John Sheehy, Nick Smyth, Paddy Kirwan, and Marty O’Leary emerged as the top crew at the Match Racing Championships in Kinsale at the weekend, The Royal St George Yacht Club team have been dominant on the Match Racing Tour of Ireland all year and look set to break into the top 100 match racers in the world when the next ISAF World Rankings are announced in December.
Although John is now Dublin based the Sheehy family are Kinsale natives and it was a touching moment for John when he finally lifted the national title here after 5 silver medals in the previous 5 years. To top it off bowman Marty O’Leary completed the All Ireland Sailing Championship and National Match Racing Championship double for the second year in a row.
Match racing will form an Olympic discipline as a womens event for the first time in 2012 with the men expected to follow in 2016 or 2020. Over the last few years Ireland has slowly built up the infrastructure required to compete at the highest level. The Irish Sailing Association SailFleet J80s were used again at this event and this year saw the development of a series of events that have allowed Irish teams to take considerable steps forward. A guest team from the Danish federation attended this years Championships with officials from France and England also present and, having been suitably impressed, invitations for Irish teams to attend major international events are expected to be forth coming for 2010.
Twelve teams from round the country, selected from 24 entries on the basis of world ranking, raced off for the title of ISA National Match Racing Champion. The Nationals also formed the Match Racing Tour of Ireland Grand Final with double points at stake. Though the Championship experienced the entire winter season of weather conditions, one full round robin of 66 races was completed with each team sailing against each other once. Second was Howth's Ben Duncan, Ric Morris, Ryan Scott, and Richie Murphy. Another Howth crew of Tom Fitzpatrick, David McHugh and Brendan Faffiani came third.
With a gale forcing a postponement on Saturday racing got under way on Sunday in fresh westerly conditions. As the early rounds unfolded the adage that a match race is still a sailboat race held true and the basic boat speed of the some teams saw some sort of order begin to take shape. The tie of the third round saw experienced team racer Andrew Fowler take the scalp of Irelands 470 representative at the last Olympics Ger Owens and, in round 4, the North Sails Ireland team featuring Corks Maurice O’Connell, Eoin Leahy, John Downey and Bryan Bryan took down Tom Fitzpatrick. Mean while John Sheehy and Ben Duncan quietly went about their way and these 4 teams emerged from the mornings racing undefeated.
Rounds 5, 6, 7 and 8 proved critical to the final rankings. In their race with John Sheehy the North Sails Ireland team managed to gain a controlling position and forced him away from the finish line but when the brief moment opened up that would have allowed them to scrub a penalty from earlier in the race they failed to capitalise. Having survived an extremely close encounter with Ger Ownes, Ben Duncan took a nailbiting race from Andrew Fowler. With a penalty against him in the pre start Fowler fought hard to open a lead that would enable him to make the turn that would allow him to exonerate him self. When he did instead of going back on the wind to complete his penalty he went on the attack hunting Duncan who was by then pinned over the port layline. As the wind picked up both teams screamed down the run in 27kts of breeze under spinnaker with Flower, with the penalty still against him, trying to draw Duncan in and excitable Kiwi trying to stay close enough to go into the lead when Fowler took his penalty turn but not so close as to allow Fowler to go on the attack. Both boats ended up out side the finish line and in a frantic last minute of action Ben did just enough to cross the line no more than a couple of seconds before Andrew. In the match of round 7 Sheehy continued his march to the title with a win over Tom Fitzpatrick, the only team to takes races from him all year, and in round 8 defeated Duncan.
By the completion of round 10 that evening the leader board looked as follows: John Sheehy 7-0, Ben Duncan and North Sails Ireland 5-1, Tom Fitzpatrick 7-2, Andrew Fowler 4-2.
As the morning mist and fog cleared Mondays racing started in a gentle southerly. In the opening round of the day North Sails Ireland out sailed a sleepy Duncan team to go into a clear second, who in turn put pay to Tom Fitzpatricks hopes in a ding dong rig clashing encounter in round 13. As Sheehy saw off Ger Owens in round 14, Fowler beet the North Sails lads leaving Sheehy, Duncan and North Sails Ireland to close out the final rounds to finish on the podium in that order. Sheehy and Duncan duly delivered but as thick fog obliterated the race course the local team skippered by George Kingston stole a win in the very last race of the event knocking North Sails Ireland down into 5th place overall. With the windward mark invisible from the bottom of the course the wind swung 60 degrees shortly after the start. The race management made the only mid race mark change of the event and the North Sails lads, having lead all race, could only look on from where the mark had been as their opposition rounded the mark in it’s new position and cruised to the finish. Such small margins characterised the racing all weekend.
Final event standings: John Sheehy 11-0, Ben Duncan 9-2, Tom Fitzpatrick 8-3, Andrew Fowler 8-3, North Sails Ireland 7-4, Andrew Deekin 5-6, Ger Owens 5-6, George Kingston 4-7, Martin Mahon 4-7, Mark Tighe 3-8, Mary O’Loughlin 2-9, Kristian Molbech 0-11.
Final Match Racing Tour of Ireland standings: John Sheehy 48 points, Tom Fitzpatrick 34 points, Andrew Fowler, Ben Duncan and North Sails Ireland tied on 20 points, Martin Mahon 13, Ger Owens 12, Andrew Deakin 9, Brian Reilly 8, Alex Barry 6, Thesaurus Software 3, Conal Casey 3
Plans for 2010 are well progresses with John, Tom, Ben, Andrew, Prof and the others set to go head to head over a series of 5 Tour events starting in Cork and Kinsale in the spring. At the prize giving the ISA announced that it intends to hold a Womens Match Racing Championships next year.
Irish Match Racing Association formed
A well attended meeting of active match racers was held at Kinsale Yacht Club on the 24th of October. As a result it was agreed to form an Irish Match Racing Association in order to further develop the sport in Ireland. Richard Morris was appointed as the first Secretary General. He was also given responsibility for the north and north east.
2009 saw three new match racing events established and it was hoped to expand these again for 2010 in order to consolidate the position of the Match Racing Tour of Ireland amongst the premier events on the Irish sailing calendar. The following appointments were made to manage the events in the relevant areas.
Tom Fitzpatrick Midlands
John Sheehy East and south east
George Kingston South and south west
Michael O’Conner was appointed to continue his work as international liaison and in race officer and umpire development. With match racing now an Olympic discipline Mary O’Loughlin was appointed to represent the interests of womens match racing.
In addition the meeting saw the urgent need to provide those with an interest in giving the discipline a go an opportunity to compete and learn in a cheaper and less pressured environment than the Tour events provide. Development of a performance pathway to bring sailors through from team racing and onto the international match racing circuit was also viewed as a key objective.
With these objectives in mind Andrew Fowler was appointed to look at the model that has been developed in Kinsale by Henry Kingston and to apply it else where in the country.
The ISA has played an important role in developing match racing as a sport in Ireland over the last 3 years and the association intends to continue a close working relationship with the sports governing body in Ireland. With that in mind Ed Alcock was appointed to provide a link between the two and to provide general advice and guidance.
Match racing shares a number of resource issues with team racing and while no specific appointment was, or will be, made the Irish Match Racing Association intends to work closely with the Irish Team Racing Association on an ongoing basis.
Recent postings on afloat.iehttp://www.afloat.ie/news/sheehy-is-ireland-s-top-match-racer/
http://www.afloat.ie/news/12-teams-to-contest-match-race-title/
http://www.afloat.ie/news/sheehy-unmatched-in-derg-event/
