Light airs hamper Fastnet getaway

SAILING: LIGHT WINDS on the English Channel were last night playing havoc with the Fastnet Race, which began from Cowes yesterday.

On the 30th anniversary of the tragic race in which 15 sailors lost their lives, a more sedate competition to the famous lighthouse off West Cork was on the cards.

First sailed in 1925, the race has lost none of its appeal and the maximum entry of 300 boats was reached several weeks ago.

However, with fresher winds forecast only from Land’s End on, the fleet was last night dealing with the prospect of anchoring off the Dorset coast as the tide flooded eastwards and threatened to halt progress in a breeze of less than 10 knots.

The conditions have already put paid to a record, and Mike Slade’s ICAP Leopard, holder of the course time of one day, 20 hours, 18 minutes from the 2007 event, was the best of a slow bunch last night.

Leopard’s 26-strong crew includes Cork’s Justin Slattery fresh from his adventures in the Volvo Ocean race on Green Dragon.

At 100 feet overall, Slade’s super-maxi is also the round Ireland course record holder, but even Leopard’s superior boat-speed wasn’t bringing the Irish coast any closer and the crew was weighing up the options for “kedging” for up to six hours until a favourable tide and better breeze arrived this morning.

The slow progress of the fleet means a rounding of the rock just two miles from Cape Clear island by the leaders will not take place in daylight today and might only be the early hours of tomorrow at best.

Aside from providing the main turning-mark in the race, Ireland’s involvement is a lower-key affair than usual, in contrast to 2007 when Ger O’Rourke concluded a highly-successful international campaign on his Cookson 50 Chieftain with overall victory on IRC-handicap of the Fastnet Race.

That win prompted the Limerick developer to embark on an ambitious programme for the Volvo Ocean Race that began with the purchase of the previous race winner which later became Team Delta Lloyd.

Meanwhile, the single-handed Figaro Race begins its third and longest leg today as the 52-sailors depart France on the 485-mile passage from St Gilles Croix-de-Vie to Dingle that is predicted to deliver a radical shake-up to the closely contested rankings.

Nicolas Lunven on CGPI leads the star-studded fleet overall in the general rankings, though this penultimate leg could yet overturn the field by Thursday’s expected finish.

The fleet restarts from Dingle next Sunday afternoon.

In a Star fleet of a different kind, Ireland’s Max Treacy and Anthony Shanks placed 17th overall in the World Championships in Sweden on Saturday. The Dún Laoghaire pair was sailing their new boat and were 11th overall by nation.

The Cork-Dublin pairing of Peter O’Leary and Tim Goodbody, both Olympic veterans from 2008 in the Star and Finn respectively, placed 23rd in the 88-strong event that was won by Americans George Szabo and Rick Peters.