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A Sigma 33 One Design keelboat racing on Dublin Bay Photo: AfloatA Sigma 33 One Design keelboat racing on Dublin Bay Photo: Afloat

Sailing in Ireland. Sailors, Yachting, Clubs, Regattas
Chris Johnston in Prospect was second in the Beneteau 31.7 DBSC Saturday Race on Dublin Bay
Michael and Bernie Bryson's Bluefin Two won Saturday's DBSC Saturday Series racing for Beneteau 31.7s on Dublin Bay.  Recently crowned national champion Chris Johnston in Prospect was second, with John Power's Levante third.  There was a reduced turnout in Saturday…
Yachts competing at the Maples IRC Europeans 2024 on Dublin Bay
Race 5 - If you go along with the notion that the Great Divide in Ireland is not North-South, but is West/East and mostly meteorological, then the third three-race-day of the Maples IRC Europeans 2024 at the Royal Irish YC…
Luna Rossa Prada Pirelli races INEOS Britannia in the first semi-final day of the Louis Vuitton Cup on Saturday 14 September
The business end of the Louis Vuitton Cup began on Saturday (14 September) under bright sunshine on the stunning waters off Barcelona, with the first day of the Louis Vuitton Cup Semi-Finals seeing two utterly ruthless performances from the top…
Joanne Hall and Martin Mahon's Quarter Tonner Snoopy from Courtown Sailing Club lies second at the Maples Group IRC European Championships at the Royal Irish Yacht Club Photo: Afloat
Six wins from six races is the conclusive scoreline after three days of racing for David Bailey's J24 Hard on Port, who leads Class  Three on Dublin Bay at the Maples Group IRC European Championships at the Royal Irish Yacht…
Leopard 3 is the first Rolex IMA Maxi 1 World Champion
A prolonged Mistral may have restricted racing this week at the Maxi Yacht Rolex Cup, but the Costa Smeralda saved the best to last, with a dramatic adrenaline-fuelled final day that saw winds reaching the mid-20s. After a windward leg…
Continuous effort – Tom Dolan's Beneteau Figaro Solitaire 3 is a world-class challenge for solo racing
The buildup to any Olympiad is a long process, with all sorts of promises being made and policies declared by the host city and the nation around it. France's very special connection to the revival of the modern Olympics at…
Half Tonner 2 Farr (Boardman, Kelly and O'Leary) scored two wins in Class Two on day two of  Maples Group RORC IRC European Championships off Dun Laoghaire
Two wins on day two in class two for the Half Tonner 2 Farr (Boardman, Kelly and O'Leary) puts the Rush/Crosshaven crew three points shy of the top of the Maples Group RORC IRC European Championships off Dun Laoghaire leaderboard held by rival…
Johnny & Suzi Murphy's Outrajeous lead class One after day two of the IRC European Championships on Dublin Bay
Race 3: The 18 boats in Class1 of the Maples Group of the IRC European Championships, built around the significant presence of J/109s, continued with their ultra-close racing, but with the overall lead opening up ever so slightly when somebody sneezed…
The semi-final bracket is set for the Louis Vuitton Cup
Sir Ben Ainslie confirmed on Friday (13 September) that INEOS Britannia had selected Alinghi Red Bull Racing as their opponent in the first-to-five series that comprises the Louis Vuitton Cup semi-finals. The British team also selected starboard entry in their…
Karl Kwok's TP 52 from Hong Kong in winning form on Dublin Bay in the Maples Group IRC European Championships at the Royal Irish Yacht Club
Race 3: It might have been a civilised southerly breeze elsewhere, but off Dun Laoghaire, the Dublin Bay effect made the slow-building wind of the day a fickle friend. The skewing effect began right at the top for Class 0 in…
Joanne Hall and Martin Mahon's Quarter Tonner Snoopy from Courtown Sailing Club leads the overall leader J24 Hard on Port on the water at the Maples Group IRC European Championships at the Royal Irish Yacht Club Photo: Afloat
Four wins from four races means there is no doubt David Bailey's J24 Hard on Port leads Class Three after a second day of competition on Dublin Bay of the Maples Group IRC European Championships at the Royal Irish Yacht…
Winning smiles in Kinsale  - Portugal's Pedro Rebelo de Andrade, Jose Leitmann and Jamie Lea celebrate 2024 Dragon Gold Cup victory after crossing the finish line off Kinsale Harbour
Portugal's Pedro Rebelo de Andrade, Jose Leitmann, and Jamie Lea have won the Astra Construction Dragon Gold Cup at Kinsale on 33 points. After a thrilling final race, the trio overtook weeklong leaders Peter Gilmour, Yasuhiro Yaji, and Sam Gilmour, sailing for Japan on…
Tom Dolan became the first non-French winner of the race since the Swiss skipper Laurent Bourgnon in 1988. And he is the first non-French skipper to win since the multi stage race moved into identical one design yachts in 1990
On Thursday (September 12th) morning in La Turballe on the French Loire Atlantic coast Irish solo sailor Tom Dolan won La Solitaire du Figaro Paprec, renowned as the toughest single handed multi stage offshore sailing race in the world. “For years,…
The well-refreshed ship's company on the fully-crewed Sigma 33 Insider were already celebrating their Howth Autumn League win in times past, but last weekend owner Stephen Mullaney with Ian Martin demonstrated duo expertise on Insider in the double-handed spinnaker class
When it became clear just how busy Dublin Bay was going to be at this time in 2024 with its major cruiser-racer championships, a dedicated Dun Laoghaire organiser of regular annual regattas and season-long series commented: "This swathe of signature…
Karl Kwok's championship-garlanded TP 52 from Hong Kong in winning form on Dublin Bay in the first races of the Maple Group IRC European Championships at the Royal Irish Yacht Club
For some classes in the IRC Euros 2024, seriously unfortunate outcomes on the water (to put it as euphemistically as possible) may have indicated that Friday 13th had come a day early. But in the big boy's games, a grown-up…
Will Stout and Danny Cayard win Race Five, their second bullet in the series, and are the provisional overall leaders, tied on points with John Kosteki and Austin Sperry
Will Stout and Danny Cayard win Race Five, their second bullet in the series, and are the provisional overall leaders of the 2024 Star World Championship, tied on points with John Kosteki and Austin Sperry. The conditions in San Diego…

