The All-American Maxi72 battle in the RORC Caribbean 600 lived up to expectations with Hap Fauth's Bella Mente (navigated by Carrickfergus's Ian Moore) and George Sakellaris' Proteus enjoying an epic match race. The lead in the Maxi72s changed hands on seven occasions during the race. Bella Mente counted 85 sail changes and at one point, both yachts were way-over canvassed, smoking along at 30 knots in a gigantic squall. Bella Mente crossed the finish line just 14 minutes ahead of Proteus to set the bar for the RORC Caribbean 600 Trophy which will be awarded at the Prize Giving to the yacht scoring the best time under the IRC Rating Rule.

Hap Fauth was delighted to have won the match race with Proteus and full of praise for the event, the competition and above all, his team:

"We are beat; there is nothing left as the whole team gave 120% or more...unbelievable! We are just delighted to have prevailed. We had a match race for 500 miles with Proteus and that is a really well sailed boat. It was really, really good sailing. This is an iconic race that you cannot miss at all.

"The RORC should be congratulated for organising another great race. This was an interesting course because with the conditions it was totally new and fresh. We expected a maximum wind speed of 15 knots and at one point we were doing 25 knots of boat speed, just ripping, so it was terrific. Not until we got to Barbuda for the second time did we really establish ourselves. We had a tacking duel with maybe 15 tacks and extended out by four miles, we just kept our lead. A really good race and it doesn't get any better.

"Last year we didn't finished the race and we had to put the old girl back together. Bella Mente is the oldest Maxi 72 on the circuit and I am the oldest helmsman, but if I am still out of the ground next year, I will be back. This crew is the best in the world. I just stay at the back and get all of the applause."

Bella Mente tactician, Terry Hutchinson, explained some of the key aspects in the battle with Proteus:

"If you haven't done this race you have to come and do it, even with the unusual conditions it was really good. Way more exciting than we thought it would be. What surprised me was we finished the race a lot earlier than we thought, but the battle with Proteus was just as we expected. We passed each other seven times during the race! Getting that extra gust of wind and different sail combinations were big factors. Proteus was quick on a reach and Bella Mente had a slight edge upwind and downwind. At Guadeloupe, we had set a spinnaker first at Iles des Saintes, but we couldn't make the corner and then couldn't get our spinnaker down either, so we were on the back foot going around La Desirade. For the 90 mile beat, Bella Mente was going about as good as ever and we were a mile behind, but by Barbuda we were two miles ahead. It will be interesting to hear if something wasn't quite right on their boat. We got ahead when it counted, but massive kudos to the Proteus team, they sailed a great race."

Last year's overall winner, George Sakellaris racing Proteus described the race as one of the best ever despite losing out to Bella Mente.

"We had everything in this race; it was an epic battle but something went wrong with the boat on the beat to Barbuda. We even backed up the boat to try to shake off some weed or whatever it was slowing us down. Up until then it was a great race, one of the best I have ever done. We had close company all the way and not just Bella Mente, we had Leopard and SFS to contend with as well. The team is fantastic and it was very exciting. At one point we were sailing with the A1 (largest spinnaker) in 37 knots of wind and the boat was doing 30 knots. That is why I go racing, that is what I live for."

Mike Slade's Maxi Leopard 3 finished the RORC Caribbean 600 in second place on the water behind George David's Rambler 88 to claim third in class. "Leopard has not been beaten on the water by a Maxi 72 or a Volvo 70 in this race and that still stands," commented Leopard 3 Boat Captain, Chris Sherlock. Lionel Pean's French Volvo 70 finished the race just under two hours behind Leopard 3 and after time correction is runner up to Rambler 88 in IRC Canting Keel. "It was a great pleasure to race along side two Maxi72s and our target was be ahead of the other Volvo 70s and we achieved this with a good result. We had great sailing and a good fight all along but it was a hard race."

On the fourth day of the RORC Caribbean 600, over 50 yachts are still racing. Bernie Evan-Wong's Antiguan RP37, Taz is leading in IRC One. Ed Fishwick's British J/122, Redshift on El Ocaso is leading in IRC Two and Jonty Layfield's British Swan 48, Sleeper X is leading IRC Three. Peter Harding's British Class40 Ph-orty is back in the lead for the Class40 Division.

