Sailing on Saturday with WM Nixon
Afloat.ie has already clocked 2.1 million readers during 2023, so we’re communicating with a large and often international readership, although the core of our regular visitors is still very much in Ireland. And now, with just one day to go…
For sure, it’s very easy to make too much of the power of the Irish global diaspora. After all, these days just about everybody in the creative arts – particularly writing, acting and music – will determinedly claim an Irish…
In a week’s time, Sailing on Saturday will resume normal service with a preview on December 23rd of the up-coming Cruising Yacht Club of Australia Rolex Sydney-Hobart Race on December 26th, both generally and from an Irish angle, for we…
We know that the biennial SSE Renewables 700-mile Round Ireland Race from Wicklow is a significant fixture in the international calendar. We know it well, because since its inception through the dedication of the late Michael Jones and his voluntary…
Let us begin by simply setting out the pillar events of the 2024 season in Ireland, while including the major international happenings which will be of interest to our sailing community. And then we’ll provide a further take on it…
What, you might well wonder, is a blatant billboard doing at the top of the page this Saturday morning, even if it is exactly a month to Christmas, and Christmas has come early for Ireland’s younger international sailors in 2023?…
The Cruising Group can often emerge as the backbone of any sailing club, particularly in the winter. Back in the day when the new Howth Yacht Club premises opened in March 1987, fresh concepts were needed to ensure that the…
Tom Dolan halted his latest Round Ireland speed challenge on October 31st due to worsening weather forecasts off the South and Southwest coast. It was a disappointing decision for him and his team and a great many readers who had…
It’s prize-giving time down beside the Old Granite Pond. Last night (Friday), Commodore Eddie Totterdell presided over Dublin Bay Sailing Club’s annual re-distribution of their enormous cache of trophies in the National Maritime Museum in Dun Laoghaire. And tonight (Saturday),…
A statement from Tom Dolan Racing, issued at 07:54 on the morning of Wednesday, November 1st after his anti-clockwise Round Ireland Campaign from Dublin in his Figaro 3 had been abruptly brought to a halt at Dingle on Tuesday evening…
It has been a remarkable week for Irish sailing, with our clubs last weekend managing to get in the complete programme of Autumn League racing despite being close in on the tail end of Storm Babet. Meanwhile, Eve McMahon confirmed…
As solo star Tom Dolan said when he arrived this week in Greystones to position himself on stand-by for his waiting-game round Ireland record challenge from the Kish Lighthouse, the current increasingly Autumnal weather pattern is much more encouragingly dynamic…
You never really know when you’re experiencing history in the making. It was early in March 1973 when we were invited to Portaferry, along the east side of the Narrows going into Strangford Lough, on a Saturday morning. The idea…
It seems the sailing world has “recovered from recovering from the pandemic lockdowns”, as the world’s year-round programme of major events – particularly high-profile offshore challenges – swings back into top gear. Not that some of these events didn’t somehow…
The life story of Sean Flood, who has died at the age of 91, is in many ways the story of modern Ireland as seen through a sailing and business lens. From a family of traditionally and strongly patriotic outlook,…
The sailing scene in Ireland has lost three significant figures this past week with the deaths of Liam Shanahan of Dun Laoghaire, Mick Hunt of Howth, and Sean Flood of The Baily overlooking Dublin Bay. They were very much distinctive…