How to sail, sailing clubs and sailing boats plus news on the wide range of sailing events on Irish waters forms the backbone of Afloat's sailing coverage.

We aim to encompass the widest range of activities undertaken on Irish lakes, rivers and coastal waters. This page describes those sailing activites in more detail and provides links and breakdowns of what you can expect from our sailing pages. We aim to bring jargon free reports separated in to popular categories to promote the sport of sailing in Ireland.

The packed 2013 sailing season sees the usual regular summer leagues and there are regular weekly race reports from Dublin Bay Sailing Club, Howth and Cork Harbour on Afloat.ie. This season and last also featured an array of top class events coming to these shores. Each year there is ICRA's Cruiser Nationals starts and every other year the Round Ireland Yacht Race starts and ends in Wicklow and all this action before July. Crosshaven's Cork Week kicks off on in early July every other year. in 2012 Ireland hosted some big international events too,  the ISAF Youth Worlds in Dun Laoghaire and in August the Tall Ships Race sailed into Dublin on its final leg. In that year the Dragon Gold Cup set sail in Kinsale in too.

2013 is also packed with Kinsale hosting the IFDS diabled world sailing championships in Kinsale and the same port is also hosting the Sovereign's Cup. The action moves to the east coast in July with the staging of the country's biggest regatta, the Volvo Dun Laoghaire regatta from July 11.

Our coverage though is not restricted to the Republic of Ireland but encompasses Northern Ireland, Scotland, Wales and the Irish Sea area too. In this section you'll find information on the Irish Sailing Association and Irish sailors. There's sailing reports on regattas, racing, training, cruising, dinghies and keelboat classes, windsurfers, disabled sailing, sailing cruisers, Olympic sailing and Tall Ships sections plus youth sailing, match racing and team racing coverage too.

