Sailors of the Year for 2007...

JANUARY 2007

COLM BARRINGTON

The First Sailor of the Month in 2007 was Colm Barrington, with his overall win in the IRC Division in the Key West Regatta in Florida. Barrington’s Ker 50 Magic Glove was profiled as the boat to beat in this high-powered American event, and he kept ahead of the challenge from the two newest TP 52s in the US by just one crucial point in a hectic series.

FEBRUARY 2007

CARMEL WINKELMANN

Carmel Winkelmann of Dun Laoghaire personifies the spirit of voluntary effort which is the backbone of Irish sailing, and in 2006 she was one of only eight voluntary workers in all Irish sport whose contribution to national life was recognised with a government award. Currently the popular Irish Sailing Association 'Volunteer of the Year', Carmel’s dedication in all areas of sailing is incalculable and it’s the reason she is February’s Cork Dry Gin Sailor of the Month. It’s a family tradition – son Paul has skippered his TP 52 Island Fling to a class win in the Hong Kong-Vietnam race and is making his way back to Ireland for July’s Volvo Dun Laoghaire regatta.

MARCH 2007

PAT and OLIVIA MURPHY

GLOBAL VISION

The continuing round-the-world cruise of Pat and Olivia Murphy saw this remarkable couple celebrating their 40th wedding anniversary early in 2007 at sea on board their 41ft Aldebaran, voyaging from the Indian Ocean towards Oman. They then successfully transited the Red Sea, where sailing is “like trying to climb up the flames of a blowlamp which is turned off at irregular intervals”, and then the Suez Canal to reach the Eastern Mediterranean to become our popular Sailors of the Month for March.
 

APRIL 2007

DAVID HARTE

AD MAN IN SCHULL

Schull in West Cork took centre stage in Irish sailing during April when teams from Schull Community College captured two of the top three places in the Irish Sailing Association National Team Championship in Dun Laoghaire. It brought deserved praise for all involved, and none more so than Schull’s own multi-talented David Harte, who coached the developing ability of his neighbourhood to this outstanding success. 

MAY 2007

CONOR PHELAN

Conor Phelan and the crew of Jump Juice, the Ker 37, won the Scottish Series Trophy in late May, getting the benefit of the closest decision the regatta has seen for many years.

On balance, the Jump Juice crew shaded it over their Royal Cork clubmates and rivals aboard Blondie III, the Corby 37 which won IRC Class 2. While Jump Juice trounced the opposition in IRC Class 1 with their seven wins and a discarded fourth, so too did Blondie III’s aggregate seven wins which was complemented by a second place which they discarded. But Class 1 was judged to be the slightly stronger fleet, and in winning the main award for the Loch Fyne-based 174-boat regatta, Jump Juice left in their wake no fewer than three past holders of the title.

"I'm delighted,” said Phelan. “We came here with a competitive boat and figured we had a good chance of winning the class, but only today after we won the first race did we start to think we really have a chance of the overall trophy. I came here for the first time two years ago on a Beneteau 36.7 and did not do very well, but this is fantastic and we'll be back next year."

At the back of Jump Juice, Ruairidh Scott – who started his sailing on the loch as an infant on his parents International One Design – played a pivotal role as tactician.

The former national, European and world champion had a stressful final day when he learned his sister had sustained a head injury while racing on another Class 1 boat. Anna Scott – who sailed aboard the 1720 King Quick when Ruairidh won the Scottish Series Trophy in 2003 – had to be airlifted to hospital but was released later after treatment.

Both Blondie III and Jump Juice won all three races which were sailed in perfect conditions on Loch Fyne. With the north easterly breeze never dropping below 12 knots it was a fitting climax to a memorable four days. Blondie won their second race by just seven seconds. During the race their Dublin rivals aboard the Corby 35 Rosie had their time allowance saved but botched a spinnaker hoist and let the blue hulled Blondie back into the race.

Rosie, Roy Dickson's boat, took second while Steve Goacher – the Lake District sailmaker who is a multiple Flying 15 world champion and past Scottish Series Trophy winner – guided Keith Lord's Isle of Man based A-35 to third place. 

