#frostbites – Saturday afternoon's wintry showers, which significantly reduced visibility in Dun Laoghaire harbour, gave way to sunshine and blue skies on Sunday morning writes Cormac Bradley. Unfortunately, from a racing perspective, the disappeared snow took the wind with it and we were left with a patchwork quilt of calm areas and small pockets of breeze blowing from every which way within the confines of the harbour.
The lack of motive power for the racing fleets meant that another element of harbour traffic had to be considered in the Race Officer's thoughts on the viability of racing.
Due to the maintenance regime for the ferries that sail out of Dublin and the consequences of damage to one of the berthing facilities in Holyhead, the HSS crossing of the Irish Sea is back operating in Dun Laoghaire. With a scheduled departure that would have coincided with the middle of the racing "window", the absence of wind meant that dinghies could potentially compromise the manoeuvres of the HSS in getting out of the harbour. As the ferries hold the right of way, that was an unacceptable prospect, so racing was abandoned.
So despite glorious sunshine and modest air temperatures, racing was replaced with watching rugby. Don't need to detail the reaction to that exercise!