Sailing Club News

There is a network of over 70 sailing clubs in Ireland and we invite all clubs to submit details of their activities for inclusion in our daily website updates. There are dedicated sections given over to the big Irish clubs such as  the waterfront clubs in Dun Laoghaire; Dublin Bay Sailing Club, the Royal Saint George Yacht Club,  the Royal Irish Yacht Club and the National Yacht Club. In Munster we regularly feature the work of Kinsale Yacht Club and Royal Cork Yacht Club in Crosshaven.  Abroad Irish sailors compete in Royal Ocean Racing Club (RORC) racing in the UK and this club is covered too. Click here for Afloat's full list of sailing club information. We are keen to increase our coverage on the network of clubs from around the coast so if you would like to send us news and views of a local interest please let us have it by sending an email to [email protected]

Sailing Boats and Classes

Over 20 active dinghy and one design classes race in Irish waters and fleet sizes range from just a dozen or so right up to over 100 boats in the case of some of the biggest classes such as the Laser or Optimist dinghies for national and regional championships. Afloat has dedicated pages for each class: Dragons, Etchells, Fireball, Flying Fifteen, GP14, J24's, J80's, Laser, Sigma 33, RS Sailing, Star, Squibs, TopperMirror, Mermaids, National 18, Optimist, Puppeteers, SB3's, and Wayfarers. For more resources on Irish classes go to our dedicated sailing classes page.

The big boat scene represents up to 60% of the sail boat racing in these waters and Afloat carries updates from the Irish Cruiser Racer Association (ICRA), the body responsible for administering cruiser racing in Ireland and the popular annual ICRA National Championships. In 2010 an Irish team won the RORC Commodore's Cup putting Irish cruiser racing at an all time high. Popular cruiser fleets in Ireland are raced right around the coast but naturally the biggest fleets are in the biggest sailing centres in Cork Harbour and Dublin Bay. Cruisers race from a modest 20 feet or so right up to 50'. Racing is typically divided in to Cruisers Zero, Cruisers One, Cruisers Two, Cruisers Three and Cruisers Four. A current trend over the past few seasons has been the introduction of a White Sail division that is attracting big fleets.

Traditionally sailing in northern Europe and Ireland used to occur only in some months but now thanks to the advent of a network of marinas around the coast (and some would say milder winters) there are a number of popular winter leagues running right over the Christmas and winter periods.

Sailing Events

Punching well above its weight Irish sailing has staged some of the world's top events including the Volvo Ocean Race Galway Stopover, Tall Ships visits as well as dozens of class world and European Championships including the Laser Worlds, the Fireball Worlds in both Dun Laoghaire and Sligo.

Some of these events are no longer pure sailing regattas and have become major public maritime festivals some are the biggest of all public staged events. In the past few seasons Ireland has hosted events such as La Solitaire du Figaro and the ISAF Dublin Bay 2012 Youth Worlds.

There is a lively domestic racing scene for both inshore and offshore sailing. A national sailing calendar of summer fixtures is published annually and it includes old favorites such as Sovereign's Cup, Calves Week, Dun Laoghaire to Dingle, All Ireland Sailing Championships as well as new events with international appeal such as the Round Britain and Ireland Race and the Clipper Round the World Race, both of which have visited Ireland.

The bulk of the work on running events though is carried out by the network of sailing clubs around the coast and this is mostly a voluntary effort by people committed to the sport of sailing. For example Wicklow Sailing Club's Round Ireland yacht race run in association with the Royal Ocean Racing Club has been operating for over 30 years. Similarly the international Cork Week regatta has attracted over 500 boats in past editions and has also been running for over 30 years.  In recent years Dublin Bay has revived its own regatta called Volvo Dun Laoghaire Regatta and can claim to be the country's biggest event with over 550 boats entered in 2009.

On the international stage Afloat carries news of Irish and UK interest on Olympics 2012, Sydney to Hobart, Volvo Ocean Race, Cowes Week and the Fastnet Race.

We're always aiming to build on our sailing content. We're keen to build on areas such as online guides on learning to sail in Irish sailing schools, navigation and sailing holidays. If you have ideas for our pages we'd love to hear from you. Please email us at [email protected]