Despite the massive upsurge in Laser sailing in the capital's waters over the last few seasons, it was Cork Harbour helmsman that topped the 2021 Irish Laser rankings in all three rig divisions.

In the Standard rig (ILCA 7) rankings, Royal Cork Yacht Club's Ed Rice finished 2021 in first place, just .5 of a point over Royal St. George's Ross O'Leary. 

In the ILCA 6 rankings, the latest Crosshaven wunderkind, Jonathan O'Shaughnessy finished top of the Radials. As regular Afloat readers know, O'Shaughnessy had a standout season for which he was rewarded in January with RCYC's Pyewacket Trophy.

O'Shaughnessy's clubmate Dara Collins led the 2021 rankings in the ILCA 4 or 4.7 rig.

 Download the full Irish Laser rankings for 2021 below.

Rush Sailing Club hosted Tokyo Olympic campaigner Aisling Keller from the Irish Laser Association for a two day Laser dinghy training course for 13 of its junior members on January 22/23.

A report from the club's Michael Gosson says "the Juniors got some great experience under super guidance from Aisling".

"They were fully engrossed in the theory and debriefing lessons afterwards; The quietest we have seen them and all excitedly chatting in the club at the end of both days", he said. 

Aisling Keller (front row second from right) and the Rush Sailing Club juniors

Rush Sailing Club is hoping the dedicated Keller who hails from Lough Derg will return for more sailing on the Rogerstown estuary soon.

As regular Afloat readers will know, the Tipperary Laser ace qualified Ireland for the Tokyo Olympics in the Laser Radial class at the 2019 World Championships only then to be ruled out of contention due to a cut short trials series, an ad hoc change to the selection procedure by the Irish Sailing Association that left Keller 'devastated' and drew the ire of many observers. 

Wins for Kieran Dorgan in races nine and ten of the Monkstown Bay Sailing Club Laser Winter League was a significant result for the Cove Sailing Club ace in Cork Harbour on Saturday.

Top scorer Dorgan was followed by two host club sailors Brendan Dwyer and Paul O'Sullivan in the light and patchy southwest winds. See overall results below.

Three quick races were sailed off Monkstown leaving six left to sail in the 20-boat series. Dorgan gave Mary Malone his view on the series for far in this vid below:

Monkstown Bay Sailing Club Laser Winter League after ten races sailed

 The fleet come ashore after racing at Monkstown Bay

Local helmsman Chris Bateman leads the Monkstown Bay Sailing Club Laser League after a light air seventh race was sailed in Cork Harbour on Saturday.

The single race sailed brings the lead to its half way stage. A race win for Bateman in ghosting conditions puts him ahead of clubmate Ronan Kenneally with Paul O'Sullivan of Sunday's Well lying third in the popular Frostbite series.

The painfully slow going is depicted in this video clip below by Mary Malone together with an overview from Brendan Dwyer who finished second in the race.

20 boats are competing in the series.

See photos and results in Bob Bateman's Photo Gallery below.

Local Laser sailor Chris Bateman emerged as the winner of today's three races of the Monkstown Bay Sailing Club's Yard of Ale Trophy in Cork Harbour. 

The 14-boat fleet braved strong gales for today's series, the first dinghy racing of the new year.

Second overall was Ronan Kenneally with third place going to Sunday's Well Sailing Club's Paul O'Sullivan. 

Monkstown Bay Sailing Frostbites Results 2022

From an entry list of 72 dinghies, a fleet of 45 answered the Race Officer’s call and presented themselves in the start area of the Christmas Cracker Race – sponsored by Viking Marine and hosted by the Dun Laoghaire Motor Yacht Club. This event had a very short gestation period, the idea only being floated on the penultimate Sunday of the pre-Christmas Frostbites. The idea was to have a charity race for the RNLI with entry fees capped at €5/boat and a request that competitors donate online to the RNLI.

