#j24 – With four race wins from six race sailed the furrthest travelled J24 won the class southern championships at Royal Cork Yacht Club (RCYC) today. Lough Erne's JP McCaldin from County Fermanagh in Northern Ireland beat the Royal St.George's Hard on Port skippered by Flor O'Driscoll. Third was Howth Yacht Club's Kilcullen (Gordon Stirling). Full results in the seven boat fleet are downloadable below. 

Saturday morning South of Roche's Point saw a breeze of 18 to 20 knots for the first race of the J24 Southern Championship. Race Officer Ciaran McSweeney kept everybody on their toes, sounding the first gun at 10.30 as posted, catching a few competitors off guard. JP McCaldin and his crew on Jamais Encore dominated the first race with local boat YaGottaWanna showing good boat speed to claim a second place. Current Irish Champion FlorO'Driscoll claimed third place with Patrick Crosbie helming his youth team over the line ahead of the Howth Yacht Club under 25 crew.

The battle of the start line was more intense in race 2, with Howth Yacht Club and Jamais Encore stealing a march on the fleet on the first upwind leg of the windward / leeward course. The first run saw Flor O'Driscoll joining the early leaders, engaging in a duel up the next beat with HYC. The finishing places confirmed the credentials of gold fleet, with Jamais Encore, HYC and Hard on Port taking the podium.

The breeze was building by the start of race 3, and the local youth team changed from the overlapping genoa to a jib, a decision which proved to be inspired, as we watched them make their way up the racecourse, to finish close on the heels of the gold fleet boats. All the competitors followed suit with the foresail change for the last race of the day, in challenging gusty conditions. An unfortunate collission in race 4 between HYC and YaGottaWanna resulted in HYC retiring, and YaGottaWanna limping home with a hole in her aft quarter. Conor Haughton's team from the National Maritime College kept the local spirits high, with a 4th place finish.

The breeze held for the second day of racing with the race officer deciding to move the fleet to Cuskinny in the hopes of a flatter sea. All competitors opted for a jib for the first race with heavy gusts funneling up towards east ferry. Jamais Encore maintained her winning ways, bagging a third place to add to her 4 bullets in the 6 race series, and opting to withdraw from the last race to expedite hauling out, ready for the long road home to Lough Erne.

Tide became more of a prominent force in the lulls for race 6 with some boats opting to be brave and changing back to a genoa. HYC pulled out a sizeable lead on the first downwind leg only to see the lion's share of it disappear on the second beat. Another entanglement between HYC and YaGottaWanna at the leeward mark saw positions change again. Jelignite claimed their first bullet in a regional championship, a fantastic result for Finbar Ryan, and the young girls on his crew.

The crews sailed back to Crosshaven, passing the magnificent display of the Traditional Sail Fleet bathed in the sunlight of our harbour. After hauling out, all competitors enjoyed the hospitality of the club, and showed their appreciation of Kieran O'Connell for his hard work in providing a brilliantly run championship. We hope it will be an annual event here in RCYC. JP.McCaldin expressed his enjoyment of the event and the beauty of the harbour, while accepting his First Prize in gold fleet and overall J24 Southern Champion, wondering why it had taken him so long to race in RCYC. Hard on Port claimed second overall, with HYC completing the honours in the gold fleet. Local boat YaGottaWanna were delighted with their first place in silver fleet, and were highly impressed by the performance of the local youth team in a very tweaky unfamiliar boat.

#j109 – It's all smiles after the first day of the UK J/109 National Championship, with Ian Nagle's team from the Royal Cork Yacht Club scoring two bullets on J/109 Jelly Baby. "We had a great start in the first race, which put us in a good shape but we had a shocking start in the second and had to fight back from a very poor position, Nagle said.

The Cork Harbour boat, returns to Irish waters for the ICRA Nationals in Kinsale later this month, and has already tasted UK success this season lifting the vice–Admiral's Cup in Cowes in May.

The core of the Jelly Baby team has been together since they started racing the J/109 in 2008 and that experience means that they have built up a lot of knowledge about how to sail fast.  'I have to admit our boat speed was very good today. This has been a very encouraging start and we hope to build on that tomorrow', Nagle said.

#national18 –  There's great excitement around Cork Harbour this week with the delivery of the first four of the completely new Phil Morrison-designed National 18s to join the established fleet at Monkstown Bay SC.

