O'Leary ponders 2012 on Malta mission

SAILING:DOCKSIDE IN Malta and Royal Cork's Peter O'Leary is preparing for tomorrow's Middle Sea Race. The Mediterranean is a long way from home but O'Leary's thoughts are not far from London 2012.

His plans for a second appearance at an Olympic regatta are still on course in spite of the split with Tim Goodbody after this year's World Championships.

On the basis the Star keelboat demands crew to weigh in at over 110kg, an Irish shortlist would not be hard to draw. O'Leary remains tight-lipped about the identity of the replacement he maintains has already been picked. "This is a set-back for the programmme but it's better it happened now than later," Olympic team manager James O'Callghan said yesterday.

The privacy is understandable because O'Leary needs to be sure whoever fills the role has the staying power for a three-year campaign.

Rivals Max Treacy and Anthony Shanks have already taken the upper hand at the European and World Championships this season.

The next big Star event is the World Championships in Rio de Janeiro in January 2010, followed in March by the Bacardi Cup in Miami. Both Irish boats are expected to attend.

But this morning O'Leary is focused on a heavy-weather start to the Middle Sea fixture. O'Leary sails with Andy Beadsworth on the British Swan 45, Fever. There is a single Irish entry for the race in Dún Laoghaire-to-Dingle race winner Legally Brunette, an X41 (skippered by Cathal Drohan) which is making a return trip from Ireland for the event.

At last weekend's IRC handicap conference in Paris, a three-man Irish Cruiser Racer (ICRA) delegation prevented any further penalties on powered backstays. Powered equipment is making its impact on big-boat racing so it won't be long before officials will have to act. This season there were numerous complaints on fast-acting powered winches where boats were able to out-tack the opposition at the press of a button.

The ICRA hold their annual conference on November 21st in Kilkenny. The association are compiling a list of nominations for their boat-of-the-year award.

Howth Yacht Club's six-race Autumn League reaches its finale tomorrow when the 140-boat fleet in nine classes competes in the last race of a series that to date has been sailed in perfect conditions.

Tight finishes have been the order of the day in many classes over the previous five Sundays and only a few boats look certain to win their divisions.

This is particularly true in the Etchells, where Simon Knowles' Jabberwocky and Dan O'Grady's Crop Duster are tied on equal points; in Class 3 where Vincent Gaffney's Alliance has only one point to spare over arch-rival Fergus O'Kelly's Starlet; and in Class 1 where four points separate the top four boats.

Classes which look to be settled already include the Squibs, where Emmet Dalton's Klipbok is a comfortable leader; Class 2 ECHO which has been dominated by C'est la Vie (Flannelly and Others) since the first race; and David Clarke's Harlequin in the Puppeteers. Racing starts at noon tomorrow.

In Cork Harbour, Tim Costello rejoins the crew of his Dublin yacht Tiamat for the next round of the October League that has an entry of 100 boats.

Class Zero contains the bulk of next year's Commodore's Cup teams but the search continues for the small-boat component of these teams.

In dinghy news, the Irish GP14 fleet returned to Donaghadee Sailing Club for the first time in 12 years. Although the conditions varied, the end result did not, with Tim Corcoran and Brendan Brogan from Sligo YC winning their fifth from a possible seven events on this year's circuit, and securing Gold Fleet honours. At the prize giving, class president Donal McGuiness said: "The total number of entries for the 2009 season was a record 244 . . . It is not an idle boast that we are the premier dinghy class in Ireland."

Due to the bad long-term forecast for the first period of the European Speed Championships the event has been postponed; they will now take place from November 1st-6th in Dungarvan, Co Waterford.