An impressive 29 teams (which means 174 sailors) will battle for team racing's Elmo Trophy in Dun Laoghaire Harbour this weekend.

Five flights of firefly dinghies (which means 30 boats) will be launched from the Royal Saint George Yacht Club on Saturday morning.  This youth team racing event for sailors aged 19 and under launched in 2015 and has grown steadily ever since.

With 29 teams and five flights, it will be the biggest team racing event ever sailed in Ireland.

This year sees new entries from Donegal (Rathmullan Sailing Club) and Ballyholme (Topper veterans) along with many returning competitors.  The home team will be looking to defend the title with one of its many teams, but is expecting close competition from their neighbours in the National Yacht Club.

Over 200 races are hoped for over the weekend with finals around 3 O'Clock on Sunday.

While of course, the sailing is important, the uniquely social element of Team racing will lend itself well to the competitors' dinner on Saturday night, where the tables are set for 195!

Entries continue to build for the 7th Elmo trophy, a youth team racing event in Dun Laoghaire. It takes place on 27/28 August at the Royal Saint George yacht club.

This year sees the return of last year's debutants Glandore Harbour Yacht Club, as well as the first ever Donegal entry, Rathmullan Sailing Club.

The home club will look to defend the trophy after the success of ‘Sea Buoys’ last year as Afloat reported here.

The event will be sailed in three flights of Firefly dinghies, where teams of six crews will race each other in a round-robin format.

The very special Elmo Trophy that commemorates the late RStGYC team racer Graham Elmes

Teams must consist of six members from the same club, school or dinghy association. At least two members must be aged 16 and under on 31st December 2022.

All team members must be aged 19 or under on 31st December 2022 and still attending second-level education in 2022 (i.e. the event is not aimed at University Students).

Entries are still open and the entry form and NOR can be found here.

 

Glandore Harbour Yacht Club hosted the annual West Cork interclub team racing Marconi Cup regatta on July 23rd.

The event had been absent for the past two years due to Covid, so excitement had been building for weeks along the coast of West Cork in anticipation of its return. One team from Baltimore Sailing Club, two teams from Crookhaven Sailing Club and one team from Bantry Bay Sailing Club all travelled to Glandore to race the two home teams from Glandore Harbour Yacht Club.

There were over 50 highly competitive and charged sailors on the water at Glandore for the Marconi Cup Photo: Kathleen Hayes

The Marconi Cup is made up of two events, a relay race and a team event. The team event is a round-robin race format around a digital N course, and the winner of the regatta is decided based on the combined results from these two events. Current holders, Crookhaven, were eager to retain the title.

The organisers were especially excited this year to have two official team umpires attend to judge the event, Eunice Kennedy and Dave Sheahan. They had their work cut out for them with over 50 highly competitive and charged sailors on the water.

The weather was closely monitored in the days before the event, with a 28kn to 44kn Southerly wind forecast to hit the harbour in time with the first gun and the potential for a small craft warning to be in place. The Race Committee met on Friday evening, and a morning weather window was identified. The race briefing was brought forward to 8 am, with First Gun at 9 am.

The Marconi Cup team event is a round-robin race format around a digital N course

With the Regatta briefing and safety briefing complete, the sailors hit the water, and the relay race was in sequence by 09.15. Home advantage proved a winner for GHYC with them leading the race from the start. Two good crew changeovers on the pontoon helped them take the gun and ultimately the lead in the regatta.

The Round Robin team races were up next. On cumulative scores, Crookhaven 1 came out just ahead of the Baltimore Bulls, then only a hair’s breadth separated GHYC Adam and GHYC Eve teams, who were followed by the Nauti Bouys (Bantry Bay Sailing Club) with the second Crookhaven team bringing up the rear.

