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Displaying items by tag: Jackknife

The 50th entry into June's SSE Renewables Round Ireland Yacht Race is the potent Welsh J/125 Jackknife, the weekend winner of ISORA's cross channel race from Dun Laoghaire to Holyhead. 

The Andrew Hall skippered yacht won the line honours, overall and Class Zero prizes in the 60-mile race that drew a strong entry of 20 boats. 

As Afloat's WM Nixon reported recently, the 50 boat fleet reflects a strong international interest in the biennial Irish ocean classic. This latest Pwllheli Sailing Club entry is one of several hotly tipped visiting race teams.

ISORA Race six, the second cross-channel of the season, was considered a critical warmup ahead of June 18th's 700-mile race from Wicklow. The light air race included Round Ireland Race local favourites such as Paul O'Higgins Rockabill VI of the Royal Irish Yacht Club and Chris Power Smith's Aurelia – this month's Inishtearaght Race line honours winner – from the Royal St. George Yacht Club.

After six races sailed, Saturday's result puts Jackknife at the top of the Musto ISORA scoreboard. Full ISORA results here

Jackknife is no stranger to Irish waters is a regular ISORA contender and also a top-ranked Dun Laoghaire Dingle Race competitor.

The next ISORA race is on June 11th, just a week before the Round Ireland Race from Wicklow.

Published in ISORA

A Welsh sailor with a longtime connection to offshore racing in the Irish Sea has been recognised by his home club with a lifetime contribution award.

Richard Tudor was presented with the accolade recently at a special function hosted by Pwllheli Sailing Club, which has posted a glowing tribute on its website.

A fixture on the ISORA calendar, most recently in the J125, Jackknife — and a former champion in the J109, Sgrech, too — Richard has been a part of Pwllheli’s club since its first clubhouse, after a childhood growing his love of the water under the tutelage of Gwyndaf Hughes.

Sailing also runs in the family, with his father Huw serving as Pwllheli’s commodore for a time and his brothers Andrew and Stephen also keen helmsmen.

Richard sailed his first ISORA in 1976, and his first Fastnet Race in 1977 — the beginnings of a decades-long connection with Ireland’s offshore sailing scene that continues to this day. Pwllheli Sailing Club has much more HERE.

Published in ISORA

Coastal Notes Coastal Notes covers a broad spectrum of stories, events and developments in which some can be quirky and local in nature, while other stories are of national importance and are on-going, but whatever they are about, they need to be told.

Stories can be diverse and they can be influential, albeit some are more subtle than others in nature, while other events can be immediately felt. No more so felt, is firstly to those living along the coastal rim and rural isolated communities. Here the impact poses is increased to those directly linked with the sea, where daily lives are made from earning an income ashore and within coastal waters.

The topics in Coastal Notes can also be about the rare finding of sea-life creatures, a historic shipwreck lost to the passage of time and which has yet many a secret to tell. A trawler's net caught hauling more than fish but cannon balls dating to the Napoleonic era.

Also focusing the attention of Coastal Notes, are the maritime museums which are of national importance to maintaining access and knowledge of historical exhibits for future generations.

Equally to keep an eye on the present day, with activities of existing and planned projects in the pipeline from the wind and wave renewables sector and those of the energy exploration industry.

In addition Coastal Notes has many more angles to cover, be it the weekend boat leisure user taking a sedate cruise off a long straight beach on the coast beach and making a friend with a feathered companion along the way.

In complete contrast is to those who harvest the sea, using small boats based in harbours where infrastructure and safety poses an issue, before they set off to ply their trade at the foot of our highest sea cliffs along the rugged wild western seaboard.

It's all there, as Coastal Notes tells the stories that are arguably as varied to the environment from which they came from and indeed which shape people's interaction with the surrounding environment that is the natural world and our relationship with the sea.