Ireland's sailing, boating & maritime magazine

We've been waiting a year to use this header photo which – owing to a certain confusion in the filing of thousands of photographic negs and images – has had to be scanned from the November 1970 issue of Irish Yachting & Motorboating, the direct predecessor of Afloat Magazine and Afloat.ie.

But while there's still a certain contemporary feel to the energising group photo of half a century and more ago, the cover of that evidently ancient periodical does indeed speak of a distant past, of a summer's evening at Skerries when the Herons were still in the ascendant as the favoured junior class, and life moved at a more sensible pace in the quaint delusion that we were moving into an even more relaxed era to be known as The Leisure Age.

In a sense we have. Except that it turns out that 21st Century Leisure is extremely hard work, lived at such a ferocious pace that we very quickly forget the details of what we've just done as we shape ourselves for the next exhausting bit of relaxing sport. And thus something like a straightforward record and overview of what actually happened rapidly fades from the collective memory on the mistaken assumption that someone must be keeping an enduring tab on it all, a clear case of everyone's business being no one's business.

The way we were, more than half a century ago on a summer's evening in Skerries

Thus you'd be surprised by how often organisers have to refer to the inscriptions on a silver trophy to verify the names of who previously won it, and when. In such circumstances, having one core event which provides a simple recorded backbone of the progress of our sport has obvious appeal, even if sailing is a non-mechanical vehicle sport involving boats of many different types, and the inherent contradictions of expecting sailors to give of their best in boats they don't usually sail would be utterly blatant, were it not for the fact that in a surprising number of years, the eventual winner is not the representative of the class in which the Championship of the Champions is being sailed.

The Champion of our Sailing Champions, sailing's All-Ireland? Our sailing community first ran with the idea 74 years ago. And while other countries have since come up with their own versions with varying levels of success which have sometimes reduced annually until fading away, we've simply kept the Helmsman's Championship – as it was called at its inauguration in 1947 – on the road in one form or another. And now with, a Junior Championship traditionally held a week in advance, it's as much an established a part of our lives as……well, as Christmas.

Clayton Love Jnr of Cork, Helmsman's Champion in 1955 and 1960. He was instrumental in transforming the Irish Dinghy Racing Association into the Irish Yachting Association, and in 1966-67 he brought about the unification of the Royal Munster YC and the Royal Cork YC in time for the Royal Cork's Quarter Millennium Celebrations in 1969-1970.

But while Christmas has gone through many mutations to reach its current over-the-top version, the All-Ireland Helmsman's Championship - in both its Senior and Junior versions – is a very focused affair of intense interest among those who have qualified to take part and those who organise it, yet it has never become the spectator-attracting spectacle some might expect.

Admittedly, were the resources available to cover it with the sort of technological wizardry that the likes of Stan Honey and others have developed for the international mega-events, there'd be greater interest at the time. But that wouldn't result in spectators being out on the water as September turns into October and suddenly there's a real nip in the air, for all you'd need is access to a functioning screen and somewhere warm to sit.

Ted Crosbie of Cork was Helmsmans Champion in 1950. Photo: Robert Bateman   

Either way, it is very important to the Irish sailing community to know that each year, the All-Ireland Sailing Championship takes place. So much so that coming into last year, in pre-pandemic times, it had been assumed for years by everyone - in a bit of remarkable subconscious groupthink- that it would be the concluding event of the Tricentenary Celebrations of the Royal Cork at Crosshaven, just as fifty years earlier it had concluded the Quarter Millennial celebrations.

Boats of all the leading classes have been used, and in 1982 Dave Cummins of Sutton, crewed by Gordon Maguire and Mossie Shanahan, was winner in the Shannon One Designs racing at Dromineer. Photo: W M Nixon

This weekend, one pandemic-induced year's hiatus further down the line, we pick up the pieces in order to keep the golden thread intact while being acutely aware that after an exceptionally clement September, the first weekend of October is indicating wind patterns which may be volatile and then some. We can only hope, and meanwhile Afloat.ie has been looking at the runners and riders here

To date, there has only been one female winner, and this was Laura Dillon of Howth in 1996.  

But in this year of all years, it behoves us to remember those who have gone before, right back to 1947 when Douglas Heard, founding president of the shape-shifting Irish Dinghy Racing Association in 1946, presented the nascent association with a large silver salver for a Champion of Champions in 1947, and to his embarrassment was the first winner, racing in the new IDRA 14s.

Since then, other names have come to the fore at various stages of their successful sailing careers, other boat types have been used, and many different locations have hosted an event which arguably works because the Irish sailing community is notably cohesive, and it - and the island around which it sails - appear to be of precisely the size which best accommodates a somewhat eccentric contest of this nature.

