There was another super race in the O'Leary Insurances sponsored Winter Sailing League at Royal Cork Yacht Club today writes Bob Bateman.

Sunny (most of the time) with wind 20 to 25 knots from north north west was a scenario where some skippers felt better sailing without spinnakers.

Course was 65 on RCYC course card. Following a Boat start the course was no 13s, no 11s, no10p, Corkbeg s, cage p, w4 s, finish at cage.

The Grand Soleil 40 Nieulargo skippered by Denis Murphy led the fleet and looked majestic upwind but had difficulty holding off the Durcan/O'Shea 1720 sportsboat off the wind but neverthelss won today's all-in IRC race.

Tom Crosbie in No Excuses again got a good start was very steady and did enought to finish second and hold the overall IRC lead. 

Coracle Kieran Collins with son Mel on helm put in a virtuoso performance (full on) enough to finish third in the all in IRC division.

Given the number of white sail boats competing there are now two White Sail classes in the all-in start.

Scroll down for photo gallery of today's race.

Royal Cork Yacht Club had a great turnout for the opening race of its O'Leary Insurances Winter League for sailing cruisers in Cork Harbour today writes Bob Bateman.

Race officers Clem and Wendy Mc Elligott got the 32 boats – up 50% up on last year– away in W/NW winds from 11 to 14 knots but only at the second attempt at a start and also under an X flag.

The boats sailed were to sail a full course of: Corkbeg no10p, E2s, 8s, 5s, Cage p, E4s and a Cage finish but the course was shortened at Cage mark after the first round.

Coracle skipperd by Kieran Collins led at the weather mark but lost lead to three 1720s sportsboats on the run downwind. The J109 Jelly Baby helmed by Brian Jones also broke through.

The cruisers returned to RCYC marina with Laser and Topper Leagues also starting today, providing a great winter sailing spectacle.

As the debate rumbles on as to how we can engage more young people in the sport of sailing, the Royal Cork Yacht Club has witnessed 'tremendous growth' in junior dinghy sailing activity across every level over the last eighteen months writes RCYC Rear Admiral, Stephen O'Shaugnessy. 

The club currently boasts some of the largest active dinghy fleets in the country; The Optimist class for example, has in excess of seventy sailors right across an age range from 8 -15 years old. Equally, the club Laser and Topper fleets have also seen rapid growth in numbers participating on a consistent basis at both club and regional level.

In tandem to all this single–handed dinghy activity, there is a growing fleet of RS boats being purchased by members and this appears to be filling a gap to ensure that junior members in their late teenage years keep sailing. While this is very much work in progress, the signs are positive for further growth for two handed sailing across a number of classes, including a possible 29er class.

Signs are positive for further double–handed dinghy growth in classes such as the youth 29er skiff. Photo: Bob Bateman

The result of all this is an average of ninety dinghies currently taking to the water at weekends to take part in club league racing a coaching programmes.

So what is driving this growth? A very focused junior dinghy committee ensures that every base is covered when it comes to our junior activity in the club. Underlying all our activity is the fundamental belief that every junior member is a fantastic asset to the club, irrespective of their age, ability or ambition. All our club coaching programmes and courses are structured in such a manner that the sailors within each fleet feel a strong sense of identity of being part of a larger team even though they each may well have different goals or objectives in terms of competing at various levels or simply sailing for the love of sailing'.

The spin off from all this activity has also helped towards a substantial increase in those participating in their club summer sailing courses. This, coupled with the fact that a growing number of family members are encouraging their children to be more involved in healthy outdoor activity during the summer months has led to one of the largest summer programmes in the country this year with in excess of hundred and seventy participants.

Looking to the future, the hope is to further build on the philosophy that as a sport, sailing is a skill for life that can be enjoyed at any stage and at any age and whatever ability.

There is clearly a growing demand across Ireland for dinghy sailing at every level and the club looks forward to continued growth in the build up to its 300th anniversary in 2020.

There was an interesting anniversary on Sunday at Royal Cork Yacht Club for Maurice 'Prof' O'Connell, the sailing professional, aboard Conor Phelan's all winning class one entry, Jump Juice. The Ker 37 won the CH Marine Autumn League with nine race wins from ten races but it wasn't this succesful teams only win on Cork Harbour waters. Far from it!

The weekend marked exactly ten years to the day for the Prof since winning the exact same event. How time flies! 

Prof O'Connell trimming the kite on Jump, on their way to victory in the 2007 RCYC League Photo: Bob Bateman

Prof took the 30–second video below as Jump gybed at the wing mark in the second race on Sunday. Nice bit of audio too!