In the week leading up to the event, the wind forecast varied enormously from the likelihood of no race due to high winds and gusts to a very light affair of fewer than three knots. Fortunately, neither of those scenarios arose and the fleet of 45 enjoyed winds that went up to a maximum of 15 knots, from the East. The air temperature was a balmy 10°.

Robin and Dacha Hilliard in their Flying Fifteen (3729) in the PY race Photo: Ian Cutliffe

The course was set as a “Tour of the Harbour” with marks in locations to make shoreside viewing easier. Thus, a mark was laid inside the end of the Carlisle Pier, in front of the National Yacht Club, another mark was set inside the fairway entrance to the marina towards the ice-house and the remaining two marks were set close to the Boyd Memorial on the East Pier and upwind of the western breakwater where it joins the West Pier.

Brian and Charlie O’Neil rounding Mark C (Boyd Memorial) Photo: Ian Cutliffe

The fleet was set a beat for the opening leg, to the mark off the Boyd Memorial, and they proceeded in an anti-clockwise direction around the harbour thereafter.

The plan was to have the first boat racing for 75 minutes and the Fireball of Frank Miller & Hermine O’Keeffe (14713), bisected the finish line 1.5 minutes inside that target.

Two Fireballs led the fleet all the way round. Miller was the first to fly spinnaker after rounding the weather mark and he was followed closely by Neil Colin & Marjo Moneen (14775). These were initially challenged on the water by the RS400 of Dave Sweeney and Gavin Doyle but as the race progressed the gap to the Fireballs increased. A strong ILCA turnout was led by Eve McMahon in the ILCA 6 (Radial), Gary O’Hare in the ILCA 7 (full-rig) and Max Cantwell in the ILCA 4 (4.7). Eve has had a great 2021 with a win in Lake Garda in the ILCA 6 Youth Worlds and she followed that up with a top 5 place in the Youth Worlds earlier this month. At the finish, she was only a couple of boat-lengths behind regular ILCA 7 competitor Gary O’Hare.

While the various ILCA rigs represented the largest element of the fleet, there was a good turnout from the Aeros, (5 and 7), the Fireballs, and there were two each of the GP14s and RS400s. The Irish National Sailing School has eight sailors on the water in the form of School Principal Kenneth Rumball, sailing an Aero 7 and seven RS Feva XLs sailed by the senior instructors. A solitary Flying Fifteen sailed by Robin Hilliard and daughter Dacha also contested the event and the Long household had two boats out – father Pierre, and one son in the IDRA and two other sons in the Mirror. We also had a Pico, sailed two-up.

DMYC Viking Marine Christmas Cracker – Top Ten finishers

1. Eve McMahon, Howth Yacht Club, ILCA 6 (Radial)
2. Max Cantwell, Royal St George Yacht Club, ILCA 4 (4.7)
3. Noel Butler, National Yacht Club, Aero 7
4. Brendan Foley, Royal St George Yacht Club, Aero 7
5. Gary O’Hare, Royal St George Yacht Club, ILCA 7 (full-rig)
6. Kenneth Rumball, Irish National Sailing Club, Aero 7
7. David Williams, Royal St George Yacht Club, ILCA 6
8. Mark Gavin, Royal St George Yacht Club, Aero 7
9. Roy van Mannen, Royal St George Yacht Club, Aero 5
10. Conrad Vandlik, Royal St George Yacht Club, ILCA 7.

Prize-winners will be contacted directly about getting their prizes, vouchers from Viking Marine.

The Christmas Cracker fleet under starter’s orders – 20 seconds to go.

In ancient Greece, the mythological Halcyon Days at mid-winter were the calm and bright time around the Winter Solstice. In Ireland, a calm at midwinter (the Solstice is at 3.59 pm this (Tuesday) afternoon) tends to bring grey days, and if the sky does clear, fog is often imminent. But the recent days of grey calm relented sufficiently on Sunday to provide the breeze for two races - nos. 11 & 12 - to round out the first half of the Howth YC KeyCapital Winter Frostbite Series for the long-lived Laser class and the fledgling RS Aeros. And the overall Laser results were startling in the variety of clubs hitting the top eight, the host club barely making the cut with Conor Murphy at sixth.