Glandore Harbour Yacht Club hosted the annual West Cork interclub team racing Marconi Cup regatta on July 23rd

Unfortunately, with the weather window closing the final two team races were abandoned for safety reasons and all sailors were ordered to shore. The race officers and umpires retired to calculate results and after derigging, the sailors were all welcomed to the GHYC clubhouse, where a BBQ for competitors and sailors was a welcome way to help warm up and debate the morning’s racing.

After everyone had dried off and the race committee had double-checked the results GHYC Commodore, Tim Forde, began the prize giving. He started by thanking the incredible organising committee of the event especially as this was the third year GHYC had attempted to run it only to be hijacked by Covid in both of the previous two years.

A special mention was given to Harriet Emerson, GHYC Dinghy Captain, who had put countless hours into making the event such a success and a big roar from the GHYC team followed. Tim also thanked the two umpires, Eunice Kennedy and Dave Sheahan, for travelling to Glandore for the event. Baltimore Sailing Club was then presented with the Sportsmanship Award, GHYC won the Relay Race and Crookhaven Sailing Club was presented with Cup and crowned 2022 Marconi Cup Champions!

Glandore Harbour Yacht Club hosted the annual West Cork interclub team racing Marconi Cup regatta on July 23rd.

The race umpires were impressed by good and, at times, very good tactical team racing from the West Cork sailors. They also complimented GHYC on their smooth running of the event and organiser teamwork that delivered such a successful, competitive and fun event in very challenging weather conditions.

Despite the awful weather conditions, everyone left Glandore with full tummies and happy after a successful morning's racing, already looking forward to Marconi 2023, which will be held in Crookhaven Sailing Club.

History of the Marconi Cup

The Marconi Cup was inaugurated in 2001 by Crookhaven Sailing Club as a way to bring local sailing clubs together and is now an important Summer club event for all West Cork junior sailors aged 18 and under. The regatta is named after the famous Nobel prize-winning Italian engineer Guglielmo Marconi who pioneered the development of radio transmission. In 1919 he achieved the first trans-Atlantic wireless telephone conversation. Before this, Marconi had developed his technology using signalling stations on the Fastnet Rock and Brow Head near Crookhaven. Such was the monumental importance of Marconi’s work in West Cork is that it is likely no one would have survived the Titanic disaster only the ship got out a wireless distress call using Marconi's invention.

Ireland's Royal Cork Yacht Club is one of 11 teams competing in this weekend's Global Team Race championships at New York Yacht Club this weekend.

Fred Cudmore is Royal Cork's Team Captain with Grattan Roberts, Sonia Minihane, Chloe Crosbie, Harry Durcan, Cian Jones, Peter McCann and Eimear O'Leary competing.

The last weekends of July are traditionally some of the busiest of the year on the waters in and around Newport Harbour. The annual Newport Folk Festival and Newport Jazz Festival bring tens of thousands of music fans to Fort Adams on consecutive weekends, while thousands more gather on boats anchored just off the Fort's picturesque waterfront lawn.

For the competitors in the third edition of the Global Team Race, the mellifluous music of the 2022 Folk Fest wafting across the water will provide a contradictory soundtrack to the no-holds-barred, hand-to-hand combat—and occasional shouts—that are at the heart of two-on-two team racing. Both the regatta and the festival start on Friday and run through Sunday.

Thursday was a practice day (above) for the 11 teams competing in the 2022 Global Team Race Regatta.

"Our confidence level is high," says Justin Law of Newport Harbor Yacht Club from Newport Beach, Calif. "But we expect every race to be a fight."

The Global Team Race Regatta was conceived by the New York Yacht Club, which hosted the first edition in October 2018. A second edition of the Global Team Race Regatta was held in England in 2019. The third edition was scheduled for Italy in 2020, but was postponed due to the COVID-10 pandemic, and eventually rescheduled for this summer in Newport, R.I., where it will be held July 22 to 24 out of the New York Yacht Club Harbour Court.

