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7th July 2023

Big Winds Force Cancellation of First Day of Irish Topper Nationals

Ballyholme Yacht Club’s online Baycam had a very prominent red line on Friday (7 July) with the southerly offshore wind forecast to reach 37 knots in the gusts, putting paid to the first day of the 2023 Topper Nationals.

In a strong southerly, the conditions inside Ballyholme Bay on the north Co Down coast in Northern Ireland looked friendly enough — except for the cat’s paws marking the strong gusts.

There are about 60 sailors in the Topper 5.3 and 20 more in the 4.3 keen to race and they have been asked to meet Saturday morning (8 July) at 11am for an updated briefing. It is expected the first warning gun will be at 12.55pm.

Published in Topper

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William M Nixon has been writing about sailing in Ireland and internationally for many years, with his work appearing in leading sailing publications on both sides of the Atlantic. He has been a regular sailing columnist for four decades with national newspapers in Dublin, and has had several sailing books published in Ireland, the UK, and the US. An active sailor, he has owned a number of boats ranging from a Mirror dinghy to a Contessa 35 cruiser-racer, and has been directly involved in building and campaigning two offshore racers. His cruising experience ranges from Iceland to Spain as well as the Caribbean and the Mediterranean, and he has raced three times in both the Fastnet and Round Ireland Races, in addition to sailing on two round Ireland records. A member for ten years of the Council of the Irish Yachting Association (now the Irish Sailing Association), he has been writing for, and at times editing, Ireland's national sailing magazine since its earliest version more than forty years ago