Gentle start for run to Dingle

SAILING:IRISH CREWS are using the international stage to reset the Olympic pecking order – in two classes at least – and staking a claim as contenders for the 2012 Olympic regatta.

A two-week stint has served up a string of top results against the world’s best, first in Holland and now on the waters of the Olympic regatta itself at Weymouth.

On Wednesday, at the halfway stage, when the breeze hit 30 knots Annalise Murphy showed her strength when she posted two first places to lead the Laser Radial Sail for Gold regatta. After racing last night, the 21-year-old Dun Laoghaire woman was third overall with four races left in her 91-boat fleet.

The results are mirrored in the Star keelboat class where the leading Irish pair of Peter O’Leary and David Burrows now lie eighth overall in a fleet of 41.

It’s results like these that have buoyed up the rest of the 14-boat team in Weymouth, and even though the bulk of the Irish have struggled in the heavy airs, the sight of an IRL sail in the lead has been a tonic.

At home, too, these results have struck exactly the right kind of note to boost Irish crews embarking on separate offshore and inshore challenges round the coast this weekend.

Twenty-nine boats are preparing for the biggest offshore race of the season tomorrow. If the forecast is correct, the 10th Dun Laoghaire to Dingle Race will get off to a gentle start with winds of seven knots from the west.

This year’s fleet is boosted by the knowledge that this 320-mile endeavour also counts for overall ISORA points, a series that is enjoying a resurgence on both sides of the Irish Sea.

It’s not the only offshore fixture this weekend either. Kinsale Yacht Club’s 100-mile race to the Fastnet rock and back starts tonight at 8pm.

A fleet drawn from locals is joined by Royal Cork and Cove Sailing Club entries too.

On the west coast, a fleet of 58 boats drawn from nine countries is heading for Sligo and the Fireball World Championships being staged at Rosses Point from Monday. Noel Butler and Steven Oram are expected to head an Irish team comprising half the fleet. There are 17 entries from Britain. France and Switzerland have three entries each, Canada and the Czech Republic two, with Australia, the Shetlands and Germany each having one.

Strangford’s Laura Gilmore won last weekend’s Topper Ulster championships, which was staged in Cushendall. Fifty boats took part in the two-day provincial. Ballyholme’s Tim Brow was second, and third was Craig Campbell from Belfast Lough.

The RS 400 fleet mastered trapezoid courses at its northern championships at Ballyholme. Simon Herriot and Tom Moran won with a race to spare. Second was Emmett and James Ryan. Third was Robin Flannigan and Phil Cully.

There was some fast sports boat sailing at the SB3 Southerns in Tralee Bay last weekend – and a number of collisions, out of which came one happy ending at least. Dun Laoghaire’s Seán Craig and Strangford’s Peter Kennedy became “involved” on day one, rendering Kennedy’s boat unusable. In a sporting gesture, Craig offered his boat as a replacement, with the Royal St George trio then sitting out the rest of the series, a turn of events that ultimately led Kennedy to the title.

Munster sports boat sailing continues today with the 1720 National Championships at Royal Cork Yacht Club. Seventeen boats are competing.