The RORC Caribbean 600 began with a cliffhanger start involving real cliffs from which the Maxi 72 Bella Mente (Hap Fauth, US) got the better of defending champion Proteus, another American Maxi 72 campaigned by George Sakellaris and Reginald Cole writes W M Nixon.

And as of 1800hrs Irish time Wednesday, with just thirty miles to the finish at Antigua, it’s likely they’re racing for the overall win in a cliffhanger finish, metaphorically speaking this time, swapping places with every manoeuvre.

The way that this unique race of a cat’s cradle course around and among islands to make up a total distance above the magic minimum 600 miles expected of the great classics may mean that it’s not really offshore racing as we usually know it. But it certainly has its followers on the edge of their seats.

Rambler 88 is currently the only boat finished, and predictions based on current performance suggest she might hold onto fourth. But with afternoon breezes building and then falling away as the rest of the fleet make their way towards the finish off English Harbour, the very fact of having it done and dusted is a matter of quiet encouragement for George David and his crew aboard the boat which won every which way in the Volvo Round Ireland Race just eight months ago.  

Meanwhile, think of the mental stress. Even while we’ve been scribbling this, Ian Moore’s tactics have brought Bella Menta up past Proteus, and the Fauth boat is now three miles ahead of Proteus with just 29 miles to go, and making 9.6 knots to the 5.8 of Proteus……Time for a cup of strong tea.

RORC Adds: George David's American Maxi, Rambler 88 finished the 2017 RORC Caribbean 600 on Wednesday 22 February 2017 at 11 hrs 56 mins 17 secs AST taking Monohull Line Honours.

This year was George David's third line honours win in the RORC Caribbean 600. However, the record set by his previous boat, Rambler 100 in 2011 remains intact for another year. However, George David was very content with the performance of the team and Rambler 88.

"The forecast was right on for direction as the breeze went a full 360 degrees, but we had a bit more velocity than anticipated. It was a good race and we enjoyed it very much but this was a different race altogether. It was more like the English Channel than the Caribbean and Rambler 88 will be racing there this summer in our build up to the Rolex Fastnet Race. I have never taken part in those races before so that will be interesting as well.

Mike Slade's British Maxi Leopard 3 is expected to be the second monohull to finish the race in front of two Maxi72s vying for the overall win under IRC: Hap Fauth's Bella Mente and George Sakellaris' Proteus. Lionel Pean's French Volvo70 SFS II is also expected to finish the race today, 22 February at 17:30 AST.

Maybe it’s because the weather has been unseasonably like home at times out in the Caribbean, but the Irish sailors spread through the RORC fleet have been in the racing frame through a wet cold front from the nor’west. For a while, it turned sunshine hopes upside down, but the Micks in the mix are on boats which have been showing mighty well since last’s night’s posting, when top navigator Ian Moore on Bella Mente was leading the fleet on IRC writes W M Nixon.

The first of the multi-hulls, Lloyd Thornburg’s MOD 70 Phaedo 3 with Damian Foxall on the strength, has already taken line honours in 33 hours. But further down the line, the pendulum of fortune has swung back and forth as monohull boats of hugely varying sizes take on the challenges of a real cat’s cradle of a course.

The vagaries of fortune are revealed by the fact that for some hours this morning Irish time, the overall leader was the superyacht Dannesskjold, whose crew include Tim Goodbody, Aine Hanevy, and Paul O’Donoghue, while the Kinsale-registered Lilla was third. But the most recent set of figures show that Dannesskjold has plunged to 32nd overall, while Lilla plunhed to 48th, and the best-placed Irish sailor is now Marcus Spillane, originally of Cork, now San Francisco-based, an ISA Board Member and representative on World Sailing.

He also presides over the 49er International Association and the Nacra 17 Association, but currently his focus is on getting the best performance out of the Swan 66 Bounty in the Caribbean 600, and they lie third overall, 20 minutes or so ahead of George David’s Rambler 88 in fourth, and 45 minutes ahead of Bella Mente in 5th. Yet while Phaedo may be well finished, but there’ll be many twists of failure and fortune before we get the final IRC placings.

After an epic battle with their MOD70 sister ship Maserati, Phaedo^3 with County Kerry's Damian Foxall onboard took multihull line honours in the RORC Caribbean 600.

The Round Ireland speed record holder Lloyd Thornburg and his crew of Brian Thompson, Michel Desjoyeaux, Miles Seddon, Rob Greenhalgh, Pete Cumming, Paul Allen and Foxall, finished with an elasped time of 33 hours 40 minutes and 46 seconds. The clubhouse leaders have to wait until the rest of the MORCA fleet finish to see how they finish on handicap.

