series. Fourth-placed Peter Kennedy of RNIYC in ‘Ridgefence.com’ was making amends for his OCS on the Saturday by following up that result with a win in the penultimate race, with ‘Flutter’ again second.  Sean Craig’s ‘Yeti’ was third while Duncan and Dorgan filled 4^th and 5^th respectively.

Dorgan left his best to last, winning the final race from Kennedy, Craig and Duncan in that order, a result that set up the tie after discards. In the race for the rest of the fleet, three northern boats filled the sixth to eighth places overall while Shane Murphy’s ‘Dinghy Supplies’ in 9^th was the next best placed Howth entry.

SB3 Eastern Championships – overall results

1. Sharkbait (Duncan/Moran/Morris) HYC     12 points
2. Sibelius (K.Dorgan) CSC       12 points
3. Flutter (A.Algeo) RStGYC  14 points
4. Ridgefence.com (P.Kennedy) RNIYC – 15 points
5. Yeti (S.Craig) RStGYC) – 17 points