In the near future, other boats will be arriving to make their debut as Crosshaven with the Royal Cork YC, as well as further augmenting the Monkstown group. By the time the class's big British and Irish Championship is staged at Royal Cork from July 26th to 31st, the necessary critical mass of the new boats should have been achieved to provide top quality racing. But there will of course also be special provisions made to ensure that boats of older types (the restricted class has been in existence since 1938) are continuing to get worthwhile sport.

The development of this newest and very exciting National 18 has been largely powered by the Cork Harbour National 18ft Class Association, and National 18 sailors in Britain have been particularly impressed by the way that the Royal Cork YC invested funds to help this community effort towards a brighter future from resources within the class association.

This weekend will see the four new boats getting their rigs tuned with some trial sailing planned, but we'll be very surprised indeed if there isn't a test race or two down Monkstown way on Saturday and Sunday.

These boats will take a bit of getting used to, but there's no doubting the excitement in the air...

Big smiles greet Colin Chapman's new Ultra Design National 18 one of the first eight National 18's new design to arrive at the Royal Cork Yacht Club for the 2015 season.

L. to R. Royal Cork Admiral Pat Lyons, Dom Long, President National 18 Class, Rear Admiral Dinghies, Celine McGrath and owner Colin Chapman. Picture Robert Bateman.

#sb20 – After an exhilarating day of SB20 sportsboat racing sailed on Cork harbour's Eastern Bank at Royal Cork Yacht Club, only one point separated Darren Martin's Sharkbait and Aidan O'Connell's Ruby Blue going into today's final rounds writes Claire Bateman. Yesterday had seen some scary episodes including Justin Burke's deck lifting from the hull of his boat 'Alert Packaging'.

A relaxed Sharbait crew returning to shore without having had to sail the final race. Photo: Bob Bateman

Todays forecast was for very light wind and this indeed turned out to be the case. However, the 11-boat fleet headed outside the harbour to try to get the best of any wind going and indeed the first race of the day was started but abandoned just before the weather mark as the wind had died completely. However, a new breeze of some 8 to 10 knots arrived to save the day and resulted in a win for Sharkbait and thus negated the need for them to sail the final race.

Results downloadable below.

#2K – Eight teams from Italy, The Netherlands, Germany, Great Britain and Ireland gathered at the Reale Club Tevere Remo, Rome for the first 2K tour event of 2015. Two days of intense round robin racing saw a three way tie break at the top between Cork, YYCS and Spinnaker.

The final day on Sunday started with rain and no wind but PRO Constanzo Villa managed to get in 4 of the critical race to complete the round robin. The final saw last year's runner up Royal Cork face YCCS. It was the Italians who emerged as winners in a sun drenched final.

Final Results
1st Yacht Club Costa Smeralda
2nd Royal Cork
3rd Spinnaker
4th Dutch Match and Team Racing Association
5th Rome Racing Team
6th Royal Thames
7th Serpentine racing
8th Bavaria Yacht Club

#1720 – No sooner had Baltimore Sailing Club announced its 1720 National Championships last week than Royal Cork Yacht Club unveils its Union Chandlery sponsored 1720 European Championships to be held in the first week of September.

The nine race regatta will run from September 3rd to 5th and the proposed schedule of races is: Thursday 3rd of September up to four races; four more on Friday, concluding with one final race on Saturday.

More details in the NOR downloadable below.

#national18 – Since being introduced to the public at the RYA Suzuki Dinghy Show in March of this year, the first of the new Phil Morrison designed National 18s has been undergoing sailing trials and completing the required EU stability tests. From the moment she hit the water for her inaugural sail at Brightlingsea it was clear that the boat was something special, say her promoters.

Afloat.ie covered recent developments in the class here when WM Nixon concluded the National 18s were taking dinghy racing onto a new plane.

British Olympian Rob White, whose company White Formula builds the boats, was among the first to helm her and couldn't keep the grin off his face. "She's seriously slippery," said Rob immediately after sailing "she feels really responsive and accelerates instantly in even the lightest puffs."

As well as impressing with her sailing performance the new National 18 also passed her EU RCD stability tests with flying colours. Named Hurricane after the very first ever National 18 launched in 1938, she is now on the South coast and has so far been seen in Lymington, Keyhaven and Poole Harbour. First impressions have been very favourable, and she has turned heads both in the dinghy park and on the water.

Production is in full swing on the dozen boats already on order. The next batch of four will go to Cork in June to start the Irish fleet with further boats following shortly thereafter.

A programme of test sails is currently being set up and further details of how members of the press and those interested in sailing the boat, including the more than 40 people who signed up at the Dinghy Show, can get involved will be published shortly.