Afloat.ie “Sailor of the Month” for October 2016, ace navigator Ian Moore originally from Carrickfergus, is once again calling the shots aboard Hap Fauth’s Maxi 72 Bella Mente. And they’re leading the fleet in the RORC Caribbean 600 by nearly an hour on corrected time as the first 24 hours of racing draws to a close with many islands still to be rounded, and a myriad of wind changes to be negotiated writes W M Nixon.

2016 was Moore’s dream year, as among other achievements he piloted the RP 63 Lucky to a runaway win in the Transatlantic Race in July, and then he transferred to Bella Mente for Cowes Week in August and showed he was equally adept at working the inshore Solent conditions to take just about every major prize. Came October, and he guided the Cookson 50 Mascalzone Latino to the overall win in the Middle Sea Race.

Now he’s back at the screens aboard Bella Mente, and has clearly taken over where he left off, on top form. He would have been in there on Bella Mente’s start, which was a classic, calling for water right in under the cliffs as she forced the fleet - and particularly the 2016 winner Proteus – to allow her to tack onto port.

But this is one complex race, like sailing a course made from a bowl of spaghetti, so a lot of chips (if you’ll excuse a hyper-mixing of metaphors) have to fall the right way into the deep-fat fryer which is Caribbean racing, in order to stay ahead of a hungry fleet including the likes of George David’s Rambler 88.

Despite the sad sudden departure of Sean McCarter from the fray aboard the much-fancied Infiniti 46 Maverick after a crewman sustained a serious hand injury, Irish interest is strong throughout the fleet, and the one boat with an Irish sail number, Simon and Nancy DiPietro’s Kinsale YC-registered Briand 76 Lilla (a prize winner in past races), is tramping along in the top half of the fleet, well-placed for a boat which is really a cruiser-racer.

Lilla is flying the flag for Ireland, and doing mighty well for a boat with full cruising comfort.

Through the fleet we find such Irish luminaries as Tom McWilliam aboard Leopard, Gabrielle MacManus on Olympia’s Tigress, Wicklow’s David “Farmer” Ryan and WSC Commodorial spouse Jim Cummins on the First 40 Arthur Logic, Damian Foxall on Phaedo 3, Marcus Spillane on Bounty, Barry Hurley and James Murphy on Pata Negra, Maurice “Prof” O’Connell and Dwayne Lysaght on Louise, Timothy Goodbody, Aine Hanevy and Paul O’Donoghue on Danneskjold, Cian O’Carroll on Eleonara E, William Byrne and Chris Raymond on Spice, Mark Norman on Piccolo, Storme Delaney (I’m not making these names up) and Ciara Scott on Sunset, and James Carroll on Spice.

Between them all, we should have something to show for everyone’s efforts in a race which at its inauguration in 2009 was won overall by Adrian Lee’s Cookson 50 Lee Overlay Partners of the Royal St George YC. This is a boat which in a previous incarnation was Ger O’Rourke’s Cheftain of the Royal Western of Ireland yacht Club, overall winner of the 2007 Fastnet. Our 2017 squad have a lot to live up to.

Sean McCarter, the Derry Clipper World race sailor who is part of the Infniti 46 Maverick crew has retired from the RORC Caribbean 600 following an injury to a crewman this morning. 

A statement from the boat an hour ago said: "Maverick diverted to Nevis to drop Steve Taylor off at the hospital after suffering an injury to his right hand. As soon as the incident occurred the team retired from the race and made best speed to Nevis. Piers has gone with Steve to the hospital in Nevis. The rest of the team are safe and well. We are on a mooring outside of Charlestown Nevis and will clear customs tomorrow morning. Our thoughts are with Steve. His next of kin have been notified."

McCarter, who has his eye on a Vendee Globe 2020 campaign, was part of the British Maverick crew skippered by Oliver Cotterell.

The latest news from the race tracker is that Ireland's former Green Dragon VOR entry is second overall and while Round Ireland Multhull record holder Phaedo 3 is first multihull they are behind last year's record pace. 