JUNE 2007

THE TYRRELLS and JOHN TWOMEY

June’s Cork Dry Gin Sailor of the Month award is shared between John Twomey and his team from Kinsale, and the Tyrrell family of Arklow. The Tyrrells work the sea, and sail it for sport. In four days in June, their J/109 Aquelina won Class 1 at the annual Lambay Race (it was also celebrating 150 years of Howth Regatta) and then went on to win overall in the biennial Dun Laoghaire to Dingle race of 280 challenging nautical miles.   

Days later, the fleet gathered for the annual ICRA Championship at Crosshaven, closely followed by the four day Sovereign’s Cup series at Kinsale. In both events, John Twomey of Kinsale was absolutely flying with his specially modified 23-footer Shillelagh. The boat has been modified to his own designs to accommodate Twomey’s disablement, the result of a cycle-racing accident in his teens. But the sailing world and international sport has long since stopped making any allowances for this – Twomey is an ace sailor by any standard. He won his class in the Nationals at Crosshaven and then within a week – at the end of a very tough race on the last day of June – he clinched the overall title in the Sovereign’s Cup.

JULY 2007

TED KEELON and VINCENT GAFFNEY

On the East Coast, Cruisers 3 are the best show in town. They’re boats around the 26ft to 32ft size with such a natural sense of community that since 1994 they’ve organised their own championships as a major event, in addition to providing some of the best fleet turnouts at the top regattas and race weeks.

In July, immaculately prepared classic boats from Cruisers 3 racked up the trophies. Vincent Gaffney from Howth took his Albin Express Alliance across to the West of Ireland Championship at Clifden, and won the overall prize – his runner-up slot on Tralee Bay in 2006 was no flash in the pan. Meanwhile, Ted Keelon of Dun Laoghaire was readying his Impala 28 Whistlin’ Dixie for the four-day Volvo Dun Laoghaire Regatta, in which Cruisers 3 provided a turnout of 38 boats, and some of the best class racing in a massive turnout of 522 very various craft. The Keelon team were right on form, winning their class and the overall trophy.

The Cruisers 3 achievement made everyone think again about always having new boats. Alliance dates from a late 1970s Quarter Ton design by Peter Norlin which was put into production by Albin Yachts in Sweden in 1981 – they still make them – while the Impala 28 was designed by Welshman David Thomas in 1982.

So the Cruisers 3 East Coast Championship at Dun Laoghaire MYC on the last weekend of July was of hyper-interest, as time constraints meant Vincent Gaffney had elected not to do the Dun Laoghaire Regatta. Right in the groove, the Alliance crew won the Cruisers 3 championship. But despite post-regatta exhaustion, Whistlin’ Dixie was runner-up. They share July’s award.

AUGUST 2007

GER O’ROURKE

Ger O’Rourke’s two-year record in Chieftain eclipsed all other Irish performances offshore when the Limerick sailor – the current Cork Dry Gin Irish Sailor of the Year – lifted the Fastnet trophy in Plymouth in mid August.

O’Rourke’s Cookson 50 was confirmed as the overall winner of the Rolex Fastnet Race, bringing yet another prize to a campaign that has included wins in Cowes, Hobart, Antigua and Hamburg, as well as around Britain and Ireland.

O’Rourke, a property developer from Limerick, has been sailing for the past 20 years, cruising on a succession of 30–40 footers along the south coast before he got the racing bug, sailing out of the Western Yacht Club in Kilrush as crew on some race boats. He then started racing dinghies and worked his way up to bigger grand-prix yachts.

Chieftain was built in 2005 at Cookson’s in New Zealand. It was the fifth Cookson 50-foot design built at the yard, but with some key modifications including adding a single forward canard and removing the trim tab. The boat has had some good success, including this summer’s HSH Nordbank Blue Race (transAtlantic race from Newport–Hamburg), where the boat was second across the line, second in class, and first in IRM class. In fact, it led the 3,600-mile race for most of the way, but flukier going in the final days saw the eventual winner come in from the northwest.

O’Rourke typically waits to finish a race before he enters the next one; “First of all, I want to make sure I have a rig up”. Sailing in the Nordbank transAtlantic race, Chieftain didn’t finish until six weeks before the Rolex Fastnet start and by that time the entry list had reached its limit of 300. Chieftain was 46th on the waiting list.