Looking ahead, there will a National 18 English Championship at Bosham during the weekend of 4th and 5th July 2015. This will be followed by the British and Irish Championship, hosted by the Royal Cork Yacht Club from to 26th to 31st July, where 12 of the new boats will be competing alongside some 30 GRP Proctor 18s, and a fleet of wooden classics.

Current orders for new boats will keep builders White Formula busy through until late summer.

#royalcork - It's only May and already Royal Cork Yacht Club claimed a second UK keelboat title yesterday when Ian Nagle and his J109 crew on Jelly Baby won the Vice Admirals Cup in Cowes. The Crosshaven campaign finished on 12 points with their nearest rival on 27, with five wins out of nine races. Hammering the UK fleet in their own back yard is no easy feat and it is a second such victory for  Munster sailors already this season, the first being Anthony O'Leary's Easter victory at the same venue.

Nagle's Jelly Baby boat will remain in the UK till June for the J Cup before returning to compete in Sovereign Cup in Kinsale.

The Vice Admirals Cup is now firmly established as one the Solent's premier keelboat events, a mix of one-design and IRC racing. In recent years it is has been chosen by the RYA as one of the selection events for the British teams in the Commodores' Cup.

In Cowes, Jelly Baby put the final stamp on their already impressive lead by adding a third followed by a win to secure first place overall. Whilst the victor was a foregone conclusion the same could not be said of the remaining podium positions with just four points separating Robert Stiles' "Diamond Jem", Paul Griffiths' "Jagerbomb", the RNSA's "Jolly Jack Tar", Tony Dickin's "Jubilee" and David Rolfe's "Shadowfax" overnight. The tension was palpable as the boats came to the line and it was nip and tuck from start to finish of race eight. "Shadowfax" took her first race victory of the series and was followed across the line by "Jagerbomb", "Jelly Baby", "Jubilee", "Diamond Jem" and then "Jolly Jack Tar". A quick recalculation of the points revealed that "Jagerbomb" now lay second on 23 points, "Shadowfax" and "Jolly Jack Tar" were both on 26 points and "Jubliee" and "Diamond Jem" both had 27 points. Right from the final warning flag the boats were jockeying for position and there was plenty of place changing on every leg of the course. At the line "Shadowfax" crossed second behind "Jelly Baby", "Jubilee" was third and "Jagerbomb" fourth. "Jolly Jack Tar" could only manage an eighth, their worst result of the series, and "Diamond Jem" was ninth. Overall that meant that "Jagerbomb" took second place overall by a single point from "Shadowfax" with "Jubilee" fourth, "Jolly Jack Tar" fifth and "Diamond Jem" sixth.

Having travelled all the way from Cork to compete in this year's Vice Admiral's Cup regatta "Jelly Baby's" owner Ian Nagle said he was "Pleasantly surprised." with their success.

"We've done pretty well in Ireland, we've won a couple of ICRA Nationals in 2012 and 2014 and we won the Irish J/109 Nationals last year, but this is our first time out of Ireland. We've come from Cork and are staying to do the J-Cup as well. We genuinely didn't know how we would fare against the English boats. There are no J/109s in Cork so we weren't sure how we were going to do, but I think after race 3 we felt might be on the pace. We were very happy with the race management. That kind of fast turn around was great, its lovely to race and start again quickly, that's what its all about really. He [Rob] did a great job as there was so little wind on Friday so to get the three races in that day was magic. We were full of praise for him. After that we're mad for more!"

#royalcork – The Organisers of August's Cork Dinghy Fest 2015 have introduced an Optimist fun fleet to this year's event. This fleet is for the sailors that do not qualify for the main optimist fleet. The Royal Cork Yacht Club idea is that this fleet will take part in some point to point fun races, like a race around Spike Island or a race up the Owenabue River at high tide. The young sailors will also be involved in fun shore side activities if the weather does not permit them to take to the water on any given day. This is seen as a great way to include as many sailors as possible in the festival without compromising the racing of the other fleets.

The new format dinghy week runs from 20th – 23rd of August.

The main Optimist fleet has also been limited to the first fifty entrants. Sailors must be ranked in the top fifty, from their Junior or Senior National rankings 2014.

Event plans are now well under way and it is shaping up to be a unique sailing experience, with four main race areas as well as two point to point race areas.