Last night's Royal Cork Yacht Club prizegiving for the ten–race CH Marine Autumn League Series was officiated by RCYC Rear Admiral Keelboats Kieran O'Connell with Martin O'Donovan of CH Marine in attendance.

Scroll down the page for a gallery of prizewinners by Bob Bateman.

The best was kept til last and the closing races of the CH Marine Autumn League today in Cork Harbour featured some fine sailing conditions writes Bob Bateman.

Winds were force four from the north/north west on a beautiful Autumn day at Crosshaven.

Classes one, two and three raced outside the harbour. The White Sail fleet and the Sportsboat fleets raced inside the harbour.

Despite two big storms this month, Race Officer RCYC Peter Crowley got ten races sailed and two discards applied.

Conor Phelan's Ker 37 Jump Juice was the clear winner with nine race wins in IRC One. Paul & Deirdre Tingle's X34 Alpaca was second on 17–points with K Dorgan/J Losty third in the Beneteau 36.7 Altair. Eight competed. 

In IRC Two, Kieran Collins Coracle IV, an Olson 30 won from Ted Crosbie's X302 No Excuse. Third was the Sunfast 32 Bad Company (Desmond, Ivers & Deasy). Ten competed.

Even though, past champion Fools Gold from Waterford Harbour was not competing this year, there was good support from the travelling Dunmore East fleet with Robert Marchant's Fulmar Fever, a Fastnet Race entrant, competing in IRC Three. Photo: Bob Bateman

In IRC Three, Dave Lane and Sinead Enright's J24, YaGottaWanna was the clear winner in the ten boat fleet but second  and third were tied on the same 24 points. Cracker, a Trapper T250 skippered by Denis Byrne won through on the tie-break rule. Third was David Marchant's Sigma 33 Flyover from Waterford Harbour.

Prior to going afloat today, Port of Cork gave a briefing to sailors about navigating in the harbour and the importance of keeping keeping clear of commercial shipping.

The series included an ICRA training initiative for the fleet that comprised a North Sails Ireland rig set-up advice and video of today's racing captured by drone and this was viewed post racing at Royal Cork Yacht Club.

As usual, SCORA in in the process of computing results from this CH Marine League, together with the April league in Kinsale, Calves Week at Schull Harbour and the Cobh to Blackrock Race to declare overall season prizes.

Full results are here. Today's photo gallery below. Prizegiving pictures to follow after tonight's prizegiving at RCYC.

George David’s Rambler 88 has taken line honours for the owner’s third time in the 608-mile Rolex Middle Sea Race currently finishing in Valetta writes W M Nixon. But Nin O’Leary and Alex Thomson in the IMOCA 60 Hugo Boss have turned in a virtuoso offshore performance to be third home across the line, bested only by the significantly larger Rambler and the 100ft Leopard.

Unlike the Fastnet Race 2017, where Hugo Boss suffered from having to beat the whole way from Cowes to the Fastnet Rock, thereby leaving inadequate space and distance to demonstrate her formidable offwind capacity, in this race the “lovely black boat” was able to lay the course – albeit in often very light winds – most of the way on the anti-clockwise circuit towards the most northerly turning point, the volcanic island of Stromboli.

Hugo Boss gets smoothly away from Valetta at the start. Although winds were light all the way to the northerly turn at Stromboli, they were seldom dead on the nose and the specialised IMOC 60 was able to stay well placed. Photo: Kurt Arrigo

There, with a west to nor’westerly filling in to eventually become a classic Mistral-generated Mediterranean gale, most of the fleet elected for long tack/short tack progress towards Sicliy’s decidedly rugged northwestly coast’s series of massive headlands. But Hugo Boss’s crew chose to continue to lay on port tack far offshore, accepting the reality that right-on windward work is not their boat’s strong suit.

Thus they found both a slightly more favourable slant of wind well offshore, and a more regular sea state. The northwest corner of Sciliy is notorious for its confused back-wash ridden sea, and when Hugo Boss closed with the fleet again yesterday morning, they were already approaching Sicily’s most westerly race turn at Favignana island, finding themselves in company with the larger boats, and now well ahead of 50ft to 65ft craft which had been hassling them earlier in the race.

The Botin 65 Caro (Maximilian Klink, Germany) kicks her heels in heavy winds in the backwash-plagued rough seas off Sicily’s northwest coast. Boats that gave much of this coast a good offing, such as XP-ACT and particularly Hugo Boss, benefitted from more regular seas Photo: Kurt Arrigo

With Favignana astern, it was all systems go, and at the front of the fleet while Rambler 88 – which was to cover the final 300 miles in 14 hours – was unassailable, for a while Hugo Boss looked as though she might be able to pip Leopard for second place on the water.

