Five years after her last international ILCA campaign, Olympic silver medallist Annalise Murphy is back for a World Championship on home waters — but Dublin Bay will provide a far sterner test than last month's Irish Nationals.
Murphy's return to the ILCA 6 will face its first major international test when the Women's World Championship comes to her home waters on Dublin Bay in September.
Five years after her last Olympic ILCA campaign, the 36-year-old National Yacht Club sailor has returned to the single-handed dinghy in which she won silver at Rio 2016 and finished fourth at London 2012.
Murphy has already passed her first domestic test emphatically. Racing an ILCA for the first time in five years, she won last month's Grant Thornton ILCA Irish National Championships on the same Dublin Bay waters that will host the Worlds.
But the World Championship represents a substantial step up in opposition and will provide a much clearer measure of where Murphy now stands against the international ILCA 6 fleet.
Five-Year Gap Ends on Home Waters
Murphy stepped away from Olympic single-handed sailing following the Tokyo Games, completing a three-Olympic campaign in the class.
Her Rio silver made her only the third Irish sailor to win an Olympic sailing medal, 36 years after David Wilkins and James Wilkinson took Flying Dutchman silver at Moscow 1980.
Murphy's route to Tokyo had itself involved a return to the single-hander. After Rio, she embarked on a 49erFX campaign before switching back to the Laser Radial, subsequently renamed the ILCA 6, for her third Olympic appearance.
This latest return comes in different circumstances and, so far, Murphy has given no indication that it represents the beginning of another Olympic campaign.
According to a feature published by the International Laser Class Association (ILCA) on Tuesday, Murphy applied on July 16 for one of Ireland's places at the Women's Worlds and initially sat first on the waiting list behind three confirmed Irish entries.
Breeze Test – Annalise Murphy showed she has lost little of her medium to heavy-air speed during her winning return at the ILCA Irish Nationals, but September's World Championship will provide a considerably sterner international test. Photo: Afloat
Any uncertainty about whether she remained competitive after five years away was answered, at least domestically, at the Irish Nationals.
Murphy won the 44-boat ILCA 6 fleet with seven net points after six races, opening a nine-point advantage over Howth Yacht Club's Sienna Wright, with Royal St George Yacht Club's Marcus Shelley third.
The final day's racing was cancelled when westerly winds averaged around 24 knots and gusted above 30, leaving Murphy's overnight advantage as the final result.
Her scores included three race wins and two second places.
Worlds Provide a Different Test
The result inevitably raised expectations around Dún Laoghaire, particularly given Murphy's long-established reputation as a formidable heavy-weather sailor.
The World Championship, however, presents a very different proposition.
Instead of a domestic fleet, Murphy will face the leading ILCA 6 sailors from around the world across a championship series in which changing wind strengths and conditions can expose small differences in boat speed, technique and consistency.
Whether Murphy's appearance represents a one-off return for a World Championship on home waters or something more remains an open question.
More immediately, the Worlds will provide a considerably sterner measure of how her speed and technique compare with the international ILCA 6 fleet after five years away from top-level competition.
Worlds Rehearsal – The ILCA 6 fleet races on Dublin Bay during July's Irish National Championships, which provided a test of the waters that will host the Women's World Championship in September. Photo: Afloat
There is also considerable symmetry to the timing.
The championship comes almost exactly a decade after Murphy won Olympic silver at Rio 2016 and brings her back to World Championship competition on the waters where she developed as a young sailor.
It also places her alongside a new generation of Irish ILCA 6 sailors, headed by Paris 2024 Olympian Eve McMahon.
Much has changed in Irish ILCA 6 sailing during Murphy's five-year absence.
McMahon emerged as a multiple youth and junior world champion before representing Ireland at the Paris 2024 Olympics and has since made her mark at senior level.
Most significantly, McMahon won bronze at the 2025 ILCA 6 Women's World Championship in Qingdao, China — Ireland's first senior World Championship medal in the class, an achievement Murphy herself never managed during her distinguished ILCA career. With Murphy now returning to the international fleet, how Ireland's two Olympians fare alongside each other on home waters adds another intriguing dimension to the Dublin Bay Worlds.
Olympic Medallists Drawn Back to ILCA
ILCA has highlighted Murphy's return as part of a wider pattern involving some of the class's most successful Olympic sailors.
Croatia's Tonči Stipanović, a two-time Olympic silver medallist and five-time European champion, returned to ILCA 7 competition at the European Championships in Kaštela in May after a year away.
Stipanović is also coming to Dublin Bay and is entered for the Men's ILCA 7 World Championship, which precedes the Women's event.
The class association also points to Brazilian sailing great Robert Scheidt, whose career provides perhaps the most striking example of a champion returning to the single-handed dinghy.
Scheidt won Olympic Laser gold at Atlanta 1996 and Sydney 2000 before moving into the Star after Athens 2004.
He subsequently returned to the Laser and won the 2013 World Championship before eventually competing at a seventh Olympic Games in Tokyo at the age of 48.
For ILCA, the three examples demonstrate the enduring appeal of a strict one-design class. For Murphy, the immediate motivation is closer to home: an opportunity to contest a World Championship on Dublin Bay.
Irish Challenge – Paris 2024 Olympian Eve McMahon will be among Ireland's ILCA 6 challenge when the Women's World Championship is staged on home waters in Dublin Bay in September. Photo: Sailing Energy
Two World Championships for Dublin Bay
Murphy's return adds another significant Irish storyline to a major period of international sailing in Dún Laoghaire.
The Men's ILCA 7 World Championship gets underway first, bringing a major international fleet to Dublin Bay before attention switches to the Women's ILCA 6 Worlds in September.
The Irish Nationals provided a useful rehearsal for the venue, race management team and infrastructure, as well as for Murphy herself.
The Nationals demonstrated that five years away have not prevented the Rio medallist from immediately returning to the front of an Irish ILCA fleet.
The considerably harder question is what that performance means at world level.
Dublin Bay will shortly provide the answer.
World Stage – Dublin Bay will host back-to-back ILCA World Championships, with the Men's ILCA 7 event followed by the Women's ILCA 6 Worlds and Annalise Murphy's return to international championship competition.
