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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
Kenefick Steering Chimp to Half Ton Success
Top Cork youth sailor George Kenefick at the helm of Chimp has tightened the strangle hold on the lead of the Half Ton Classic Cup and now has a 14-point margin over  nearest rivals off Cowes. One time series leader…
Deluge Over, Upd8 Wins DBSC Race
The deluge that hit Dun Laoghaire yesterday afternoon did not dampen the spirits of the Dublin Bay Sailing Club fleet who emerged from the harbour for a brisk Thursday evening race. Austin Whelan's First Class 8, Upd8 made the most…
Irish Trainees On Tall Ship Lord Nelson
Lord Nelson,  owned by the Jubilee Sailing Trust,`was one of the Class A ships participating in the Tall Ships Races this year. The Jubilee Sailing Trust is a UK based charity which promotes mixed ability sailing – able-bodied and physically…
Schull To Host ISAF World Team Racing Championships
Sailing teams from Australia, Japan, United States, Thailand, Italy, Spain and Ireland will converge on Schull next week (August 27th - September 4th) to contest the ISAF World Team Racing Championships at both open and youth level writes Vincent Ahern.…
Storm Wins Howth IRC Race
HOWTH YACHT CLUB. WEDNESDAY SERIES 3 (O'ALL) 24/08/2011 Class 1 IRC: 1, Storm P Kelly (3.00); 2, Tiger Hughes/Harris (9.00); 3, Trinculo M Fleming (9.00); Class 1 HPH: 1, Storm P Kelly (3.00); 2, Trinculo M Fleming (7.00); 3, Tiger…
Supernova to Contest MGM Sponsored DBSC Cruiser Challenge
July's Volvo Dun Laoghaire Regatta Boat of the week, Supernova, will be in action again this weekend in the Cruisers III East Coast championships. The annual fixture is being raced as part of tomorrow's DBSC Cruiser Challenge sponsored by MGM…
Chimp Consolidates Lead On Day Three of The 2011 Half Ton Classic Cup
A race win for Dave Cullen's King One leaves the Howth boat tenth after day three of the Half Ton Classic Cup. When the Solent is on form there is no better place in the world to sail and it…
Jérémie Beyou is Crowned King of the Solitaire du Figaro 2011
Today, Wednesday at 12:49:01 Jérémie Beyou crossed the line first to win the fourth and final leg from Les Sables d'Olonne to Dieppe. By finishing in Dieppe ahead of the rest of the fleet, and scoring his third consecutive victory,…
Irish Offshore Sailing Makes Success of Debut Season
Irish Offshore Sailing, a new yacht training centre based in Dun Laoghaire, Co. Dublin is now launching its autumn winter calendar, having had a very busy first season, despite the current economic climate. The school is an RYA and ISA…
Ainslie to Contest J109 Championships
The Port of Dartmouth Royal Regatta is based around a programme of rowing and sailing events, but also incorporates a busy programme of activities including air displays, fireworks, a large fair, and many other smaller events that happen in and…
Yacht Broker O'Leary Marks Return to DBSC Sailing with a Win
Ross O'Leary marked his return to Dublin Bay Sailing Club (DBSC) racing last night with a light air win in the PY/Laser class. The Dun Laoghaire based yacht broker has missed part of the dinghy season due to an ankle…
King One Drops to Tenth After Round Isle of Wight Race
Dave Cullen's King One lies tenth overall at the 2011 Half Ton Classic Cup after double points results from a Round the Isle of Wight dropped the Howth boat from third. Day two of the  saw the 38–strong fleet racing…
Irish Sailing Association Hits Out at Newstalk Interview
The Irish Sailing Association (ISA) has hit back at last week's Newstalk radio interview where questions over the state funding of Irish Olympic Sailing was raised. In the interview with a number of Olympic hopefuls, including Dun Laoghaire sailor Annalise…
Ireland 'Can Benefit from Nurturing Sailing'
Two recent letters in The Irish Times serve as a "reminder of the high value of sailing to the social and economic health of Ireland". Enda O Coineen - who helped bring the Volvo Ocean Race to Ireland - writes…
The Biggest National Eighteen Championships Ever
I can only start by thanking everyone who made the effort to make it to the event this year, we had people come from far and near and because as we all know without them an event like this cannot…
Britain's Team Aqua Clinch RC44 Cup in Sweden
Team Aqua (GBR) clinched the overall title by a narrow four point margin, over Team CEEREF (SLO) in the final day's racing in Maarstand, Sweden. Photos from Oskar Kihlborg below. Behind the top two there was still third place to…

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]