An array of Irish sailors are on different boats at this week's event and are lead by County Kerry's Damian Foxall as they compete in the ninth edition of the regatta that  started in magnificent conditions with the largest ever offshore fleet assembled in the Caribbean enjoying sparkling conditions. A south–easterly breeze, occasionally gusting up to 15 knots and a relatively calm sea state provided conditions for the perfect start with some close battles on the water yesterday.

Unlike 2016, when two Irish boats were racing, namely; Conor Fogerty's BAM from Howth Yacht Club and the Royal St. George's Lee Overlay Partners Cookson 50 skippered by Adrian Lee this year the sole Kinsale cruiser, Lilla, bears Irish sail numbers.

Navigator Ian Moore originally from Carrickfergus, is once again calling the shots aboard Hap Fauth’s Maxi 72 Bella Mente. David Ryan and Jim Cummins of Wicklow Sailing Club are on UK yacht First 40 Arthur Logic. Maurice 'Prof' O'Connell from the Royal St. George YC is racing and Royal Irish Yacht Club member Storme Delaney, who completed the ARC Rally in December, is also in action. For more Irish sailors on the race please read our update here.

RORC Commodore, Michael Boyd of the Royal Irish Yacht Club in Dublin was hoping to compete on Giles Redpath's Pata Negra, but due to business commitments had to watch the start from ashore this year. "It was almost as nerve racking to be up at Fort Charlotte as on the water, and of course we are all hurlers from the ditch telling them to get closer to the cliffs. It was a fascinating start from an amazing and historic vantage point to see these wonderful boats take off. Everything went very smoothly, which is a great tribute to our professional race management team and our volunteers. This was quite an emotional moment for me and we will of course be wishing them all well for the next few days and a safe return."

The MOD70 battle for multihull line honours has already kicked off. Lloyd Thornburg's Phaedo3 pulled away (with Foxall onboard) from Giovanni Soldini's Maserati at the upwind start but as the two cracked sheets at Green Island, Maserati deployed their foil and took up the lead. Two hours into the race, the two flying trimarans were approaching the Barbuda mark touching 18 knots of boat speed.

George David's Rambler 88 got away to a terrific start and leads the monohull fleet on the water by almost three miles on approach to Barbuda. However, three hours into the race and after IRC time correction, George Sakellaris' Proteus is estimated to be leading overall with Hap Fauth's Bella Mente second and Rambler 88 third.

IRC Canting Keel and IRC Zero produced a thrilling start. Lionel Pean's French Volvo 70 SFS II came charging in on port, baring away behind the two Maxi72s to take a commanding position on the favoured left side of the course.

The Class40 Division are enjoying incredibly close racing. Peter Harding's Ph-orty leads, Catherine Pourre's Earendil and Halvard Mabire's Campagne de France are both within one mile. The pack of Class40s have the magnificent sight of the 182ft twin-masted schooner Adela ahead of them. Cressida Robinson reporting from Carl Wilcox's Nisida: "We have had everything from 15 knots gusting up to 30 and spotted a water spout on the way to Barbuda."

A record fleet of 80 yachts will be competing in the 9th edition of the RORC Caribbean 600 starting from Antigua this morning.

This year's race will see the most spectacular line-up of high performance boats and crews racing from 30 different countries.

The crew list reads like the 'Who's Who' of international sailors with hundreds of round the world, America's Cup, Olympic and Volvo Ocean Race professionals rubbing shoulders with passionate corinthian sailors on the same 600 mile race course around 11 Caribbean islands.

Check out the pre–event video below with an interview with RORC Commodore Michael Boyd of Dublin Bay. 

Both monohull and multihull Round Ireland record holders are part of a fleet of over 80 yachts expected for the ninth edition of the 2017 RORC Caribbean 600 in which 900 sailors from 30 different nations will race non-stop around 11 Caribbean islands, starting and finishing in Antigua.

Passionate corinthians will be rubbing shoulders with Olympic medallists, America's Cup winners and round the world sailors in a race to take home the coveted RORC Caribbean 600 Trophy. The 600 mile course is designed to offer a tactical, high speed race with stunning vistas at every corner.

"The RORC Caribbean 600 is very different to the other 600 mile races and definitely not a holiday race in the Caribbean," commented RORC Racing Manager, Nick Elliott. "The race has many tactical legs with land effects and wind-driven currents which are both difficult to predict. The heat of the day and the long nights are also unusual features for an offshore race making it every bit as challenging as the Rolex Fastnet Race, and just as exciting. It is interesting to note that the records for the Rolex Fastnet Race and the RORC Caribbean 600 are very similar."

