Yacht Freya That Rescued Kitesurfer Moves up to Second Overall in Dun Laoghaire Dingle Race After Redress

12th June 2021

Afloat.ie Team

Conor Doyle's Freya from Kinsale Yacht Club has been awarded second place overall in the 2021 Dun Laoghaire Dingle Race by a protest committee following the rescue of a kitesurfer off the Wicklow coast in the early stages of the 280-mile race Credit: Afloat

Conor Doyle's Freya, the racing yacht at the centre of a kitesurfer rescue undertaken during the first hours of the Dun Laoghaire Dingle Race on Wednesday has been granted redress, a decision that gives Doyle and his Kinsale Yacht Club crew second overall in the 2021 edition of the prestigious Irish offshore sailing fixture.

The Xp50 yacht, the largest in the 38-boat fleet, was the first to finish in Dingle early on Friday morning but was scored fifth on IRC rating due to the time delay involved in completing the rescue off the County Wicklow coast.

Doyle filed for redress as required under racing rules of sailing and this afternoon the race protest committee found the following facts: on 9th June Freya was beating southwards along the Wicklow shore against a tide flowing northwards at approximately 2 knots.

At approx.19.20 on port tack sailing towards the shore, Freya saw a semi-inflated kite in the water, further out to sea at a distance of 0.5 N,M. She tacked to investigate. At 19.30 the crew identified a kite surfer in the water in need of assistance. Freya's position was N 52 51.671, W 06 02.610. A video of the incident is posted on Afloat here.

Freya started her motor, lowered sails and requested RNLI assistance via Rosslare radio.

At 19.45 the casualty was taken on board and Freya motored in a Southerly direction to rendezvous with the Arklow lifeboat.

The kitesurfer casualty is taken on board Freya

At 19.50 Freya informed the race office of the incident.

Freya transferred the casualty to the lifeboat at 20.12 and then motored northwards until resumed racing at 20.21. Her position at this moment was N52 51.581 W 06 02.553, less than 200m south of the position where they stopped racing.

Freya transfers the casualty to the Arklow lifeboat Photo: Chris Power Smith/Aurelia

The protest committee found that Freya's overall strategy was not significantly modified by the time lost in the rescue.

In conclusion, the committee granted redress and said Freya's elapsed time was made significantly worse through no fault of her own by giving help as required by RRS 1.1.

The Protest Committee evaluated that the total time lost was approx.75 minutes. However, it decided the fairest arrangement for all boats affected is to give Freya joint second place.

Download the full case document below

Downloads

Case 1 update2.docx (192 Downloads)

Published in Dun Laoghaire Dingle

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The 16th edition of the 280-mile race organised by the National Yacht Club starts at 2 pm on Wednesday, June 7th, on Dublin Bay.

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Published in Dun Laoghaire Dingle

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Dun Laoghaire Dingle Race

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Dun Laoghaire to Dingle Yacht Race Information

The biennial Dun Laoghaire to Dingle race is a 320-miles race down to the east coast of Ireland, across the south coast and into Dingle harbour in County Kerry.

The race is organised by the National Yacht Club.

It never fails to offer a full range of weather, wind and tide to the intrepid entrants, ranging from a 32ft cruiser to a 79ft all-out racer.

Three divisions are available to enter: cruiser (boats equipped with furlers), racing (the bulk of the fleet) and also two-handed.

D2D Course change overruled

In 2019, the organisers considered changing the course to allow boats to select routes close to shore by removing the requirement to go outside Islands and Lighthouses en route, but following input from regular participants, the National Yacht Club decided to stick with the tried and tested course route in order to be fair to large and smaller boats and to keep race records intact.

D2D Course record time

Mick Cotter’s 78ft Whisper established the 1 day and 48 minutes course record for the Dun Laoghaire to Dingle Race in 2009 and that time stood until 2019 when Cotter returned to beat his own record but only just, the Dun Laoghaire helmsman crossing the line in Kerry to shave just 20 seconds off his 2009 time.