O’Rourke took the boat to the Hamble River near Southampton and got her ready. Other entries fell by the wayside, but with three days to go, Chieftain still hadn’t made the cut. The ‘final list’ of official starters was published and she wasn’t on it. But with the weekend looming, there was another faller, and Chieftain was in.

In addition to his regular crew that had been on stand-by, O’Rourke literally picked up a couple of experienced crew from a Hamble boat yard, including bowman Cam Marshall, part-New Zealand, part-Irish, who turned out to be “a star”.

In addition to O’Rourke and Marshall, the crew were Jochem Visser (Netherlands), Edwin O’Connor (Foynes), Deirdre O’Rourke (Ger’s 18-year-old daughter), Kevin Johnson (Dublin), Donie Herarty (Cork), Tom Whelan (Kilrush), Tom Whitburn and Rob Gullen from England, and two New Zealanders – Matthew Stuart and Ryan Huston.

Chieftain only experienced about 25 knots the first night, not the 40 knots that many boats saw. Chieftain had a double-reefed main and O’Rourke felt prepared for the weather conditions; they had gone through all the procedures and had a fairly experienced offshore crew that had done a lot of miles. Still, It had crossed O’Rourke’s mind; “What am I doing here? Do I need this? But we persevered and it paid off. I was seasick myself as was another crewmember, it was wet, yeah, it was grim. Two of us had dry suits and weren’t doing too badly.”

Recapping their strategy, O’Rourke said, “our navigator, Jochem Visser downloaded some grib (weather) files but the fact that the weather was changing 180° when we got to the Rock kind of suited our size boat as opposed to the larger-sized boats.

Sailors of the Year for 2006...

JANUARY 2006

GER O’ROURKE

The New Year was ushered in on the crest of a wave when Ger O’Rourke won his class in the annual Sydney-Hobart Race with his innovative Cookson 50 Chieftain. This made the Limerick owner-skipper the Cork Dry Gin Sailor of the Month for January. But the O’Rourke Chieftain show was only just getting on the road. The summer programme in Europe was to see them take the Western Yacht Club name to the fore in many events, with Chieftain’s superb offshore racing ability being brilliantly demonstrated by overall wins in August’s Round Britain and Ireland races, and September’s Cowes to Cascais sprint.

FEBRUARY 2006

JUSTIN SLATTERY

First man past Cape Horn. That was the accolade for Justin Slattery of Cork when ABN Amro One led the Volvo Ocean Race round the legendary headland where South America thrusts into the Southern Ocean. Slattery is in charge of the sharp end on Amro, and thus he was personally the first past the post on most of the round the world race’s stages. But Cape Horn is special, and Justin Slattery was clear winner of the Cork Dry Gin award for February.

MARCH 2006

EAMONN CONNEELY

The impressive boats of the TransPac 52 class gathered at Miami in the Spring for the class’s first Global Championship. The lineup of international sailing talent was formidable, which made it all the more remarkable that Eamon Conneely of Galway established an early and significant points lead racing Patches. However, this lead was lost when damage forced the boat’s retirement from the high-scoring offshore race. But the indomitable Galwegian inspired his crew to one final effort, and the concluding races saw Patches confirmed as title-holder, and Eamon Conneely became Cork Dry Gin Sailor of the Month for March.

APRIL 2006

MARY O’LOUGHLIN and ANDREW FOWLER

In April, attention turned to Irish waters, and the ISA National Match Racing championship in Kinsale. In this specialised branch of sailing, some sailors learned quicker than others, and some learned very quickly indeed. After a bruising final, Andrew Fowler of Dún Laoghaire showed that he and his crew had what it takes, and he took the title, while Mary O’Loughlin of Howth was top woman helm. They share the Sailor of the Month title for April.

MAY 2006

ANTHONY O’LEARY

By the end of May, Anthony O’Leary of Cork could look back on twelve months of unmatched achievement. His superbly-sailed Corby 35 Antix had won her class in the British IRC Championship, and been overall winner of the championships in Ireland and Scotland. The Scottish win was achieved before the end of May, a brilliant success to start the new season, and Anthony O’Leary launched into it as Cork Dry Gin Sailor of the Month for May.