Featuring a magnificent collection of yachts, an incredibly varied fleet will be racing under the IRC, CSA and MOCRA rating systems, as well as Class40s racing under class rules. Rambler 88, Phaedo3 and Maserati will be gunning for course records, however, the winner of the RORC Caribbean 600 Trophy will be decided by the yacht with the best corrected time under IRC.

George David's American Maxi Rambler 88 is back with an impressive crew line-up for another tilt at the race record, the overall win and class honours. New Zealand's multiple America's Cup winner, Brad Butterworth is part of an impressive afterguard including fellow Kiwi, Brad Jackson and Australian navigator, Andrew Cape. Virtually the entire crew are America's Cup winners and stars of the Volvo Ocean Race.

Phaedo3 has assembled a phenomenal crew for the race and multiple world record holder, Brian Thompson is joined by Volvo Ocean Race winners Robert Greenhalgh and Damian Foxall. Extreme 40 champion, Pete Cumming and the formidable talent of Michel Desjoyeux, the only sailor to have won the Vendée Globe twice. Maserati's skipper, Giovanni Soldini is Italy's most decorated offshore sailor and Maserati has been fitted with foils which can provide a speed advantage over Phaedo3. A fascinating contest for multihull line honours is expected.

The winner of the Multihull Class will be the yacht with the best corrected time under MOCRA. Seven teams are entered including Shaun Carroll's Australian Modified Sea Cart 30, Morticia which is the smallest yacht competing in the entire fleet, and the head-turning all-carbon R-Six, skippered by Robert Janecki, which is the first ever entry from Belize.

IRC Overall for the RORC Caribbean 600 Trophy

Overall winners of the previous eight editions of the race have all come from IRC Canting Keel and IRC Zero. Amongst this year's favourites are two Maxi 72s: Hap Fauth's Bella Mente - overall winner in the 2015 race, and current holder of the RORC Caribbean 600 Trophy, George Sakellaris' Proteus.

Whilst the two Maxi 72s are firm favourites, the stellar cast racing in IRC Canting Keel and IRC Zero includes; Farr 100 Leopard and three Volvo 70s, Lionel Pean's SFS II from France, Trifork skippered by Dutchman Bouwe Bekking and Green Dragon, skippered by Austrian Johannes Schwarz. The dark horse of the canting keel class is Maverick, skippered by Oliver Cotterell. The Infiniti 46 with DSS side foils was class winner for the RORC Transatlantic Race and the Rolex Middle Sea Race.

In IRC Zero, the 182ft schooner Adela, skippered by Greg Perkins is the largest yacht taking part and making a RORC Caribbean 600 debut is Anders Nordquist's Shamanna. The 115ft superyacht is the largest of nine Swans competing this year and boasts a crew including many of Malta's best sailors from the Calascione, Podesta and Ripard families. RORC Admiral and IMA Secretary General, Andrew McIrvine is a guest aboard Grant Gordon's Maxi cruiser 72, Louise. Overall winner of the 2017 Cape to Rio Race, Stefan Jentzsch's German Carkeek 47, Black Pearl is the smallest yacht in IRC Zero. South African America's Cup sailors, Mark Sadler and Marc Lagesse form the afterguard.

With 17 yachts, the largest class competing this year is IRC One and a huge variety of yachts includes Giles Redpath's Lombard 46, Pata Negra, with RORC Commodore, Michael Boyd among the crew. Bernie Evan Wong's RP37, Taz will be proudly flying the Antiguan flag once again. Bernie is the life and soul of the race having competed in all nine editions as skipper.

The IRC Two champion, Ross Applebey's Scarlet Oyster is back attempting to win the class for the fourth consecutive race in a highly competitive field including; Ed Fishwick's Redshift on El Ocaso with a young, top-class crew including, 2012 Olympic Silver Medallist Luke Patience and Figaro sailors, Alan Roberts and Nick Cherry, as well as Volvo Ocean Race sailor, Nick Bubb.

Close racing is expected in IRC Three among four vintage Swans, including two Sparkman & Stephens designed Swan 48s, Jonty Layfield's Sleeper X and Andrew & Mia Schell's Isbjorn. Peter Hopps, skipper of the Sigma 38, Sam has competed in every edition of the RORC Caribbean 600.

