Kinsale Yacht Club hosts the Irish Dragon South Coast Championships from 10 - 12 September 2010.

A very competitive fleet of 18 Dragons will assemble in Kinsale this weekend for the final Championship of the Irish calendar with both the South Coast title and
valuable ranking points for both the World and European Championship qualification on offer.

Though this is a helmsman's championship the importance of an established and cohesive crew on a Dragon is crucial when determining favorites. Neil Hegarty, Peter Bowring and David Willams (Phantom) have excelled on the waters under the Old Head in recent years taking two consecutive National Championships in 2007 and 2009. However, they have always been pushed hard by Martin Byrne (Jaguar) who won the last edition of the South Coast Championships held in Kinsale in 2008 with his son Conor and constant collaborator Pedro De Andrade. Along with several other stellar teams from both the Royal St George and the Royal Irish, including current National Champion Don O'Donoghue (Seabird), is perennial favorite Simon Brien (Kin) from the Royal North of Ireland.

Kinsale Yacht Club has been selected to host the Dragon Gold Cup 2012 and the Kinsale Dragon fleet will be hoping to end the Dun Laoghaire domination of
recent years.

Olaf Sorensen, Martin Payne and Shawn Kingston (Christianna) will lead the challenge with Cameron Good, Henry Kingston and Simon Furney (Little Fella) another long-established team pushing hard for a breakthrough this year. Class Captain Anthony O'Neill with Donal Small and his son Eoghan (Tenacious) have sailed consistently well this season however; Tim Cronin, Caroline Matthews and Harry Lewis (Jee) have found a rich vein of form following a prolonged lay-off and could prove the surprise package.

The courses will be Windward-Leeward and six races will be sailed, with two races each day back to back. Friday promises very interesting conditions with fresh to strong southwesterly winds though the breeze set to moderate throughout the weekend. Principal Race Officer Alan Crosbie and his team will commence proceedings on Friday morning with another scintillating Dragon regatta in prospect.

A group of nine teenagers from the Kinsale area is embarking on a Round Ireland Challenge in aid of the world's largest charity hospital ship.
The keen sailors, most of whom have just finished their exams, will be sailing a 39ft yacht round the coast of Ireland over six days in August, to raise money for the international charity, Mercy Ships. The charity provides free medical and humanitarian aid to the poorest countries in Africa via its 500ft hospital ship, the Africa Mercy. It is the first time any of the youngsters have undertaken such a challenge and their training starts this week at the Kinsale Yacht Club, where they will familiarise themselves with the yacht Sonas kindly supplied to them for the challenge by its owner David Ross

Ben Fusco, 19, from Kinsale, said, "We are all keen sailors and wanted to combine our love of sailing with doing something for charity. There are lots of great maritime related charities out there but when we heard about the work of Mercy Ships, we were taken by the idea that a ship provides free medical care to some of the poorest people in the world.

"Hearing that thousands of people every year are given free medical care by volunteers on the ship was inspiring and we knew we had to do something special to raise money for them – hence our Round Ireland Challenge.

More on the forum thread started by Ben Fusco HERE.