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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
The Welsh J122 Mojito of Peter Dunlop and Victoria Cox now leads the ISORA 2024 Series with 492.5 points
After a weekend of action off the Arklow coast, the Musto ISORA 2024 Series has a new overall leader. The Welsh J122 Mojito has taken the lead, but only by half a point from the smaller J109 Ruth of the Shanahan family…
Dun Laoghaire's Saskia Tidey, racing for Team GB with Freya Black at the Paris 2024 Olympic Sailing in Marseille
Dun Laoghaire's Saskia Tidey, racing for Team GB with Freya Black, is lying tenth in the Women’s Skiff after the opening day of sailing at Paris 2024. The Royal Irish Yacht Club sailor who sailed for Ireland at Rio but…
George Radley's vintage 40-footer IMP from Cove Sailing Club will compete in the 40th anniversary CAlves Week Regatta in Schull, West Cork, from August 6th
Schull Harbour Sailing Club has received some late entries for its August Calves Week Regatta to bring the fleet up to 65 competing boats.  Beginning on August 6th, the annual West Cork regatta has attracted an eclectic mix of cruisers, including…
C’est magnifique: the historic French tallship Belém, dating to 1896 visited Cork city this weekend and where onlookers viewed from the quayside. The three masted barque recently attended in Brittany, the Brest-Douarnenez Maritime Festival and in April transported the Olympic Flame from Greece to Marseilles ahead of last Friday’s spectacular Seine based opening ceremony. The next port of call is Galway on 1 August where sail trainees continue their Irish tour.
Belém, the iconic French-flagged trainee tallship and one-time Guinness family luxury yacht that earlier this year carried the Olympic flame from Greece to the host nation, is currently visiting Irish ports, writes Jehan Ashmore. Prior to this weekend's visit to…
Bangor RNLI’s new inshore lifeboat Ruby Robinson
Bangor RNLI in Northern Ireland launched to the aid of two people last week in two separate incidents on a single day. At 10.46am on Tuesday (23 July), the volunteer crew launched their new Atlantic 85 class lifeboat Ruby Robinson…
The Tom Shanahan skippered J109 Ruth took its third ISORA win of the season in the Dun Laoghaire to Arklow race, having scored a victory in May's cross-channel race and more recently lifted the K2Q trophy in Crosshaven after this month's Dublin to Cork Race
The Shanahan family's J109 Ruth from the National Yacht Club has produced its third offshore race win of the 2024 Irish Sea Offshore Racing Association (ISORA)season, this time in Saturday's Dun Laoghaire to Arklow race, which is weighted at 1.3…
The 2024 ILCA 6 Youth European Championships at Ballyholme Yacht Club on Belfast Lough
All 370 competitors have arrived at Ballyholme for the ILCA 6 Youth European Championships, and with just one more day until racing starts, things are running smoothly; even the boat and sail inspection is half an hour ahead of schedule.…
Royal St. George's Jaguar sailing team, sailed by Martin Byrne, Adam Winkelmann, and John Simms, leads the Irish South Coast Dragon Championship going into the final race
Going into the final day of racing at the Irish South Coast Dragon Championship at Glandore Harbour Yacht Club in West Cork, only one point separates the top two overall in a 17-boat fleet. Royal St. George's Jaguar sailing team, skippered…
Phil Lawton and Neil O'Hagan lead the DBSC Thursday Flying Fifteen Series with 19 points
For the third Thursday in a row, DBSC  Race Officer John McNeilly had good winds for course setting on the latest Flying Fifteen Thursday night of Dublin Bay Sailing Club. And, assuming reward is the right word, he was rewarded with…
Dublin Bay Sailing Club's (DBSC) new Committee Vessel, 'Corinthian,' alongside at the National Yacht Club
Dublin Bay Sailing Club's (DBSC) new Committee Vessel, 'Corinthian,' will begin her race management duties next Thursday after arriving into Dun Laoghaire Harbour this afternoon after Saturday's racing.  Other race management vessels and club rescue craft accompanied the brand new…
Job done. The moment of elation when Annalise Murphy wins the Silver Medal at the Rio Olympics 2016, after it had looked for a while as though she'd do well to take the Bronze
The racing in the 2024 Sailing Olympiad gets under way in Marseille on Sunday with a determined Irish team in three classes, and across-the-board support at all levels at home for our young sailors. The Olympic effect is notably inter-twined…
CH Marine Chandlery is on-site to support the ILCA 6 Youth European Championships at Ballyhome Yacht Club at Bangor in Northern Ireland
CH Marine Chandlery, which is on-site to support today's opening of the ILCA 6 Youth European Championships at Ballyhome Yacht Club at Bangor in Northern Ireland, is offering a special price on ex-charter boats at the event and online. As Afloat…
The Irish Olympic team pass by during the opening ceremony of the Paris 2024 Olympics with ILCA sailors Finn Lynch (left) and Eve McMahon (fourth from left)
Irish Olympic sailors Finn Lynch and Eve McMahon were on board boat number 36 during Friday's Paris 2024 Opening Ceremony, the most unique Opening Ceremony ever staged. Led by flagbearers Sarah Lavin and Shane Lowry, the 26-strong Team Ireland contingent…
Even more than 20 years after designer Tony Castro launched the SB20 (formerly known as the SB3) into the market, the asymmetrically powered sports boat looks bang up to date as pictured here on Dublin Bay
Devoti Sailing is set to breathe new life into the SB20 sportsboat class with plans for a comprehensive revival and revamp. Under the guidance of Olympic silver medallist and America’s Cup campaigner Luca Devoti, the boatbuilder will oversee the international…
Kenny Rumball and crew competing in the RS21 class at Volvo Cork Week Regatta
dJuly has been non-stop for RS Sailing and its various classes in Ireland. With the recent announcement of the Sports Capital Grants, many sailing clubs throughout Ireland submitted successful applications for new sports equipment in their training classes. The RS…
Mayo Sailing Club's Joan Mulloy has signed up for the 2024 Double Handed World Offshore Championships
Mayo Sailing Club's Joan Mulloy has signed up for the 2024 Double Handed World Offshore Championships in September. That adds to a busy sailing schedule as she is also looking forward to the next stage of 'The Famous Project' in…

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]