Team Racing, which features two teams of two of four boats each sailing against one another in a close-quarters win-or-lose format, is popular around the world. World Sailing ran the Team Racing World Championship 10 times between 1995 and 2015. That event featured three-on-three competition in two-person dinghies, which favored teams of younger and lighter sailors.

While the fundamentals are very much the same, the Global Team Race Regatta uses the two-on-two format, which makes the competition easier to follow. The team with the last boat across the finish line in an individual race loses the race. The Global Team Race also uses keelboats instead of dinghies, which makes the competition accessible to a wider variety of sailors—both from a size and age perspective—and brings the added complexity of spinnakers into the mix.

When it comes to the top team racing yacht clubs in the United States, Newport Harbor is always hovering at the top of the list.

"Our club has a very active team race base with members sailing year-round," says Law. "From January through April of this year alone we probably had organized practice at least every other week. Keep in mind, that sailing was done in our glorious Harbor 20s, but still provided a way for us to team race 2v2, 3v3, and 4v4.”

A fourth-place finish at the 2019 Global Team Race Regatta, sailed on the Solent in England in J/70s, and a track record of strong finishes at the New York Yacht Club’s team races every August, which use Sonars, proves the Newport Harbor team is as formidable on the road as they are on their home waters in Southern California. It will be one to watch.

With a first-place finish in the inaugural event in 2019 and a second-place on home waters in 2019, the Royal Thames Yacht Club would also appear to be a favorite for top honors at the third edition. But the team competing this year is significantly different from the team that won in 2018

”This is the first time this particular team has sailed together,” says Andy Cornah, who sailed for the Royal Thames in 2018 and also won a team racing world championship in 2015. “In terms of event preparation, we haven’t really done anything specific, but we all have a strong background in dinghy team racing and have done a few Sonar team racing events between us.”

The Royal Cork Yacht Club, of Ireland, is another team that comes to Newport with a lot of talent, but wondering whether the team will gel in the heat of battle.

“The club often competes on the 2K circuit in Europe,” says Fred Cudmore, the team captain. “But with COVID, we haven’t really sailed as a team in a number of years. We’ll have a better idea after the first race. We’ll give it our best, have fun and make the most of the great New York Yacht Club hospitality.”

Despite the fierceness of the competition on the water, team racing is perhaps the most collegial of sailing competitions. Win or lose, a good time is practically guaranteed.

”We are all excited about visiting Newport, especially those who are here for the first time,” says Cornah. “We always feel at home on Thames Street and we are looking forward to some great racing with teams from all over the world, renewing old rivalries and making new friends.”

Competing teams: Bayerischer Yacht Club, Starnberg, Germany; Japan Sailing Federation, Tokyo, Japan; New York Yacht Club, New York, N.Y.; Newport Harbor Yacht Club, Newport Beach, Calif.; Royal Belgian Sailing Club, Zeebrugge, Belgium (at right); Royal Cork Yacht Club, Cork, Ireland; Royal Thames Yacht Club, London, England; Royal Yacht Squadron, Cowes, England; Sorrento Sailing Couta Boat Club, Sorrento, Australia; St. Francis Yacht Club, San Francisco; The Corinthian Yacht Club, Marblehead, Mass.

Download 2022 entries & team rosters below

Gonzaga College was crowned as the Schools National Team Racing Champions 2022 at the event hosted by the Royal St George Yacht Club at Dun Laoghaire Harbour.

Since the event's inception in 2004, it is the first occasion that a Leinster School has taken this much-sought trophy.

Captained by Trevor Bolger, the Gonzaga Team attained a 100% race win victory over their competitors.

The team showed a first-class mastery of team racing tactics as they controlled all their races.

Photo: Andrew Conan

On average, their winning positions were from the pre-start and by mark one were clear with a 1 and 2 position.

The third helm focused on covering their opponents, and from there on, the opposition was playing catch up.

The Gonzaga Team were Trevor Bolger Helm 1, Jacques Murphy Helm 2, Archie Daly Helm 3, and the crew were Ethan Hunt, Cathal O'Reagan and Jules Start.

