Ireland's sailing, boating & maritime magazine

At year’s end, the Sailors of the Month adjudicators survey the overall scene in search of an outstanding and innovative event which has added to the variety of the Irish sailing programme. In 2019 this role was well filled by…

Darren Wright of Howth rounded out an exceptional year of achievement in 2019 with a courageous bareboat charter campaign in the especially challenging 75th Rolex Sydney-Hobart Race. Nearer home, his year had already seen success with the Classic Half Tonner…

With his fourth overall win provided by the big-fleet 75th Rolex Sydney-Hobart race, Gordon Maguire was officially described at the prize-giving in Hobart as one of the world’s greatest offshore racers. This latest victory is only one of the peaks…

Who gets your vote as Afloat Sailor of the Year 2019? The past year, in the view of Afloat's Winkie Nixon, has produced the 'crème de la crème' of the sport in Ireland, and Afloat has picked out 30 individual sailors…

The annual November visits of Skerries windsurfer Oisin van Gelderen to the Luderitz Speed Canal in the Namibian desert in southern Africa continue to fascinate Irish sailors as he battles to achieve a sustained speed above 50 knots. He has…

The 71st annual National Team Racing Championship hosted by Royal St George YC in the mid-November weekend attracted 16 squads from all over Ireland, and it was one of the furthest-travelled teams - Baltimore Sailing Club - which went home…

November is stock-taking time in a pre-Olympic year with the international championship programme about to get under way in the Southern Hemisphere, and the review of Irish Olympic hopefuls during the 2019 season shows that it was Aisling Keller of…

Optimist ace Rocco Wright of Howth found it was tough at the top when the 185-strong 11-nation fleet gathered at his home port for the Irish Open Nationals in August. After he’d won the first race, he was a marked…

Michael O’Connor of Royal St George YC is “Sailor of the Month (Senior)” for October after emerging as the 73rd All-Ireland Champion Helm after a ding-dong two-day final raced in Flying Fifteens from the National Yacht Club on October 5th…

The long story of the re-birth of the 1926-built 56ft Conor O’Brien trading ketch Ilen of Limerick was acquiring an almost wraith-like aspect until in 2019 – the restoration job completed – she undertook the very tangible 5000 miles Salmons…

Chris Bateman of Cork has been cutting a swathe through the dinghy sailing scene in Ireland at both junior and open level in a number of classes for some time now, and as he turned 18 on September 23rd, his…

Royal Cork Yacht Club’s Anthony O’Leary’s Bronze Medal in the 20-team New York YC International Invitational at Newport, RI in September is an astonishing achievement when we remember that many of the other top-level Corinthian crews had been practising in…

When young James Dwyer Matthews of Royal Cork and Kinsale returned in early August from England with the 2019 British Optimist title added to his already impressive trophy list, it was in the knowledge that the up-coming Irish Nationals at…

The 2019 Irish GP 14 Nationals at Skerries in breezy August weather defied its title by having a truly international turnout, but then it was seen as a dress rehearsal for next year’s GP 14 Worlds at the same venue.…

When the J/24 Headcase snatched the overall win in the final races of the J/24 Nationals 2019 on Lough Erne, inevitably it was a team effort with the boat carrying the usual complement of five. But as we have to…

The Laser Radial Youth World Championship at Kingston, Ontario in Canada was something special as Laser designer Bruce Kirby, the man who transformed the world’s solo dinghy sailing, is Canadian. But it was also something special for Eve McMahon of…