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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
RS Sailors Heading North to Cushendall
The 2011 RS400 and RS200 Traveller Series draws to a close this weekend with the National Championships taking place at Cushendall Co. Antrim. Two strong fleets of over 40 boats in total are expected. In the RS400's Simon Herriott of…
ISA Seek New Regional Development Officer
The Irish Sailing Association (ISA) is seeking a Regional Development Officer. The vacancy follows Denis Dillon's announcement that he is leaving the post to join Shannon Sailing based in Dromineer on Lough Derg as its Managing Director from January 2012.…
British Gold Medallists Withdraw from Dun Laoghaire Star Regatta
The Star European Championships in Dun Laoghaire took another dramatic twist today when Brtitish Gold medallists Iain Percy and Andrew Simpson withdrew from the regatta citing the skipper's ankle injury sustained on the first day of racing. Meanwhile, 30 knot…
Three Races Planned to Get Star Euros Back on Track
If winds ease tomorrow - and it is doubtful - three races of the Star European championships will be sailed to get the Dublin Bay regatta back on schedule.High winds once again dictated the racing schedule at the Star European…
Dun Laoghaire's Jay Bourke Wins Etchells Title
It was tight in points at the top end of the Etchells Nationals in Howth in the last weekend of August. After a protest was resolved Jay Bourke's Northside Dragon from the Royal St. George Yacht Club won on countback…
Sail Training Vessel Rescued by Weymouth RNLI (Video here.)
The crew of the Weymouth RNLI relief Severn class all-weather lifeboat Beth Sell assisted a 24 metre sail training vessel with 16 persons onboard that was dismasted South of Portland Bill. The footage taken by crew members iphones and pentax…
40 Knot Winds Cancel Star Racing in Dun Laoghaire
Strong winds have forced the cancellation of racing at the Star European championships in Dun Laoghaire for the second time in three days. 40 knot southwesterlies have left the Royal St.George YC organisers with no option but to scrub today's…
Offshore Sailors Consider 'Virtual Marks' for 2012 Fixtures
Taking a lead from this year's Lyver offshore sailing race, when Liverpool Yacht Club used a "virtual" waypoint as a mark on the course, ISORA may include this type of mark in future races, that's according to Commodore Peter Ryan.…
Italians Lead, O'Leary/Burrows Third in Star Europeans
Ireland's Peter O'Leary and David Burrows lie third and only six points off the overall lead held by Italian's Diego Negri and Enrico Voltolini after the first two races of the Star European championships in Dun Laoghaire. The staging of…
Britain's Olympian Ben Ainslie Goes Extreme!
Britain's most successful Olympic sailor Ben Ainslie will skipper Oman Sail's 'Oman Air' Extreme 40 in the next three Acts of the Extreme Sailing Series™ in Trapani (Sicily), Nice (France) and Almeria (Spain). The 34-year-old already has three Olympic gold…
Rosanna Davison Goes Sailing on Team Sanya (Pics here!)
Former Miss World Rosanna Davison went sailing from Dun Laoghaire today on board the Chinese Volvo Ocean Race Yacht, Team Sanya. The yacht has backing from discover Ireland and is on a promotional day before departing for Alicante and next…
Cullaun Sailing Club Hosts Wayfarer Inlands
On the weekend of the 3rd and 4th of September, Cullaun Sailing club hosted the Wayfarer Inland championships in conjunction with the club's annual mixed fleet regatta.It was a heart lifting sight to see so many cars in the car…
Thick Fog, No Wind Present Cherbourg Challenge
After a wet and windy season the weather gods conjured up a new and unusual challenge for the finale of the RORC 2011 season: light airs and thick fog. Speaking after the race the overall winner, RORC Vice Commodore, Mike…
O'Driscoll Adds J24 Easterns Title at Malahide to Season's Haul
Flor O’Driscoll, who recently retained his J24 National title and won Class 3 in the Dublin Bay Challenge, added to his season’s haul of trophies by winning the Malahide Marina-sponsored J24 Eastern Championships hosted by Malahide Yacht Club last weekend.…
RS 200: the 'ideal' next step for Irish Youth Sailing?
Questions over the next step for juniors after the RS Feva point to the bigger RS200 writes Feva sailor Ciara Byrne The RSFeva has become the world's best selling two-person dinghy in recent years with fleets also growing in clubs…
Nick Craig Reflects on Fourth OK Dinghy World Title
Nick Craig chats to Robert Deaves after his record-equalling fourth OK Dinghy World title How times have changed. A little over seven years ago, no British sailor had ever won the OK Dinghy World Championship. It was a commonly held…

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]