Here is a quick look at what's on, according to the RCYC:

1. Fun activities for all after sailing, (Stand up paddle board races, adult Optimist racing etc.)
2. Aprés sail music,
3. Anto's Famous BBQ.
4. Special guest speakers,
5. Dinghies on display.
6. Invitational sailing by other classes after racing.
7. Tidal Briefing for the next day on each race area.
8. Night time bands and DJ's.
9. Dedicated camping

#royalcork – Four years and seven months may seem an eternity for many people. Yet if you're in the business of planning major club and sporting events, particularly where there's a significant international context, then four years and seven months is but the blinking of an eye. In 2020 - in four years seven months and 22 days to be precise - the Royal Cork Yacht Club will be 300 years old. W M Nixon takes a look at life in and around a very remarkable and undoubtedly unique organisation as it moves steadily towards its special date with destiny.

The world's oldest yacht club is in good health, enjoying a growing membership with an increasing and very distinguished international flavour. And it already has a proven track record in marking significant birthdays. Back in 1969-70, led by Clayton Love Jnr as a visionary and energetic Admiral, the club celebrated its Quarter Millennium with a two year sailfest which included finishing a Transatlantic Race, starting or finishing several other major offshore races, staging several national and international championships, running a race week, and co-ordinating an especially successful Cruise-in-Company by a large fleet from Cork Harbour to Glengarriff on Bantry Bay.

In this galaxy of sailing events, the Royal Cork's traditions of volunteerism and competitive involvement afloat was much in evidence. If Crosshaven sailors weren't running the show afloat and ashore, then they were likely to be competing in it afloat, and almost inevitably featuring in the frame.

So in all, those staging the Quarter Millennium set a standard which their successors planning towards 2020 - which is additionally distorted by being an Olympic year - will find difficult to match. For they'll be doing so in a very changed world in which newly re-born regattas and special events are crowding the national and international calendar, while the undoubted international change of attitude in favour of events in warmer climates means that a sailing club on an island well north in the Atlantic will have to try that much harder to attract the kind of boats and sailors its major and unprecedented anniversary merits.

But far from being fazed by the prospect of what needs to be done for 2020, the Royal Cork YC relishes living life to the full in the here and now. During the past year and more, the Crosshaven club has been led with such enthusiasm and exemplary energy afloat and ashore by Admiral Pat Lyons that at the National Sailing Awards in Dublin in March, it was announced that the Royal Cork was the winner – for the sixth time - of the annual ISA/Mitsubishi Motors "Sailing Club of the Year" trophy, which dates back to 1979 but has been firmly under the wing of Mitsubishi Motors since 1986.

However, although the announcement was made at a national gathering, the essence of the Club of Year accolade is that the winning club and its members should be honoured in their own clubhouse in its own very specific local setting. Which sounds straightforward enough. But when you get into the world of high-powered sailing types and the challenge of trying to get many fast-moving targets into one place at the one time, it makes herding cats seem like a doddle. So it wasn't until this week that a date was finally found on which most of the key players in the Royal Cork scene would be in and around their clubhouse. But it was well worth the effort and the wait – the ceremony provided us with the very purest spirit of Royal Cork.

Crosshaven in high summer. Around Cork Harbour, the interaction between sea and land seems much more comfortable than anywhere else in Ireland. Photo: Robert Bateman

At this week's Club of the Year awards ceremony for the Royal Cork YC were (left to right) W M Nixon, (chairman of the adjudicators), David O'Brien (ISA Board Member), Pat Lyons (Admiral RCYC), Frank Keane (Chairman Mitsubishi Motors), and Billy Riordan (CEO Mitsubishi Motors). Photo: Robert Bateman

Such is the enthusiasm of this remarkable club at its immaculately-maintained and hospitable clubhouse/marina complex in Crosshaven that you'd think they must be one of the newest in the land. But they went at their sailing in 2014 as though it was Tricentenary time already, running a nine-month club sailing programme with an extensive junior training input, and in addition staging the ISAF Women's International Match Racing Worlds in June.

Then in July they hosted a successful Cork Week which – apart from providing great racing for all competitors – showcased the new Irish International Commodore's Cup Team for the first time, an auspicious debut as the team went on to win the Commodore's Cup, with Royal Cork's Anthony O'Leary playing a key role throughout.

Anthony O'Leary also won the British IRC Opens and the Irish Helmsmans Championship, and then for good measure he took the 1720 Nationals as well. Meanwhile, RCYC's Harry Durkan took the junior title, while clubmate Seafra Guilfoyle was garlanded with international success in the Lasers.