The winner in 2014 at Howth was Cork's Anthony O'Leary racing a J/80 and crewed by Dylan Gannon and Dan O'Grady. Photo: Johnny Wormald

In 2015 Anthony O'Leary retained the title, racing J/80s again, but this time in Dublin Bay at the National YC. Photo: Afloat.ie/David O'Brien

Inevitably you remember some wins better than others, and I thought 2014's last-ditch victory by Anthony O'Leary racing J/80s at Howth was something very special, for that was the year he carried the Commodore's Cup team to victory largely on his own shoulders, and it was remarkable that at season's end he still found something in reserve to win out in a contest of such a very different type.

Others will have their own favourite wins to contemplate in this long litany of outstanding sailors. It's a record of sailing achievement which reverberates down the ages. And when the winner holds the salver aloft, for a few seconds, the world really does stand still as we contemplate the wonder of Irish sailing.

All Ireland Sailing Winners 1947-2019

Year	Senior Winner	Junior Winner	Junior First Girl
2019 2018	Michael O’Connor Peter Kennedy	Chris Bateman Atlee Kohl	Alana Coakley
2017	Fionn Lyden	Micheal O’Suilleabhain	Leah Rickard
2016	Alex Barry	Johnny Durcan	Kate Lyttle
2015	Anthony O'Leary	Peter McCann	Clare Gorman
2014	Anthony O'Leary	Harry Durkan	Gemma McDowell
2013	Ben Duncan	Séafra Guilfoyle	Megan Parker
2012	Peter O'Leary	Fionn Lyden	Aisling Keller
2011	George Kenefick
2010	Nicholas O'Leary	Philip Doran	Sophie Murphy
2009	Nicholas O'Leary	Matthew O'Dowd	Diana Kissane
2008	Nicholas O'Leary	Philip Doran	Tiffany Brien
2007	Stefan Hyde	Chris Penney	Annalise Murphy
2006	Peter O'Leary	George Kenefick	Rachel Guy
2005	David Crosbie	Fionn Jenkinson	Lisa Tate
2004	Tom Fitzpatrick	Katie Tingle
2003	Neil Hegarty	Erica Tate & Lorraine Stallard
2002	Conor Walsh	Robert Collins & Kenny Keogh
2001	Feargal Kinsella	Peter Bayly & Niall Cowman
2000	Gerald Owens	Peter O'Leary
1999	Mark Mansfield	Nicholas O'Leary
1998	Tom Fitzpatrick	Gerald Owens
1997	Tom Fitzpatrick	Neil Spain
1996	Laura Dillon	Gerald Owens
1995	Ruan O'Tiarnaigh	Laura Dillon
1994	Tom Fitzpatrick	Evan Dolan
1993	Sean Craig	Evan Dolan
1992	John Ross Murphy	Tom Fitzpatrick
1991	Mark Lyttle	Tom Fitzpatrick
1990	Mark Mansfield	Robert Eason
1989	Marshall King	Conal Casey
1988	John Murtagh	J McWilliam
1987	Mark Lyttle	Dan O'Grady
1986	Mark Lyttle	T McWilliam
1985	Paul Rowan	Nicky Timon
1984	Paul Rowan	Niall Alexander
1983	Brian Craig	Niall Alexander
1982	David Cummins	Michael Stavely
1981	David Cummins	Mark Lyttle
1980	T W Whisker	Justin Maguire
1979	Chris Arrowsmith	Justin Maguire
1978	Wiclif McCready	John Gilmore
1977	Wiclif McCready	Mark O'Hare
1976	Adrian Bell	Bryan Maguire
1975	David Gay	Joseph English
1974	Peter Duffy	Alan McFarlane
1973	Owen Delany	David McFarlane
1972	Harold Cudmore	Robert Bleakney
1971	Adrian Bell
1970	Robert Dix
1969	Maurice R Butler
1968	Vincent Delany
1967	T C M Morris
1966	John F Russell
1965	James Nixon
1964	J K O'Reilly
1963	Owen Delany
1962	G M Sargent
1961	M C Walsh
1960	J Clayton Love Jnr
1959	J O McCleary
1958	J K O'Reilly
1957	J Somers Payne
1956	J Somers Payne
1955	J Clayton Love Jnr
1954	Neville D Maguire
1953	Johnny Hooper
1952	Neville D Maguire
1951	Richard Uren
1950	Ted Crosbie
1949	Richard Uren
1948	John Wearing
1947	R Douglas Heard

When time stands still – 2018 winner Peter Kennedy of Strangford Lough YC and his crewman Stephen Kane hold their trophies aloft after winning in SB20s at Lough Ree YC. Photo: ISA