13 Schools competed in the event, 6 Munster, 1 Connacht and 6 Leinster, which was an excellent turnout as the maximum number of qualifiers were 14.

Irish Schools National Team Racing Champions 2022 Results

There was another event included in the weekend championships, the Munster Provincial event, which did not take place this year for several reasons.

Munster Schools

Rochestown College was crowned the Munster Schools Team Racing Championships for 2022.

Running racing proved to be very challenging for Race Officer David Bolger as, at minimum the event had to complete 80% of the Round Robin, which was a schedule of 85 races, to achieve a result.  Congratulations to David on achieving this, as the wind was not playing ball with us over the two days.

Photo: Andrew Conan

Saturday started with the wind at 230 degrees at 6-8knots when racing commenced. The wind died entirely and swung to 130 degrees. Reset the course and swapped positions for start and finish boats. Later in the afternoon, the wind died again and reappeared at 250-270 degrees. This lost a minimum of 40 minutes of racing time. Max wind strength for the day was nine knots.

On Sunday, the course was set close to the Carlisle Pier with 250-260 degrees wind direction. On occasion, there were gusts of up to 12 knots, and the racing started at 9.42.

Photo: Andrew Conan

There was a significant wind shift in the middle of race 53, with the direction being 010. It was allowed to settle at 310-320. The course was repositioned around the committee boats in a new direction.

The wind continued to shift left and organisers continuously shifted the course accordingly.

After race 63, repositioned the course to the centre of the harbour with consistent 6-8 knots from 250 to 270 degrees.

Finally, at Race 73, the event hit the magic number of 80% when the wind died off.

Photo: Andrew Conan

No event takes place without the support and hard work of the volunteers. Organises say thank you to Team Leaders David Bolger Race Officer, Robbie Walker, P.R.O, Keith Start Beach Master/Changeover Coordinator and Lorraine O'Connor Results/Race Office, and their crew of volunteers, club members, and school representatives.

Photo: Andrew Conan

The S.S.A.I. would like to thank the following Royal St. George Yacht Club and Flag Officers for hosting the event, Ronan Adams, Sailing Manager, Karin Ryan, Sailing Secretary, Catering and Boat House staff.

Eunice Kennedy elected as Chairperson Schools Sailing Association of Ireland

The Schools Sailing Association of Ireland held their Annual General Meeting on Saturday evening (30th of April 2022), and Eunice Kennedy was elected as Chairperson. 

Schools National Team Racing Champions 2022 Photo Gallery by Andrew Clonan

After a hiatus of two years due to Covid, the Schools National Team Racing Championships are being hosted by the Royal St.George Yacht Club at Dun Laoghaire Harbour on Dublin Bay.

The Royal St. George Yacht Club, home to team racing in Ireland welcomes 13 School Qualifiers from Connacht, Munster and Leinster.

As part of its team racing history, the club has two flights of Fireflies and organises Team Racing Clinics for Schools, Transition Year Modules and any groups who wish to learn more on this aspect of sailing. Details can be found on the club website.

The Royal St.George Yacht Club at Dun Laoghaire Harbour

School team racing is increasing in popularity due to a successful government grant that provided a new national flight of Fireflies and a second order is on the way.

Team racing can be comprised of 2 boats v 2, 3 v 3 or as the Oppies class like to do it, 4 v 4.

"Team racing by nature is very inclusive as everyone has to work as a team, the races are short and the racing is very tactical", says Royal St.George Yacht Club's event organiser Eunice Kennedy, Royal St.George Yacht Club Event Organiser.

"It is not about being the first to get a good start and to be the first over the finish line. It is all about teamwork, covering your opponents, and setting mark traps to assist your teammates into a winning combination. It is like a game of cat and mouse" she says.