It was not to be, as things were easing slightly as the leaders came into Valetta late last night and in the small hours of this morning. With the pace dropping. Rambler 88 was able both to finish first and beat Hugo Boss on corrected time, albeit by just 5 minutes and 26 seconds. But O’Leary and Thompson and their crew of Will Jackson and Jack Trigger (there’s only room for two extra on the very purpose-designed IMOCA 60) were able to beat Leopard (Pascal Oddo, France) by 55 minutes on CT, while Udde Ingvall’s super-skinny Maxi 98 CQS from Australia has finished fourth across the line, almost ten hours astern of Hugo Boss on corrected time.

The severe conditions north of Sicily have taken their toll of the fleet and Irish entries, with Two-Handed favourites Brian Flahive of Wicklow and Sean Arrigo of Malta with the J/122 Otra Vez an early retiral, while Conor Doyle of Kinsale with the DK 46 Hydra had managed to get as far as the great headlands of northwest Sicily before pulling out.

He’s done it again. George David (left) receives the line honours flag for the third time from Royal Malta YC Commodore Godwin Zammit

But Ireland’s most experienced participant, Middle Sea Race 14-times veteran2012 Barry Hurley, is sailing a really cool race with Shane Giviney and other noted talents on the Xp44 XP-ACT. Having given those bouncy northwestern headlands a decent offing to get them quickly clear while maintaining a good fleet place, they’ve just passed Pantellaria and are lying fourth overall on corrected time.

Current handicap leader is the 2012 Swan 53 Music (James Blackmore, South Africa) while the Russian JPK 10.80 Bogatyr (Igor Rytov) is second and the former Round Ireland star Tonnere de Breskens, the Ker 46 now known as Tonnere de Glen and owned by Tian Domonique of France, is third, with XP-ACT in fourth overall and well clear of the next boat.

Speeds are still well up, but with the wind easing it’s going to be a long day getting past Lampedusa and across to the finish at Valetta.

Race tracker here

In the penultimate day of racing of the CH Marine Chandlery Autumn League, Conor Phelan's  Ker 37 Jump Juice holds a commanding lead of six points writes Bob Bateman.

Phelan's class one lead is over Royal Cork club–mates Paul & Deirdre Tingle in the X34 Alpaca on 12 points overall with K Dorgan/J Losty in the Beneteau 36.7 Altair third on 15 points.

Winds for today's two races were westerly starting at 14–knots but falling all the time. The second race started in eight–knots.

Jump (Conor Phelan) leads eight boat class one. Photo: Bob Bateman. Scroll down for gallery

A strong ebb tide of about two to three knots made it a hard beat for competitors (a Spring tide coupled with a lot of freshwater in the harbour after the last few days of rain). 

There were many groundings as competitors looked for slacker tide by sailing on the edge of Spit Bank where some of the groundings occurred. 

The first to ground was Jump Juice in the first race, hence their poor score (nine points) and one they are able to discard.

Full results here.

With nine confirmed entries already for the 2018 edition of the Beaufort Cup, Cork Week Chairman Kieran O'Connell of Royal Cork Yacht Club says it promises to be a great event. '2016 was the inaugural event and we saw 12 different services compete for the title. We are set to have a significant increase on that number in 2018,' O'Connell told Afloat.ie

The Beaufort Cup invites sailing teams from associated national services, 50% of each team must be active in the service they represent.

Racing will take place over five days in a mix of offshore and inshore racing.

Teams will get the chance to enjoy the 'renowned social experience' of Volvo Cork Week and the winning team will also have €10,000 donated to a nominated charity of their choice while the winner will also be eligible for the Volvo Cork Week Cup (Boat of the Week across the full 5 days) at Cork Week 2018.

Download the Notice of Race below.

Drifting conditions in Cork Harbour may have appeared beautiful to the onlooker but to the crews of the 52 boats competing in Royal Cork Yacht Club's CH Marine Autumn League it was very frustrating writes Bob Bateman.

Outside Cork Harbour Race Officer Peter Crowley managed to get one race for classes 1, 2 and 3 completed.

Inside the harbour it was a different story with the whitesail fleet getting a start outside White bay giving the fleets a beat into number 10 buoy.

Cork Harbour stalwart Michael Murphy (flask in hand) who is sailing in the same boat for 38 years. Photo: Bob Bateman

Bandit sailed by Richard Leonard got a great pin end start and led as far as Fort Carlisle where the Foul spring tide coupled with the fickle north west breeze put a stop to progress for everyone and Race Officer John Downing abandoned racing for the day.

The sportboat fleet fared no better using a laid windward leeward course and they also had to abandon racing.