Sailor of the Month
Andrew Craig of the Royal Irish Yacht Club’s very clearcut overall win with his J/109 Chimaera in the Scottish Series, incorporating the Scottish IRC Championship 2019, has been a superb demonstration of boat and logistics management, personnel selection, and good…
There were three McMahon family members from Howth racing in the Laser Radials at this year’s Irish Junior Championship at Crosshaven. But while youngest Jack had to be content with 13th overall, his cousin Eve was very much in improvement mode…
Dedicated Olympic solo sailor Finn Lynch (National Yacht Club) is “Sailor of the Month” for April on the strength of his closely-focused campaign towards qualifying for the 2020 Olympics. In three major international regattas during the first part of the…
Jamie McMahon (Howth Yacht Club), put in a convincing performance at the Irish Youth Championships at Royal Cork Yacht Club in the final weekend of April to emerge as Laser Radial overall champion, seeing off some determined challenges from a…
Lucy McCutcheon, Commodore and Team Sailing Captain of University College Dublin SC, is the Afloat.ie “Sailor of the Month (Team Racing) for March after her squad’s victory in very close racing in the Irish Universities Team Championship staged at Lough…
James Dwyer Matthews (15) is Sailor of the Month (Junior) for March
2nd April 2019 Sailor of the Month
A fleet of 155 boats is a daunting prospect, even when they’re little Optimist dinghies. But in recent years young James Dwyer Matthews of Kinsale has shown increasing expertise in dealing with the special challenges such numbers entail. Now at…
Cork’s Rob and Peter O’Leary are the Afloat.ie “Sailors of the Month (Open)” for February with their Bronze Medals at the talent-studded Star Junior Worlds in Florida in the first week of the month. The unique attraction of the International…
Cruising and its organisations move at their own serene speed, and when Donal Walsh of Dungarvan received Irish Cruising’s supreme trophy - the Faulkner Cup - in February, it was recognition by his peers of an outstanding and seamanlike achievement…
Pierce Purcell is January’s Sailor of the Month for Services to Sailing
3rd February 2019 Sailor of the Month
When Pierce Purcell of Clarenbridge in Galway officially retired from the marine business on the 31st January, it by no means ended his association with boats, the sea and sailing. For his entire life has been devoted to helping others…
With his captaining of the successful Gonzaga College team in the inaugural Shanahan Cup raced at the Irish National Sailing School on January 16th, noted junior sailor Jack Fahy is the Afloat.ie “Sailor of the Month” for January 2019. Competing…
Darryl Hughes is so completely identified with his classic 43ft 1937 Tyrrell-built ketch Maybird (whose superb restoration he project-managed himself) that, as Maybird shares her home port between Crosshaven in Cork and Poolbeg in Dublin, both places can claim this…
Fintan Cairns of Dun Laoghaire is disarmingly modest about his many achievements in cruiser-racing organisation, based as they are on his extensive experience as an active sailor, his own innovations, and his readiness to acknowledge when he has taken an…
Donal O’Sullivan’s retirement after 27 years as Honorary Secretary of Dublin Bay Sailing Club provides the opportunity for honours from all sides for someone whose contribution to the continuing vitality of one of the world’s largest yacht racing organisations is…
Who gets your vote as Afloat Sailor of the Year 2018? The past year, in the view of Winkie Nixon, has produced some 'extra-special sailors', and over the past 12 months we have picked out 26 individual sailors and pairings who have excelled in…
Vicky Cox & Peter Dunlop are the “Sailors of the Month (Offshore)” for November
2nd December 2018 ISORA
The annual November awards ceremony of the Irish Sea Offshore Racing Association is a highlight of sailing’s social calendar, a convivial gathering of friendly rivalry from both sides of the Irish Sea. But though 2018’s was staged with the usual…
Oisin van Gelderen is the Afloat.ie/Irish Sailing “Sailor of the Month” for November after twice breaking the Irish sailing speed record at the three week Luderitz World Speed Sailing Challenge in Namibia. The veteran National Windsurfing Champion from Loughshinny in…