The convincing overall winner was one of the furthest travelled, Ronan Wallace of Wexford. But though it was mostly Fingal clubs thereafter down to sixth until two Dun Laoghaire helms - Richard Tate of RStGYC and Eoin Delap of DMYC - enter the listings at 7th and 8th overall, an outlier is Dan O’Connell at fourth for ISA. This makes him The Man From God Knows Where, so we’ve assumed he’s from Derrynane in County Kerry, as that’s where successful sailors called Dan O’Connell tend to hail from.

The Laser 4.7s were Howth all the way, with Charlie Keating winning from Fiachra Farrelly, who missed the concluding races as he’s away with his folks Cormac & Mandy for a two month Caribbean cruise. Meanwhile, the flotilla of RS Aeros saw John Phelan winning from Daragh Sheridan, with Paul McMahon third.

Laser Standard Results: 1st Ronan Wallace (Wexford Harbour BTC) 10 pts; 2nd Daragh Kelleher (Skerries SC) 31; 3rd Tom Fox (Rush SC) 35; 4th Dan O’Connell (ISA) 38; 5th Dave Kirwan (Malahide YC) 42; 6th Conor Murphy (Howth YC) 47; 7th Richard Tate (RStGYC) 69; 8th Eoin Delap (DMYC) 69pts.

Full results here: https://www.hyc.ie/results

After a year’s absence due to COVID, Irish sailors finally have the opportunity to compete at the Youth Sailing World Championships in Oman on Monday. 

As Afloat previously reported, Ireland's team is Eve McMahon in the girl's Laser Radial class, along with Jonathan O’Shaughnessy in the boy's division and Ben O’Shaughnessy and James Dwyer Matthews in the 29er class.

Ireland has had some success in Oman already this winter with eighth place achieved by Robert Dickson and Seán Waddilove at the 49er World Championships, and last week a 17th placing by Aoife Hopkins in the Laser Radial World Championships.

Mussanah’s average temperature in December is a balmy 24 degrees, with average winds of 10-17 knots, although extremely light winds have been a feature of the past world championships.

Racing for both Laser Radials and 29er classes begins on Monday 13 December and continues all week to Friday 17 December.

The Irish Laser Coach is Vasilij Zbogar, and 29er coach Thomas Chaix.

Howth Yacht Club's Aoife Hopkins achieved a personal best outcome at the women's Laser Radial (ILCA6) World Championships in Mussanah, Oman today after winning the tenth race of the series.

The Irish solo sailor had gone into the final day holding 20th overall and convincingly won the penultimate race before placing 17th to end the regatta 17th overall.

Hopkins started well and was first boat into the steadier breeze on the course before leading the 63-strong fleet around the first mark. As she has shown all week, her downwind performance was strong and she extended her lead for the remainder of the race for a very solid first place.

Belgium's Emma Plasschaert was crowned the new world champion after continuing the yo-yo battle across the fleet that saw her depose the Tokyo 2020 Olympic champion from the overall lead.

Denmark's Anne-Marie Rindom had led the event twice during the six days but ultimately finished just outside the podium in fourth place.

Hopkins is part of Irish Sailing's Senior Squad working towards qualification for Paris 2024 in the women's single-handed event sailed in ILCA6 dinghies (formerly known as the Laser Radial).

Emma Plasschaert of Belgium

Emma Plasschaert of Belgium is the 2021 ILCA 6 Women’s World Champion finishing level on points with Agata Barwinska of Poland. Plasschaert finished ahead of Barwinska in the final race, crossing the line in third, to win gold while Barwinksa claims silver. Viktorija Andrulyte of Lithuania takes the bronze, two points behind. Olympic Champion Anne-Marie Rindom (DEN) finished fourth, four points off the podium positions, with Julia Büsselberg (GER) in fifth despite winning the final race. Just seven points separated first and fifth in the end.

