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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 well-refreshed ship's company on the fully-crewed Sigma 33 Insider were already celebrating their Howth Autumn League win in times past, but last weekend owner Stephen Mullaney with Ian Martin demonstrated duo expertise on Insider in the double-handed spinnaker class
When it became clear just how busy Dublin Bay was going to be at this time in 2024 with its major cruiser-racer championships, a dedicated Dun Laoghaire organiser of regular annual regattas and season-long series commented: "This swathe of signature…
Karl Kwok's championship-garlanded TP 52 from Hong Kong in winning form on Dublin Bay in the first races of the Maple Group IRC European Championships at the Royal Irish Yacht Club
For some classes in the IRC Euros 2024, seriously unfortunate outcomes on the water (to put it as euphemistically as possible) may have indicated that Friday 13th had come a day early. But in the big boy's games, a grown-up…
Will Stout and Danny Cayard win Race Five, their second bullet in the series, and are the provisional overall leaders, tied on points with John Kosteki and Austin Sperry
Will Stout and Danny Cayard win Race Five, their second bullet in the series, and are the provisional overall leaders of the 2024 Star World Championship, tied on points with John Kosteki and Austin Sperry. The conditions in San Diego…
Day five of the Kinsale Dragon Gold Cup 2024 brought lighter winds that were extremely shifty and, at times patchy, resulting in place changes on every leg
Day five of the Kinsale Dragon Gold Cup 2024 supported by Astra Construction Ltd brought the fifth race winner in five races. A lighter northerly breeze of five to eighteen knots and a more benign sea state made for a…
David Bailey's J24 Hard on Port made the best of blustery conditions on Dublin Bay to lead Class Three after the first two races in blustery conditions of the Maples Group IRC European Championships at the Royal Irish Yacht Club
David Bailey's J24 Hard on Port leads Class Three after the first two races in blustery conditions on Dublin Bay of the Maples Group IRC European Championships at the Royal Irish Yacht Club. Two wins for the Bray Sailing Club…
John Minnis's Belfast Lough-based A35 Final Call II leads on the water in a race that's later abandoned due to a 55-degree wind shift on the first day of the IRC European Championships on Dublin Bay
The national success, as the 2024 season progresses, of John and Suzi Murphy's J/109 Outrajeous from Howth has been so, well, utterly outrageous, that ordinary folk might reasonably have expected a slight but inevitable easing of the pace by the…
James Dwyer's Swuzzlebubble leads with a one, and two scored in the first two races of Class Two the Maples Group RORC IRC European Championships off Dun Laoghaire
Vintage Half Tonners won both of Thursday's (12th September) opening races in Class Two of the Maples Group RORC IRC European Championships off Dun Laoghaire this afternoon, but a J97 lies second overall after an unfortunate collision between two Half…
Adam Ovington's Half Tonner Head Hunter was dismasted in the opening race of the Maples Group 2024 RORC IRC European Championships. See the sequence of photos below
Adam Ovington's Half Tonner Head Hunter was dismasted in the opening moments of the first race of the Maples Group RORC IRC European Championships off Dun Laoghaire this afternoon. On opposite tacks after the start, the upper mast of the…
Escaping to the open sea. The Cruising Association of Ireland fleet manoeuvring to go through the Liffey Toll Bridge after their successful Three Bridges Rally in the heart of Dublin, with Tom Fitzpatrick's classic sloop Saoirse in foreground
The Matt Talbot Bridge in Dublin provided a useful border-marker in last Saturday (September 7th's) good weather. The 104th Liffey Swim was coming down-river to finish off the Customs House, while Commodore John Murphy's Cruising Association of Ireland's annual Three…
Simon Boote, Ger Deely and Domhnaill MacDonnacha after finishing the Frefighters from Galway Fire and Rescue service Connemara currach fund raising rowing event in aid of Cancer Care West on the Corrib
Galway firefighters not only rowed a currach up and down the river Corrib for charity – they also built the vessel themselves. Galway Fire and Rescue Service members had decided to undertake a row for Cancer Care West, in memory…
Tom Dolan, the skipper of Smurfit Kappa – Kingspan, leading the overall ranking at the end of the first two acts, did not disappoint in taking the historic win in the 2024 Solitaire du Figaro
The suspense was palpable throughout the third and final leg of the Solitaire du Figaro Paprec! It was a leg of truly epic proportions in which Tom Dolan and his fellow rivals had to contend with some particularly boisterous conditions,…
Davey O'Connell's Ball 'n' Chain lies sixth at the National 18's 17-boat RCYC September league in Cork Harbour
After six races sailed and one discard, Nick Walsh, sailing Peaky Blinders with Rob Brownlow and Ed Rice – who sailed to success in Scotland in August and also at September's Royal Cork 'At Home' Regatta – are looking like winners again in the…
Race Four of the 2024 Star World Championship was underway with a clear start on the first attempt
San Diego delivered yet another beautiful day on the water, with winds up to 12 knots, sunshine and cooler air. The 64-boat fleet was towed out on time and by 13.00 Race Four of the 2024 Star World Championship was…
Britain’s Andy Beadsworth sailing TUR56 Provezza won race four of the Dragon Gold Cup in Kinsale
With four races down and two to go Australia’s match racing legend Peter Gilmour sailing JPN56 YRed continues to hold a narrow lead at the Kinsale Dragon Gold Cup 2024 supported by Astra Construction Ltd. Race four got underway after…
Dubin Bay Sailing Club (DBSC) Water Wag racing is cancelled at Dun Laoghaire Harbour
Dubin Bay Sailing Club (DBSC) Water Wag racing tonight (Wednesday, Sept 11th) is cancelled due to gusty northwest winds forecast for Dun Laoghaire Harbour. Westerly winds were forecast to gust to over 30 mph at start time (6 pm) this evening.…
Gaston Morvan sending it in the fast reaching conditions of the final leg of the 55th La Solitaire du Figaro
With less than 100 miles to sail to the final finish line of the 55th La Solitaire du Figaro Paprec the 2024 title looks set to go down to the wire. After a brutal double crossing of the Channel yesterday…

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]