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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
31 Boats Puts Irish Fireball Fleet on a High in Dunmore East
31 Fireballs contested the last domestic regatta of the season at one of the Class' favourite locations Dunmore East. Included in the entry was Brian O'Neill from Strangford Lough, currently the northern representative of the fleet, Michael Ennis another northern…
Fresh start to Howth's Autumn League
The 2010 Howth Yacht Club Autumn League – sponsored by WD-40, Crystal Holidays and The Food Room - got underway in fresh south-westerly winds with the first races for the 130 entries in ten classes. While conditions were damp to…
Asgard II Accident Report Due in Two Weeks
The Marine Casualty Investigation Board (MCIB) report of the investigation in to the sinking of Asgard II will be published in the next two weeks, two years after the ship sank off the French coast. The Irish Times has more…
Rumball and Moran Master Big Seas in Dunmore East
Kenny Rumball and David Moran made the most of strong winds and big seas sailing to win the Fireball Munster Championships in a last race decider at Dunmore East this afternoon. In a series that was cut to just four…
Supernova Comes Home First in DBSC
Ken Lawless sailing Supernova made the best of the autumnal sailing conditions to win the penultimate race of Cruisers three yesterday. The Dublin Bay Sailing Club race was sailed in light and misty conditions. Next Saturday is the final race…
Dun Laoghaire to Host Top French Race in 2011
In a major announcement for Dun Laoghaire sailing a top French fixture involving 50 single handed yachts will visit the east coast port next Summer. Dun Laoghaire will be the only stop over outside France for next year's  prestigious La…
SB3s Plan Further Expansion with Dun Laoghaire Open Day
Not content with being the biggest (and fastest) keelboat class in the country the SB3 class association in Dun Laoghaire intends to break new ground this winter and further expand the class. In a letter to members class captain Justin…
New WD-40 Cruiser Challenge in Howth's Autumn League
Howth Yacht Club's annual 6-race Autumn League starts this Sunday (19th September) with 130 entries in 10 classes to date, a figure which is expected to increase with Dublin Bay boats joining the cruiser fleet to compete in the newly-introduced…
O'Regan and Flanigan Win 420 Champs
Royal Cork Yacht Club hosted the 2010 National Championships of the 420 class last weekend. Principal Race Officer for the event, which was sailed out of Cuskinny in Cork harbour was Richard Leonard. There was an abundance of sailing talent…
Knox-Johnston in Search for Ten Skippers
Sailing legend Sir Robin Knox-Johnston has launched his latest search for ten exceptional skippers to lead the internationally sponsored teams in the next edition of the Clipper Round the World Yacht Race. Clipper 11-12 will start form the UK in…
On the Forum: 1720s, New Rules for Sailing and Helping out in Powerboating
In sailing, Brian C expects the 1720 sports boat class to explode again in the coming months. He says "with a lot of the top IRC boats sold and heading for foreign lands, the 1720 can be picked up easily/cheaply…
ISORA Plan to Build on 2010 Success
Alterations to future sailing series plus a change to how races are scored will be considered at November's ISORA agm. The 2010 season has been a watershed year for the body after the National YC rekindled interest in Irish sea…
Kinsale Dragon Photos HERE!
A great event for the Dragon class in Kinsale rounded off the 2010 season at the weekend. Photos afloat and from the prizegiving by Bob Bateman are HERE
Matt Davis and Raging Bull are 2010 ISORA Champions
Race 10 – Pwllheli to Howth – James Eadie Sailing Race 11th September 2010. From an entry list of 31 boats, 13 boats came to the line in Pwllheli for the last race in the 2010 ISORA Offshore series writes Peter…
O'Leary Adds 1720 National Title to Season Haul
Commodore's Cup Captain Anthony O'Leary led the 1720 National Championships from start to finish at Baltimore SC this weekend. He finished the seven race series with four first places. The full results are HERE. There was drama this afternoon when…
Masterclass by O'Driscoll earns J/24 national title
  An exhibition of how to win sailing races on the second day of the Irish J/24 Championships at Howth saw Flor O'Driscoll and his crew from the Royal St.George YC on 'Hard on Port' deservedly win the national title…

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]