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Cast Your Vote as Ireland's Eve McMahon Shortlisted for World Sailor of the Year Award

22nd October 2024
With a haul of World youth titles Ireland's Eve McMahon has been shortlisted for a 2024 World Sailor of the Year Award
With a haul of World youth titles Ireland's Eve McMahon has been shortlisted for a 2024 World Sailor of the Year Award Credit: World Sailing

Eve McMahon took another first for Irish sailing this week when she was announced as a finalist for the Rolex World Sailor of the Year award.

As regular Afloat readers will know, the Irish Sailor of the Year and Paris 2024 debutante from Howth Yacht Club won multiple world championship medals at the youth level, including the ILCA 6 Youth World Championships twice and the U21 world title.

The Irish solo sailor faces stiff competition in the overall young female sailor category from 29er duo Iakovina Kerkezou & Danai Giannouli of Greece, 29er helm Ewa Lewandowska of Poland, and kitesurfer Maria Catalina Turienzo of Argentina.

The names include Olympic champions, dominant teams, and organisations committed to improving the global sailing community. Each finalist impressed the judging panel with their achievements over the past year, commitment to sustainability in sailing, and efforts to modernise the sport at every level.

Two new awards will make their debut this year: the male and female Young World Sailor of the Year will celebrate the rising stars of our sport, while the Boat of the Year award has been renamed the World Sailing Technology Award to recognise the wider work on innovations in sailing.

Voting for all World Sailing Awards opens today, and everyone who loves sailing is invited to help decide who will be the winners.

Voting closes at 2300 UTC on Sunday, 27 October.

The public vote will make up 50% of the final decisions, with 50% of the votes being contributed by World Sailing's expert panels.

More on Eve McMahon's achievements here

Cast your vote here.

Award Shortlists

Rolex World Sailor of the Year finalists - Male

  • Diego Botin & Florian Trittel (ESP)
  • Peter Burling (NZL)
  • Ruggero Tita (ITA)
  • Matt Wearn (AUS)

Rolex World Sailor of the Year finalists - Female

  • Odile van Aanholt & Annette Duetz (NED)
  • Eleanor Aldridge (GBR)
  • Marit Bouwmeester (NED)
  • Vuyisile Jaca (RSA)

11th Hour Racing Sustainability Award

  • The IODA ROPE Program
  • Switzerland SailGP Team (SUI)
  • rrreefs AG (SUI)
  • Winds of Change (CYP)

Young World Sailor of the Year – Female

  • Iakovina Kerkezou & Danai Giannouli (GRE)
  • Ewa Lewandowska (POL)
  • Eve McMahon (IRL)
  • Maria Catalina Turienzo (ARG)

Young World Sailor of the Year – Male

  • Vittorio Bonifacio (ITA)
  • Max Maeder (SGP)
  • Grae Morris (AUS)
  • Magnus Overbeck (DEN)

Team of the Year

  • Odile van Aanholt & Annette Duetz (NED)
  • Diego Botin & Florian Trittel (ESP)
  • Spain SailGP Team (ESP)
  • Ruggero Tita & Caterina Banti (ITA)
  • Team WINGS (SWE) 

World Sailing Technology Award 

  • Master Sailing jdoo (CRO)
  • Nautical Cloud Ltd (GBR)
  • Northern Lights Composites (ITA)
  • Vakaros (USA)
Afloat.ie Team

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EVE MCMAHON

Age: 20
World Ranking: 12th (best to date)
Olympic Ranking: 12th
Hometown: Howth, Dublin
Club: Howth YC
Coach: Rory Fitzpatrick

When she was younger, Eve followed in the footsteps of her two older brothers (Ewan and Jamie) and started summer sailing courses in Howth YC at the age of just 7. Although new enough to the senior circuit she started training alongside senior athletes long before this Olympic cycle. She worked as both Anne-Marie Rindom’s DEN (Tokyo Olympic Gold medallist) and Annalise Murphy’s IRL, official training partner for the Tokyo Olympic cycle.

So, it is no surprise that after finishing her time in the youth fleet with a Triple Crown, McMahon then went on to qualify Ireland in the ILCA 6 fleet for the Paris 2024 Olympic Games. McMahon would like to be the most successful Irish female, ILCA 6 sailor ever and be a figurehead for women in sport, especially sailing.

  • Paris 2024 Team Ireland Olympian
  • 2023 U21 ILCA 6 World Champion
  • 2022 Youth ILCA 6 World Sailing Champion
  • 2022 Youth ILCA 6 European Championship
  • 2021 ILCA 6 Youth World Championship
  • 2021 U19 Silver Medallist European Championships
  • Afloat Irish Sailor of the Year 2019, 2020 and 2021, 2022 and 2023

Eve was also awarded Afloat’s Sailor of the Year 2023 as well as UCD’s Sportsperson of the Year and was nominated for RTE’s Young Sportsperson of the Year. She is from from Howth Co. Dublin, and on being selected for the Irish Olympic Team she is one of Team Ireland’s Paris Scholars studying International Commerce at UCD.

Eve additionally had the unique opportunity to carry the Olympic Flame on the initial stages of its journey landing in Marseille, France, where she will be competing this summer, on its route to the Olympic Opening Ceremony.

Eve McMahon's 2021 sailing achievements

  • Irish Sailor of the Year 2021
  • Gold Medallist Youth World Championships Italy Highest Ranked Irish Female 
  • Star Sailors league Silver medal at the Youth European Championships Croatia Gold medallist U19,
  • Silver medallist U21 Senior European Championships Bulgaria Race win Senior European Championships Bulgaria
  • Selected Paris 2024 Olympic Solidarity Scholarship Sport Ireland
  • 15th Senior European Championships Bulgaria, 1st Irish Female, securing Sport Ireland Carding.
  • Youth ISAF World Representative Oman, equivalent to Youth Olympic in sailing,
  • 4th overall Guinness World Record Participant Beach Clean up -
  • Oman Gold medallist U19 Allianz World Cup Netherlands
  • Gold medallist U23 Lanzarote International Regatta 4th
  • U21 European Championships Montenegro
  • Nominated for Irish Sailor of The Year
  • Bronze medallist Connaught's Wexford
  • 9th Silver Fleet European Continental Qualification
  • 5th Pre-Qualifciation regatta Lanzarote