Menu

Ireland's sailing, boating & maritime magazine

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
Endeavour current lead at Mermaid Nationals
As things stand today (4 August 2009), Roger Bannon in Endeavour is defending his slender lead over Paddy Dillon, sailing no. 131 Wild Wind, in the 2009 Mermaid National Championships at Sligo Yacht Club. Bannon is a five-time winner of…
Cobh pays tribute to Ostar winner
Barry Hurley and Dinah, with crewmate Andy Boyle, arrived home in Cobh at 1400hrs on Sunday 2 August, having sailed from New York via the Azores, to be met by a welcoming flotilla led by two Cork Harbour pilot boats,…
Annalise boosts London hopes
Dun Laoghaire's Annalise Murphy has produced Ireland's first top ten result at an Olympic Class World Championships in six years to provide a much needed boost to Irish sailing chances in London 2012. Yesterday's eighth place result at the 87-boat…
Fascinated by Fastnet: Johnston first NI sailor to enter double-handed
Philip Johnston was born 30 years ago, the year of the Fastnet Disaster, and on the 9 August, in less than two weeks time, Philip will make history as the first Northern Irish sailor to enter this famous Rolex Fastnet…
Irish duo take 3rd at Allen RS Feva Europeans
Conor Lyden and Peter Stokes of the RCYC got an excellent result at the Allen RS Feva European Championships at Lake Garda, which ran from the 27th to the 31st of July, reports Ronan Lyden.  Racing for day 5 was…
AnnaLise moves into tenth
The National YC's AnnaLise Murphy has moved in to the top ten of the Women's Laser Radial Youth World Championships in Karatsu, Japan. The 21-year-old lead the 87-boat fleet in the last race today until she lost a couple of…
O'Driscoll is Sailor of the Month
Flor O’Driscoll, overall champion of the Volvo Dun Laoghaire Regatta 2009. is the Irish Independent/Afloat.ie “Sailor of the Month” for July after an inspirational performance which saw his veteran J/24 Hard on Port emerge as supreme champion from a fleet…
Dinghies at the Evening Topaz Sailing. Photo: Brian McDowell Malahide’s Three Clubhouses…  1 The Three Day Wonder!   Although the club was founded in 1958 it did not have a clubhouse until 1959. Despite planning the club's first Whitsun Open…
Below: Union Chandlery Topaz Nationals 2009, Malahide YC The Topaz Class Association of Ireland has been formed to promote the Topaz Uno and Uno Plus as the one design Sailing dinghy of choice for the modern generation. Please note: 2009…
The Wayfarer: 16 feet, with spinnaker, a family day sailer, cruiser and racing dinghy for inland and coastal waters. Stable and easily managed by beginners yet it's PY of 1099 reflects excellent Class and mixed fleet performance. Friendly and social…
The Irish Topper Class Association promotes the Topper Class in Ireland, both North and South, through the organising of competition and through the provision of coaching and support to topper sailors. Click here for all the latest Topper Sailing News.…
The Dublin Bay Waterwag lays claim to being the oldest one-design sailing boat in the world. Founded as a class in 1887, the design was modified in 1900 and the rules are essntially unchanged since then. Afloat's Graham Smith wrote,…
Royal Ocean Racing Club 1925 – 2005 If the crew of the last boat to cross the finish line of the first ever Fastnet race did hear the cheers from the Royal Western Yacht Club of England, as the new…
Lough Foyle Yacht Club is situated on the banks of the River Foyle at Culmore Point, approximately 3 miles north of the Foyle Bridge. New members are always welcome. If you are interested in finding out more about the club…
East Down Yacht Club (EDYC) has extensive facilities for both cruising and racing. It is located on the western shores of Strangford Lough, Co Down, Northern Ireland. The Club is situated on a 9-acre site, which includes a modern clubhouse,…
Craigavon Lakes Sailing Club was formed in 2003 to promote the enjoyment of sailing and to enable members to improve their sailing skills and work towards further RYA qualifications. The club is based at the Craigavon Watersports Centre. The club…

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]