Though it may have been officially known as the Royal St George Yacht Club for at least 175 years, unofficially it has been known for longer than anyone can remember simply as “The George” writes W M Nixon. And if you were headed for its annual one day sailfest at the peak of the season, you were off to “The George Regatta”.
Some things have changed, and one relatively new feature of the modern Dun Laoghaire sailing scene is the biennial four day Volvo Dun Laoghaire Regatta. For this mega-event, everyone pools resources and membership of the waterfront clubs becomes virtually interchangeable, developing it into Irelands biggest sailing event.
That’s fine - so long as it stays biennial. It had become clear that while the burden of each club running its own annual regatta was giving poorer returns for the effort involved, every other year a combined effort gave good results.
But that in turn sharpened the appetite in alternate years for each club to revert to its own almost-traditional stand-alone regatta. Already this year we’ve had the National YC on Saturday 18th June. And then there was the Teng Tools Royal Irish Yacht Club Regatta this past weekend.
This coming Saturday, on July 2nd 2nd, it’s the Royal St George Yacht Club’s turn, and they’ve opted to pare right back in the title of their event, an historic regatta which in 1904 witnessed radio pioneer and inventor Marconi’s first experiments in transmitting race results from out in Dublin Bay.
An innovator like Marconi would probably approve of abbreviating the title. The only thing he might find unlikely is that German cars are now ahead of the cars of his native Italy. Be that as it may, this Saturday sees the Frank Keane BMW George Regatta in Dublin Bay with at least 27 classes racing, there are Try Sailing facilities as well, and there’s a wide range of entertainment and hospitality planned throughout the famous old club house and forecourt. Simple and modern, yet traditional and stylish at the same time.