Menu

Ireland's sailing, boating & maritime magazine

Displaying items by tag: Lady Elizabeth

#Rowing: On the first day of Henley Royal Regatta, Ireland’s three crews fell to opposition which made good starts.

UCD’s senior eight were beaten by Drexel University of Philadelphia in the Temple Cup for student eights. Drexel carved out an early lead, but UCD came back were in real contention to about halfway, when the Americans moved away to a clearwater lead, which they held to the end.

 In the Thames Cup for club eights, Commercial fell to a young Dutch composite which made light of the difficult conditions of choppy water and a headwind. They started brilliantly, held off a push by Commercial and won well.  

Lady Elizabeth, rowing in the Wyfold for club fours, veered off course early and hit the booms. While they recovered, there was no real prospect of catching leaders Tideway Scullers.

Henley Royal Regatta (Selected Results; Irish interest)

Temple (Eights, Student): Drexel University, USA bt UCD 2 ¼ l, 7:23

Thames (Eights, Club): Roeivereeniging Willem III, the Netherlands bt  Commercial 3¾ l, 7:13.

Wyfold (Four, Club): The Tideway Scullers’ School A bt Lady Elizabeth easily; 8:05.

Published in Rowing

#Rowing: Henley Royal Regatta did not yield any early joy for Irish crews this morning. In the Wyfold Cup coxless fours, Lady Elizabeth were beaten by Nottingham Rowing Club ‘A’. The English crew cut across from their station at the start and took a lead which they did not relinquish. Lady Elizabeth tried hard in the warm conditions, but their young opponents held on to their lead and won by two and a half lengths.

Henley Royal Regatta, Day One (Irish interest)

Wyfolds (Fours, Club): Nottingham RC ‘A’ bt Lady Elizabeth BC 7 mins 39 seconds, 2½ l.

Published in Rowing

#ROWING: Lady Elizabeth lost to London club The Tideway Scullers' in the Britannia Cup for club coxed fours at Henley Royal Regatta today. The Irish crew were trailing by a length after a quarter of a mile and the deficit had opened up further by half way. The result left Three Castles as the only Irish club still in the Henley draw, though Anthony English, representing Nottingham Rowing Club, also won today.

 

Henley Royal Regatta, Day Two (Selected Results; Irish interest)

Britannia Challenge Cup (Men’s Four, coxed, Club): The Tideway Scullers’ School bt Lady Elizabeth BC (B Smyth, PJ Waldron, D Meehan, S King; cox: B Farrell) 1¾ l, 7 mins 49 secs.

Prince of Wales Challenge Cup (Men’s Quadruple Sculls, Intermediate): Tyrian Club and Thames RC bt Queen’s University (G McKillen, A Boreham, T Oliver, C Beck) 3l, 7:17.

Double Sculls Challenge Cup (Men, Open): Three Castles (D Neale, E Grigalius bt Roy Roy (C Owen, J Hale) 3l, 8:08.

Diamond Sculls (Men’s Single, Open): A English (Nottingham) bt L Wells (Thames) easily, 9:15.

Published in Rowing

#ROWING: The Lady Elizabeth coxed four and single sculler Anthony English both qualified for the main draw at Henley Royal Regatta today. The Lady Elizabeth crew of Brendan Smyth, Stuart King, Peter Waldron, David Meehan and cox Brendan Farrell will compete in the Britannia, while English, who has been based in Nottingham, is set for the the Diamond Sculls. It is the premier event for single scullers.

A number of Irish crews were not asked to pre-qualify. The Trinity senior eight will compete in the Temple Cup; Queen’s University have a quadruple scull in the Prince of Wales; Dave Neale and Eimantas Grigalius of Three Castles are entered in the Double Sculls.

Henley Royal Regatta – Qualifiers (Irish interest)

Diamond Sculls: A English

Britannia (Fours, coxed): Lady Elizabeth

Published in Rowing

Ireland's Trading Ketch Ilen

The Ilen is the last of Ireland’s traditional wooden sailing ships.

Designed by Limerick man Conor O’Brien and built in Baltimore in 1926, she was delivered by Munster men to the Falkland Islands where she served valiantly for seventy years, enduring and enjoying the Roaring Forties, the Furious Fifties, and Screaming Sixties.

Returned now to Ireland and given a new breath of life, Ilen may be described as the last of Ireland’s timber-built ocean-going sailing ships, yet at a mere 56ft, it is capable of visiting most of the small harbours of Ireland.

Wooden Sailing Ship Ilen FAQs

The Ilen is the last of Ireland’s traditional wooden sailing ships.

The Ilen was designed by Conor O’Brien, the first Irish man to circumnavigate the world.

Ilen is named for the West Cork River which flows to the sea at Baltimore, her home port.

The Ilen was built by Baltimore Sea Fisheries School, West Cork in 1926. Tom Moynihan was foreman.

Ilen's wood construction is of oak ribs and planks of larch.

As-built initially, she is 56 feet in length overall with a beam of 14 feet and a displacement of 45 tonnes.

Conor O’Brien set sail in August 1926 with two Cadogan cousins from Cape Clear in West Cork, arriving at Port Stanley in January 1927 and handed it over to the new owners.

The Ilen was delivered to the Falkland Islands Company, in exchange for £1,500.

Ilen served for over 70 years as a cargo ship and a ferry in the Falkland Islands, enduring and enjoying the Roaring Forties, the Furious Fifties, and Screaming Sixties. She stayed in service until the early 1990s.

Limerick sailor Gary McMahon and his team located Ilen. MacMahon started looking for her in 1996 and went out to the Falklands and struck a deal with the owner to bring her back to Ireland.

After a lifetime of hard work in the Falklands, Ilen required a ground-up rebuild.

A Russian cargo ship transported her back on a 12,000-mile trip from the Southern Oceans to Dublin. The Ilen was discharged at the Port of Dublin 1997, after an absence from Ireland of 70 years.

It was a collaboration between the Ilen Project in Limerick and Hegarty’s Boatyard in Old Court, near Skibbereen. Much of the heavy lifting, of frames, planking, deadwood & backbone, knees, floors, shelves and stringers, deck beams, and carlins, was done in Hegarty’s. The generally lighter work of preparing sole, bulkheads, deck‐houses fixed furniture, fixtures & fittings, deck fittings, machinery, systems, tanks, spar making and rigging is being done at the Ilen boat building school in Limerick.

Ten years. The boat was much the worse for wear when it returned to West Cork in May 1998, and it remained dormant for ten years before the start of a decade-long restoration.

Ilen now serves as a community floating classroom and cargo vessel – visiting 23 ports in 2019 and making a transatlantic crossing to Greenland as part of a relationship-building project to link youth in Limerick City with youth in Nuuk, west Greenland.

At a mere 56ft, Ilen is capable of visiting most of the small harbours of Ireland.

©Afloat 2020