It will be a bitter blow for the race organisers, Wicklow Sailing Club, to see so much potential interest in the race evaporate, but at least one maxi, ICAP Leopard, will still take part with several Irish crew aboard.
The Irish Volvo boat is expected to arrive here in July and be based in Galway, which will host the first ever Irish stopover of the round-the-world yacht race, now known as the Volvo Ocean Race.
The Boston to Galway leg was seen by organisers as a potential gold mine in terms of sponsorship, with the historic ties between America and Ireland on either side of the Atlantic.
Basing the Irish entry in Galway keeps it close to the heart of one of its major backers, Eamon Conneely, owner of the successful TP52 Patches, named after his home town in Galway, and the more cynical would say that it allows what has been, to this point, a very media-shy team to keep the boat well away from the prying eyes of Dublin-based media.
No doubt, it will also place them nicely to train in tough Northern Atlantic conditions off Ireland's wild west coast.
The team behind Conneely's Patches campaign has orchestrated the 'Green Team' effort from the start, and the design and build team of Reichel Pugh and McConaghy's follows the similar construction of Conneely's most recent TP52.
The Volvo Ocean Race starts in Spain next October.
Volunteers are currently being sought to help out with the stopover in Galway