ILCA 6 (Radial) 2021 World Championship podium winners

Emma Plasschaert, new women’s World Champion, said, “Today, I went to the last day without any expectation, and just wanted to have three good races. I ended up with two good ones. It is a little bit surreal to come back on shore and not know what the points are. Am obviously super stoked about it and proud to be world champion!”.

“It came to here thinking aiming for top three,” Agata Barwinska (POL) said. “Am having a bit of bitter-sweet moment. I finished with the same points as Emma but am not saying that this is my last Worlds”. She added, “It was a lot of very good athletes like Anne-Marie Rindom who just won an Olympic gold medal. It was great to race against her. For me, it was a lot of light wind throughout the week, which I really like!.”

Julia Büsselberg of Germany, finishing fifth in the women’s race, said, “On the one hand I am very happy with my performance, especially on the last day. On the other, it is just seven points to the title and I had it in my hands in at least three of the races where I made a mistake so I am not one hundred per cent happy at the moment. In my opinion, the level of the competition was very high, nearly everyone has competed at the Olympics and will continue afterwards.”

After three races sailed (under Irish Race Officer Con Murphy) at the Laser Radial (ILCA6) World Championships in Mussanah, Oman, Howth Yacht Club's Aoife Hopkins is in 28th place overall.

Hopkins is the only Irish sailor competing in the women's discipline despite the earlier official entry of Sienna Wright who does not appear on today's scoresheet downloadable below. 

The Howth sailor started well in all three races in the 63-boat fleet and went on to place 40th then 23rd and 20th in challenging light winds.

Hopkins also showed good speed downwind so will be looking to improve her first mark rounding in the coming races to utilise this strength more.

With only one fleet and none of the leading sailors escaping a double-digit result it already looks set to be a high scoring regatta. Denmark's Anne-Marie Rindom, the Tokyo 2020 Gold medallist, had been first overall but dropped to eighth after a 16th placing in race three.

Wright's brother Rocco who was also entered in the nine boat men's Radial division does not appear on the men's scorecard.

Following the Olympics, the ILCA 6 fleet first reconvened at the 2021 European Championships in Varna, Bulgaria where Agata Barwinska from Poland took the title, with Maxime Jonker (NED) and Vasiliea Karachaliou (GRE) standing beside her on the podium. These three are all competing in Oman, and they’ll be looking to repeat their performances at the World Championship level. The European Championship triumph for Barwinska came off the back of victory at the Kiel Week regatta, and it appears that she is firmly establishing herself as one of the top contenders in the ILCA 6 fleet.

Being part of the hugely successful Dutch ILCA 6 squad, Maxime Jonker has previously finished second at the 2020 ILCA 6 World Championships, so the top step of the podium has to be on her mind. Jonker makes up half of the smaller than usual Dutch squad, which has a noticeable absence from three-time Olympic medalist Marit Bouwmeester, who recently announced her pregnancy with a baby girl, but still plans to campaign toward Paris 2024. After her bronze-medal finish at the Tokyo 2020 Olympics, Bouwmeester is looking to add a fourth Olympic medal to her trophy cabinet, but she won’t be without competition from her previous podium rivals.

Danish Olympic Champion Anne-Marie Rindom is already featuring in Oman and it seems that her gold-medal glory in Tokyo has done nothing to distract her from further ILCA 6 success. Known as one of the hardest workers in the ILCA 6 fleet, the World Sailor of Year nominee is clearly determined to round out her outstanding year with an additional ILCA 6 World Championship title.

The championship organisers have again scheduled three back to back races for Friday which if completed will bring the event back on schedule with the final race planned for Monday.