JUNE 2006

TIM COSTELLO

The 2006 British IRC Championship in the Solent in June attracted a top fleet of more than 70 boats, with ferociously tough racing. As the series progressed, it became clear that the Mark Mills-designed 40 footer Tiamat from Dún Laoghaire was finding even better form than in 2005, and she took the overall title. It was a successful team effort. And with most of the crew from Dublin Bay, it was appropriate that the trophy should go to owner Tim Costello, Commodore of Dublin Bay Sailing Club and Cork Dry Gin ‘Sailor of the Month’ for June.

JULY 2006

ERIC LISSON and COLM BARRINGTON

July 2006 was possibly the busiest month ever seen in Irish sailing, and it produced two outstanding Sailors of the Month. Eric Lisson of Cork showed that patience and dedication are important components in the makeup of any successful offshore racing owner-skipper by winning the BMW Round Ireland race for the second time with his veteran 38-footer Cavatina. And Colm Barrington of Dún Laoghaire took his remarkable new 50-footer Magic Glove to the supreme award in the 400-strong fleet at Cork Week.

AUGUST 2006

STEVE MULKERRINS and JOHN GORE-GRIMES

The summer of 2006 saw the completion of two remarkable voyages: Steve Mulkerrins of Connemara sailed home across the Atlantic in the majestic 47ft Galway hooker Naomh Bairbre, which he’d built in Chicago in a project which was in itself remarkable by any standards; and John Gore-Grimes of Howth voyaged again to the very far north with his 44ft Arctic Fern, and got to within a thousand kilometres of the North Pole in a 5,055-mile cruise which took in some of the remotest and most challenging coasts of Svalbard and East Greenland.

SEPTEMBER 2006

CIARA PEELO and PETER KILLEN

Qingdao in China was the venue for the Pre-Olympic Regatta, a testing of the water for the 2008 Olympiad, and the Irish contingent faced a formidable challenge. Ciara Peelo was best, recording a race win at the Laser Radials and remaining in contention in a series which provided an extraordinary range of sailing conditions. In top level sailing of a very different kind, Peter Killen returned to Ireland with his 54ft ketch Pure Magic after a 24,000 mile voyage to Antarctica which had included celebrating Christmas and the New Year in remote icebound anchorages, highlights of one of the most remarkable Irish voyages of modern times.

OCTOBER 2006

PETER O’LEARY and DON O’DONOGHUE

The new-look Irish Sailing Association All-Ireland Championship in Dún Laoghaire in October provided an impressive display of the great sailing talent of the Royal Cork Yacht Club. In the end, it came down to which Corkman was going to be the title-holder. It was Peter O’Leary of Crosshaven who stepped on to the winner’s podium after a mighty Championship of Champions. Meanwhile, in the Mediterranean, the Autumn regatta of the International Dragon Class at Cannes attracted a high-powered fleet of 106 boats. Don O’Donoghue of Glandore put in a masterful performance to win overall.

NOVEMBER 2006

STEFAN HYDE and RUSSELL TREACY

Ireland’s November success in the 26th annual Student Sailing World Cup on France’s Biscay coast at Lorient was built on sailing squad development from successful team racing in dinghies in Ireland which – several months later – had to be refocused into a crew effort in the Mumm 30s sailed in the final. Dublin’s Trinity College was captained by Russell Treacy for the initial stage – the Intervarsity Team Racing Nationals early in the season – which secured their place as Ireland’s representative in France, where they were to race the keelboats against twelve other nations. Stefan Hyde was appointed skipper for the Worlds, leading a crew which included Russell Treacy. Ireland put in a masterful performance to become World Champions 2006, wonderful news as November evenings closed in.

DECEMBER 2006

DENNIS NOONAN

Since its inception in 1980, the biennial Round Ireland Race from Wicklow has been a significant element in the Irish sailing scene.  For most of the races since 1980, it has been Dennis Noonan who has been running the show. Ably assisted by his daughter Jacky Breathnach, Dennis has gallantly kept the Round Ireland ideal alive and well. Shortly before the 2006 staging of the event, he turned 70 and indicated that after the race, he would be standing aside from the Round Ireland administration. It is the end of an era, the conclusion of a remarkable period of service to national and international sailing, and we salute Dennis Noonan as our Cork Dry Gin Sailor of the Month for December.