"It enhances inclusivity between the stronger helms and the weaker ones, combined girl and boys teams, and time to make friends with other teams between races. The list is endless as to the value of Team Racing for developing young sailors and helps retain Junior involvement in the sport of sailing during their teenage years", Kennedy adds.

The event this weekend is taking place in the harbour with the East Pier providing an idyllic viewing platform. It is a colourful sight, with green, yellow, red and orange sails.

The RYA National Team Racing Championship saw West Kirby Hawks successfully retaining their title and the Prince Philip Trophy for another year.

Hosted by West Kirby Sailing Club on the Wirral, it was the third consecutive win of the championship for the team (pictured below), which has now claimed victory at the event six times in total.

The sell-out national championship over the weekend of 26- 27 March 2022 had 24 teams of six competing in Firefly dinghies. Although the forecast was not promising - with sailors preparing for a day of reading newspapers and playing cards - after a short delay, a gentle breeze stabilised to enable a full and uninterrupted day of racing in glorious sunshine.

With around 8-9 knots the race team rattled through a full round-robin schedule with 84 fast turnaround races for three flights of eight teams before the breeze started to wane.

Ideal conditions saw plenty of roll tacking and crews occasionally on the side, with incredibly close racing and a number of teams tied on points. All three qualifying leagues were completed, allowing the teams to progress into Gold, Silver and Bronze leagues on the Sunday.

At the end of day one, West Kirby Hawks had won all seven of their races to top their league, many other teams having won six of their seven races: Exeter Blue, Society Exodus, RTYC (Royal Thames YC) Red, Cindies Sailing Club, Rutland Raiders and Bristol Red. The top three from each league went into Gold and also included RTYC Blue and Paddington Bears. Day one results can be found here.

Final race decider

Sunday brought more sunshine and wind for a prompt start with the breeze gradually picking up to around 13-14 knots. By mid afternoon West Kirby Hawks had won 7 of their 8 races and all three leagues had almost been completed - but a re-sail was needed between RTYC Blue and Cindies to determine pole position and who would sail who in the knockout stage. The wind was beginning to vanish and in very light conditions, Cindies won the match, leaving RTYC Blue second overall in the Gold league.

West Kirby Hawks helm Dom Johnson explains: “From our point of view we were sailing well and winning our races. We’d had one loss to the Royal Thames team, who were also sailing really well all weekend, and that made their racing quite important towards the end because they likewise had one loss. Their very last race and the last race of the event in a dying breeze was a re-sail between them and Cindies. If Royal Thames won that re-sail then they would have topped the Gold league as we weren’t able to go to knock-outs because the wind went fragile. But they didn’t win it and so Cindies did us a favour! We only had one loss and they had two so it was all quite close.”

RYA National Team Racing Championship credit Dan Booth, West Kirby Sailing Club (11)[82]

With a failing breeze and a time limit of 15:30 for the semis and finals, the overall results from 87 races in the Gold, Silver and Bronze leagues proved final, giving the title to the West Kirby Hawks team of Andy Cornah, Dom Johnson, Ben Field, Fiona Harrington, Izzy Johnson and Tom Foster.

Second overall were Royal Thames Blue (Murray Hampshire, Scott Wallis, Jack Hanslope, Emma Baker, Harley Stone, Phoebe Warren) with Society Exodus (Peter Gray, John Platts-Mills, James Godd, George Clarke, Lucy Preston, Emma Mackeley) third.

Full overall results can be found here.

Team racing for all ages

Summing up their weekend for the West Kirby Hawks, Dom, for whom the victory was a 9th personal win at the event, said: “We benefit from being a team that was established a long time ago – we started sailing together in 2008 and have team raced pretty consistently at a lot of the big events since then, so we have a deep background that we can rely on and when we do get back together for the bigger events we have a good platform to be able to race on.

“One change this event though was that my usual team racing crew Holly was travelling so I had to recruit my daughter Izzy. We do Firefly sailing together but normally fleet racing and it was the first time we’d done team racing together, she’s only 13 and did a really good job in the front of the boat so it was great to be able to win the event with her. She had a great time and really enjoys team racing and the frantic nature of the sprint races.