Commodore's Cup Team Captain and Afloat.ie Sailor of the Year 2014 Anthony O'Leary with RCYC Admiral Pat Lyons and Frank Keane of Mitsubishi Motors. Photo: Robert Bateman

On the cruising front, it was to be announced in due course that during 2014, the voyaging by Royal Cork YC longtime member Neil Hegarty in his 34ft sloop Shelduck on both sides of the Atlantic, and across it too, had been awarded the premier trophy of the Irish Cruising Club, the Faulkner Cup. As it happens, the skipper of Shelduck was one of the few conspicuous absentees from this week's ceremony, for the very good reason that he's already away cruising in America. But the ICC was well represented by Vice Commodore Dan Cross of Crosshaven, and also by former RCYC Admiral Paddy McGlade, who in 2014 organised the Cruising Club's very successful 85th Anniversary Cruise-in-Company from Crosshaven to Glengarriff with an exemplary lightness of touch.

Neil Hegarty of RCYC bringing his Dufour 34 Shelduck into port at the conclusion of a Transatlantic passage during his award-wnning 2014 cruise.

Part of the Irish Cruising Club's fleet in Glengarriff during the Cruise-in-Company organised by Royal Cork's Paddy McGlade

Odyssey, the prototype of the new National 18 whose development has been largely driven by the Cork Harbour division of the class.

Back home meantime, the Royal Cork's busy and long-established fleet of National 18s played the key role in developing the new National 18 which is currently being launched to popular acclaim, and two of the key figures in what amounts to a remarkable community movement – Dom Long and Tom Dwyer – were enthusing, and quite rightly too, about the new boats in the RCYC at this week's gathering.

At the height of the season, the Royal Cork was one of the clubs leading the movement in putting new life back into the established two-person dinghy classes. And looking to the future this summer, the club's plan to revive Dinghy Week as a four day event in August already shows every sign of success, emphasising the presence of an ongoing sense of the continuity of Cork Harbour sailing, something which in its turn is reinforced by a healthy and dynamic interaction with the community within which this great club is set.

There is no doubt that Cork is different. It interacts with the sea in a much more comfortable way than anywhere else in Ireland, and boats are everywhere about Cork harbour, whether nestling in a mudberth, or lying to a sheltered mooring, or berthed in one of the sparkling new marinas which seem to be springing up in every part of the harbour as the economy gets going again.

As for trying to capture the essence of the Royal Cork, the fact that the Club of the Year trophy adjudication force us to take a still from a moving film – often a very fast-moving film – only serves to emphasise how successful the RCYC is at so many levels.

Thus its exceptional successes in 2014 have now been clarified in proper order and full detail. But already they've moved well into 2015. Cork sailors were very much to the forefront in the recent major Laser event on Lough Erne, with young Nicholas Walsh the pace-setter. And of course the indefatigable Anthony O'Leary is already the Afloat.ie "Sailor of the Month" for April after his clean run of success with the new Ker 40 Antix, ex-Catapult, in the Solent.

Party time in the Royal Cork after the formal presentation ceremony. The trio at right are ICC Vice Commodore Dan Cross and Sally and Anthony O'Leary. In classic Crosshaven style, Dan and Anthony have been friends and neighbours ashore and afloat since childhood. Photo W M Nixon

He finds her a fascinating boat after his more conservative Ker 39, the silver Antix of 2006 vintage. Whereas the older boat was quite docile to steer, as she had twin wheels complete with footbrace pads for the helmsman, the new boat is more like a giant dinghy with a widow-maker of a tiller, and the helmsman having to be hyper-fit to keep himself in place on that very wide cockpit. The word from Skipper O'Leary is that the red Antix is a dream to helm to windward, but steering her on a hairy run can be....well, very hairy indeed.

That such things could be discussed with the man himself was all of a piece with the remarkable mood in the Royal Cork Yacht Club, where the conversation turned with equal ease to the new Cool Route. This is the cruising trail from southwest Ireland to northern Norway which is being developed in Cork Institute of Technology by RCYC member John McAleer with the club very much on board as an international marketing partner.

As to just how this will go, we can only think for now that if they could just somehow bottle the communal can-do spirit of the Royal Cork and then get it to work its magic in all the other prospective ports along the Cool Route, then they really would have a winner. Meanwhile, congratulations to the Royal Cork Yacht Club, ISA/Mitsubishi Motors Sailing Club of the Year for 2015.

A different animal altogether. After the compact and comfortable two-wheel arrangement on the silver veteran Ker 39 Antix , the new tiller-steered Ker 40 Antix may provide a more direct feedback sailing on the wind for helmsman Anthony O'Leary, but hectic downwind sailing can become very hairy indeed.