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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
Dubin Bay Sailing Club (DBSC) Water Wag racing is cancelled at Dun Laoghaire Harbour
Dubin Bay Sailing Club (DBSC) Water Wag racing tonight (Wednesday, July 3rd) is cancelled due to gusty offshore winds forecast for Dun Laoghaire Harbour. Westerly winds are forecast to gust to over 30 mph at start time (6pm) this evening.  
VULNERABLE skipper Sam Goodchild (GBR) is pictured during training on April 26, 2024, in Lorient, France is one of 40 skippers named for the 2024 Vendee Globe Race solo non stop round the world race starting on November 10th
Increased interest in the 2024 Vendee Globe has led to stricter qualification rules, and 40 sailors have been unveiled for November's start. The 2020 edition of the Vendee Globe(with 33 entries) captured significant attention from sailing enthusiasts, leading the organisers…
June's Round Ireland Race winner NMD 54 Teasing Machine is the line honours favourite in Friday's 151-mile RORC Cowes Dinard St Malo Race
Organised by the Royal Ocean Racing Club since 1929, the Cowes Dinard St Malo Race is a true RORC Classic.  For the 2024 edition, over 100 boats will be in action, and they will be crewed by over 500 sailors…
Dun Laoghaire's Royal Irish Yacht Club hosts three weeks of top class keelboat racing this September
With eight weeks to go to the start of the first of three separate major sailing events at Dun Laoghaire Harbour, Royal Irish Yacht Club organisers report good local and international entries registering for three weeks of keelboat racing on…
Ireland's Johnny Mordaunt, Simon Johnson, Cian Guilfoyle and Sonia Zugel, part of the record-breaking Volvo 70 Tschuss 2 crew of Christian Zugel, celebrate the new Gotland Runt Offshore Race record time
An Irish crew onboard the Volvo 70 Tschuss 2 has broken Sweden's Gotland Runt Offshore Race speed record in what is s the world's largest annual ocean race. Ireland's Johnny Mordaunt, Simon Johnson, Cian Guilfoyle and Sonia Zugel were onboard the boat…
Eve McMahon defends her title at U21 World Championships in Portugal this week
Ireland's Eve McMahon defends her U21 World Championship Title in Viana Do Castelo, Portugal, on Wednesday, just weeks before the youth star makes her Olympic debut in Paris 2024. The Irish Sailor of the Year is the only sailor in…
FA file photo of Monkstown Bay Sailing Club’s 'At Home' in Cork Harbour
Monkstown Bay Sailing Club’s 'At Home' on Saturday for dinghies had two Laser sailors finishing overall on three points each at the top of Class 1. Harry Pritchard and Brendan Dwyer both sailed ILCA 7s. Dwyer won the first race,…
Robert Parton takes on a new role as President of the British Marine Industry
British Marine, the trade association for the UK leisure, superyacht, and small commercial marine industry, has appointed Robert Parton as its new President, effective from 18 July 2024. Having served as President-Elect for the past two years, Robert Parton is…
Looking every inch a winner, the J/24 Headcase helmed by Cillian Dickson comes in to the finish on the Costa Smeralda, and another win
Porto Cervo on Sardinia's Costa Smeralda is usually associated with the top end of the superyacht world. Yet in mid-June the super-value boats of the International J/24 Class homed in on its glamour-pot setting for their Euros. Defending champions Ireland,…
Pete Smyth and his dedicated crew made themselves very competitive first time out in the latest Searcher
The Smyth family have been well in the frame in cruiser-racing in Ireland and abroad for many years, but Pete Smyth's move into the still-competitive 2010 Ker 46 Searcher has made them extra-distinctive as "The Men In Black In The…
The year 2023 also witnessed major developments within the Belfast Harbour Estate, including the construction of a state-of-the-art temperature-controlled warehousing facility and the expansion of Belfast Harbour’s film studio offering
Belfast Harbour has announced strong financial results for 2023, showing an increase in annual turnover and operating profits despite a challenging global trading environment. The Harbour's annual turnover reached £82.9 million, marking a 7% increase from the previous year, while…
Former All-Ireland Helm Champion Laura Dillon continues her international winning ways steering the classic S&S 41 Winsome
The Round the Island Race circling the Isle of Wight is numerically one of the biggest events in the world, but seldom - if ever - has the large fleet gone through the near gale conditions 2024's June staging experienced…
Ireland’s Tom Dolan is back among the front runners with a top placing in the Le Havre Allmer Cup Series in early June
Tom Dolan's third overall in the intense Le Havre Allmer Cup Series in early June was gained against many of the best solo sailors currently at their peak in France. The best of his achievement came in the long offshore…
The Dutch barquentine Thalassa arrive in Dun Laoghaire Harbour on Dublin Bay
Dun Laoghaire welcomed the Dutch Barquentine Thalassa on Monday evening (July 1), adding to the stunning presence of tall ships in the Dublin Bay harbour this week. The Thalassa's arrival is part of its 2024 whiskey cruise programme, offering a…
Sail Training Ireland trainees
Sail Training Ireland received €50,000 from the Dormant Accounts Fund last year to enable young people from disadvantaged backgrounds to participate in voyages. Minister of State at the Department of Rural and Community Development Joe O’Brien cited the grant as…
The Galway Hookers are representing the west's maritime tradition in Brest
The Galway Hooker Sailing Club is going to trailer three traditional Hookers to Brest aboard Brittany Ferries on Wednesday Week on their way to "make Waves at Brest Maritime Festival" which, the club says, "marks a significant milestone for us,…

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]