“I’ve been in team racing for decades and you get brilliant boat handling and understanding of the rules from it, so it complements other sailing and it’s sociable, and that’s the bit my daughter enjoys and what we as the Hawks have always really enjoyed because we’re a team. That social element really encourages children and young people to continue in the sport.”

The RYA National Team Racing Championship was the first event in the UK to utilise the new World Sailing team racing rankings, which enables teams to create an id and for championship organisers to add an event. This pilot project for event grading and team rankings is supported by the Team Racing Sub Committee at World Sailing and open to all classes for 2v2, 3v3 and 4v4 team racing, offering three different ranking lists for countries, sailors and clubs/teams.

Looking ahead to the rest of the season, Dom said: “A lot of the teams were racing well and you can see that from the first rounds and the Gold league. We have some fantastic teams and it bodes well for the big events coming up like the Wilson Trophy in May, when we should have overseas teams who are now able to travel again, and hopefully some solid British teams who will do well.”

He added that for upcoming teams, there is “no substitute for boat speed in team racing which really helps win races… I would encourage any of the university or school teams looking to improve their boat speed to come along to the Firefly Nationals at Tenby this year. It will make a big difference to their performance on the team racing course.”

Eight teams with varied experience competed with Royal St. George organisers delighted to welcome new schools to the annual Leinster Schools Team Racing Championships at Dun Laoghaire Harbour.

Racing in Firefly dinghies, the inter-schools match again proved very competitive.

Teams entered from St. Gerards, Blackrock College, Gonzaga, St. Andrews, St. David's/Holy Faith and Colaiste Rathlin.

Going into the knockouts, Gonzaga College and St. Andrew's College 1 were tied on four points, Andrews 2 on 3 points and St. Davids/Holy Child on 2 points.

In the first of the semi-finals between Gonzaga v St. Davids/Holy Child, Gonzaga won by two clear points.

St. Andrews 1 v St. Andrews 2 proved to be a more highly contested semi. St. Andrews 2 took the first race. The second race was very close, and it was on the last leg that St. Andrews 1 managed to take control close to the finish line and earn a win.

The third race once again was very close. Unfortunately, St. Andrews 2 had a capsize, which enabled St. Andrews 1 to take their second win and a place in the finals.

In the final, Gonzaga took control of race one at the start line and with a display of some exceptional team racing tactics covering their opponents, they eased to a comfortable win.

Unfortunately, with wind strength suddenly increasing, race 2 had to be abandoned just after the start and competitors were safely escorted to shore.

Leinster Schools Team Racing Championships Round Robin scoresheet was split into Gold and Silver. This was done when the competition completed 50% of the Round Robin.

According to event director Eunice Kennedy, a decision was made to return the Silver fleet ashore. The fleets were experiencing intermittent gusts, and conditions were becoming too trying for the sailors as they had not done any training before the event.

Colaiste Raithlin entered the event with zero experience of team racing, thoroughly enjoyed it and said they want to continue it in the future, Kennedy told Afloat.

Eleven teams found weather windows to drive to Budworth SC in Cheshire for the RYA/BUSA Women’s Team Racing Nationals - and were rewarded with a weekend of great sailing.

Saturday saw a true Manchester style of weather conditions from light winds to big gusts - sun, rain and just a little snow. The expected high winds from Storm Eunice held off and the races were sailed in full rig Fireflies with the round-robin completed on the Saturday and the Gold/Silver leagues started.

With a wet and windy forecast for Sunday, race officer Eilidh Millar sensibly called a late finish on Saturday and an early start Sunday. With another named storm, Franklin, now on its way, the first race started in cut downs at 8am but the winds continued to build over the morning until a big gust tracking down the course blew over 5 boats across the two fleets.