Short-Handed Challengers
A number of young talented Figaro teams are expected from Guadeloupe and James Heald's British Swan 45 Nemesis will be racing Two-Handed. Five Class 40s will be competing including Halvard Mabire and Miranda Merron's Campagne de France which won the Class40 division in the 2016 RORC Transatlantic Race, Catherine Pourre's Eärendil, Peter Harding's Phor-ty, Mikael Ryking's Talanta and Marc Lepesqueux's Saint-Pierre & Miquelon.

Royal Cork Yacht Club in conjunction with ICRA and RORC will be running an IRC Measurement weekend on the 5th, 6th and 7th of May.

The aim of this weekend is two fold:

IRC Measurers:
• To train up new people on the south-coast to be qualified to measure boats. This will be done over the one evening and two day course, the cost of this will be €50 per person and will include lunch during the course.
Boat Measuring:
• While the course is on, RORC will be offering to measure boats at a substantial discount to normal cost, so if you are interested in getting your boat weighed and measured it will be done here in Crosshaven for a cost of €200 per boat. Spaces will be limited for this offer so it will be on a first come first served basis.

If you are interested in either of the two option planned for this weekend as places will be limited, so book early to ensure you get in. Further details here.

This month sees Conor Fogerty of Howth Yacht Club, preparing for one of the most prestigious and demanding solo ocean races in the international yachting calendar. 

The latest instalment of the OSTAR (Original Solo Transatlantic Race), commences on 29th May 2017.

This will see Fogerty, bring his much loved and widely campaigned Sunfast 3600 'Bam', to the start line off Plymouth Sound in the English Channel. This gruelling race which is taxing on both body and mind, heads across the North Atlantic Ocean, to Newport Rhode Island, over 3,000 miles of Ocean.

Although the race name OSTAR may trip easily off the tongue, this generally upwind race, is not for the faint hearted or indeed occasional offshore adventurer.

Fogerty and Bam surfing at 20–knots during a 2016 transatlantic crossing

The event sees the solo skippers pit themselves against strong gales and big seas as a matter of course, not to mention, ice, fog, shipping and the occasional whale attack is not unknown.

He will follow in the footsteps of a veritable who’s who of sailing greats and pioneers of ocean racing. The names of Chichester, Knox Johnson, Blyth, Tabarly, Peyron, not forgetting Ellen McArthur are some of those who have sailed this great race before him.

In an Irish context, solo sailor Barry Hurley of the Royal Irish Yacht Club took a class win in the 2009 Ostar after a 21–day match race with an Italian competitor.

OSTAR history can be traced to an English war veteran Blondie Hassler who set about organising the race in 1956 and saw it first run in 1960 under the guidance of The Royal Western Yacht Club. From those early days of sextants and hand bearing compasses, the race has witnessed the trialling of most major innovations in boat design and on board equipment common in modern day sailing. This includes the advent of multi hulls, autopilots, water ballast, GPS, and weather routing. Whilst all of the above have certainly revolutionised sailing for the modern day solo adventurer, they do little to diminish the stark reality of dealing with the conditions, the low pressure systems of the North Atlantic create.

After 21 days at sea Barry Hurley makes a dawn finish and a class win in the 2009 Ostar

Conor is a seasoned campaigner. Last year alone saw his 11–metre Bam start the year with a win in the RORC Caribbean 600. From there a 16–day solo trip to the Azores and then after some much needed R &R in Horta, back to Ireland.

Next up were the ISORA races across the Irish Sea and forays to the South Coast of England and North of France competing in RORC races. Not forgetting a 3rd place finish in the Round Ireland and a Solo Fastnet (SORC) challenge, which but for a fickle wind at the end line, would have seen him claim the top of the podium. The season came down with the Middle Sea Race off Malta which saw Fogerty and Bam claim the 3rd overall in class for the RORC 2016 season.

This was a fitting reward for skipper and crew for the thousands of hard miles campaigning in 2016, without the big budgets of some competitors or indeed sponsorship.

It has been said that the major achievement racing the OSTAR is to get the boat to the start line.

These campaigns do not come easily or cheaply to the racing privateer. The aim now is to get as many sponsors as possible on board, to back this commendable Corinthian challenge.

Conor is in discussions with potential sponsors at the moment, but he also provides a grass route sponsorship option for an individual to have their name displayed on the hull to show support, and to give his attempt every chance of success, and to fly the Irish flag with distinction. If you are interested in providing support, please contact [email protected]