Round Ireland start may yet be delayed

SailingThe Irish Cruiser Racer Association (ICRA), which had shied away from revealing the strength of their Commodore's Cup team, were thrown into the spotlight yesterday when they were described as the team to beat in the British press following last week's results at the British IRC championships in Cowes.

Buoyed by last weekend's two seconds, scored by Ireland's Flying Colours and Voodoo Chile, ICRA commodore Fintan Cairns announced that Royal Irish skipper Colm Barrington will captain the three-boat team.

While there is still activity behind the scenes, at close of business last Monday (the entry deadline), 10 teams had submitted challenges to the Royal Ocean Racing Club (RORC) for Cowes on July 25th.

There is no doubt now that Ireland is a strong team, on paper at least, with Eamon Crosbie's year-old Ker 32, Voodoo Chile, Colm Barrington's latest "Glove", the brand new Ker 39 Flying Glove, and Fidessa Fastwave, the DK46, sailed by Chris Brown and Peter Harding.

The French, as defending champions, are returning with three teams under captain Gery Trentesaux, but the the make-up of each team will not be known until after the Cowes-Dinard-St Malo Race starting on July 2nd.

The Netherlands and Belgium are also entering teams.

The RYA trials for a British team ended at last weekend's IRC Championships with selectors confidently entering a full complement of four teams.

Although each team is given equal billing, it is hard to ignore the compelling results of GBR Red, comprising Kit Hobday's Farr 52 Bear of Britain, Jerry Otter's IMX 40 Exabyte II and the J-109 Jeronimo of Jonathan and Lisa Goring, which beat Voodoo Chile for Class One honours last weekend.

The RORC said yesterday that negotiations are under way for an 11th team made up of yachts from Russia, Belgium and France. If this comes to fruition, it will be the first time an East European boat has competed at the event.

At home, Cork Week have published their sailing instructions for the 500-boat regatta in two weeks. The organisers have come up with a novel way of giving the Maxi Z86s Pyewacket and Morning Glory, as well as Full Pelt, a third round on the windward-leeward courses while still being able to give them a result against the rest of the fleet.

In Class IRC Three, the handicap band is from 1.024 to 1.039, giving only 54 seconds per hour of a difference between the top and bottom boats in a fleet of 35 starters.

Of more immediate concern, Six-time Round Ireland veteran and 1979 Fastnet disaster survivor Donal McClement last night added his voice to the weather debate surrounding the start of tomorrow's BMW Round Ireland race: 40-knot southeasterly winds are forecast for the afternoon but dropping as the day progresses.

"A prudent race committee will be monitoring Friday's weather forecasts very carefully in order to consider its options," the Royal Cork sailor said.

"There are plenty of international precedents where offshore races have been postponed," he added.

If the forecasters are correct and the race committee decide to postpone for an evening start, a further advantage for the 49-boat fleet is a turning of the tide on the east coast, giving four hours of fair rather than foul tide.

Wicklow have little option other than to play a waiting game.

Meanwhile, French Round Ireland entry Solune, with only a four-man crew, finally left a stormbound La Rochelle early Wednesday morning and is expected to arrive into Dún Laoghaire, where the bigger boats are moored, at lunch-time today.

The sail training vessel Asgard II will fly the Wicklow Sailing Club burgee from its masthead as it replaces the Irish Naval Service vessel as the traditional starting-line boat tomorrow.

Also in Round Ireland news, reigning champion Eric Lisson has made an eve-of-race call on organisers to provide a corrected time record trophy, which the Crosshaven skipper maintains would be inclusive of both big and small boats in addition to the much-hyped current elapsed time record, which can be won only by big-boat crews.

While the proposal has been warmly received by a number of other small boats, the RORC rating office that administers the handicap system says the suggestion has no technical merit because IRC handicap times, under which the race is run, change from year to year and are not absolute times, thus making comparisons between races meaningless.