The race committee brought all the boats ashore to wait for a break in the wind. Unfortunately, this did not emerge and it was not felt safe to send the sailors back out so the results thus far and from the completed first Gold League round robin were used to announce a winner.

Rutland SC retained their title with a team this year combining the longstanding Ladies What Launch group and the successful youth HYDRA group. Reigning BUSA Women’s champions Cambridge University showed their experience, combining good boat speed with strong team racing skills to finish second overall and dominate the university championship.

The Geordie Girlz and Scottish Sailors included some strong ILCA sailors, who showed great speed around the course. Another club team taking part was Leigh and Lowton SC, who finished an impressive third overall. They started as fast sailors and finished as team racers - proving to be the nemesis of the ultimately winning Rutland team.

Fiona Tylecote of the Rutland Raiders said: “It was great to see the wide range of ages and experience taking part, including the Event Director and PRO from last year’s event. With I think a difference of approximately 40 years between the youngest and oldest taking part, team racing really is a sport for life.”

One of the local Budworth teams had an ‘in at the deep end’ start, meeting reigning champions Rutland Raiders in the very first race of the event. In light winds they put up a good fight. They lost but drew on this experience with Budworth Red going on to win the Silver Fleet for the club, which has a long history of team racing and Firefly sailing.

Richard Moxey, RYA Keelboat Development Manager, said: “On behalf of the RYA, a big thank you to Budworth SC and the club’s fantastic volunteers who enabled the event to go ahead. It was great to see BSC historical team racing pedigree re-emerge for this championships. We had some really great feedback from the competitors.”

The near sell-out championship over the weekend of 19-20 February 2022 would have had 15 teams but for Storm Dudley and then Eunice, which prevented two teams from the south coast from attending along with two teams from Dublin - University College and Trinity College – whose ferries were cancelled.

Budworth SC Commodore Bill Kenyon added a massive thank you to the army of Budworth volunteers who came together prior to the event and then worked together to support the RYA organising team: “Our member volunteers managed to pull out all the stops to showcase a first class event despite the gales of Eunice brought to us by the jet stream. It was brilliant to see Firefly team racing at Budworth Sailing Club once again. All the competitors showed a mastery of both sailing skills and rules observance in extreme conditions.”

A full breakdown of results from the event can be found here

Next up on the national team racing calendar is the RYA National Team Racing Championship for the Prince Philip Trophy, 26-27 March 2022, at West Kirby SC.

University College Dublin (UCD) Sailing Club's first team have had a very successful two weeks on UK waters at team racing events.

First, they travelled to Southampton for the Wessex Winter Warmer, an event where only university first teams and strong alumni/club teams may enter.

In Saturday's racing, they won all their races on the water, however a controversial OCS call and missing a race meant that they finished the day on 8/10, costing them a spot in the semi-finals after the round-robin concluded on Sunday morning. The team finished sixth overall out of 20 teams and second university, an impressive finish considering most of the best UK universities attended.

The team then went to the Oxford "Top Gun" regatta a fortnight later, an annual invitational hosted by Oxford University where the best eight university teams in the UK and Ireland are invited to compete.

As the only Irish team invited, UCD wanted to do Ireland proud. The breeze was very strong with gusts averaging at 25 knots which made for challenging team racing, however, UCD were well up to the challenge ending the first day of racing in second place with a race in hand.

It's worth mentioning that racing was abandoned earlier than scheduled on Saturday due to an incident that happened in the UCD vs Cambridge race, one Cambridge boat T-boned another during a particularly strong gust whilst attempting a manoeuvre at mark 4, putting a large hole through a teammates boat.

The team attended the annual Oxford sailing dinner that night, a far more extravagant Saturday night than they are used to during sailing events, according to reports.

Sailing on Sunday was even windier than the first and UCD ended up slipping out of the top two spots and did not qualify for the final.

The team is looking forward to putting the experience of these two regattas into practice at the Irish varsities in two weeks time.