Sailing Ireland have had to cancel their Annual Conference scheduled for tomorrow         (March 21^st) due to Covid 19, but by innovative use of new technology they will proceed with their Annual Awards ceremony – the last to be hosted by outgoing Sailing Ireland President, our own Jack Roy.

It will be a wholly on line event, accessible on the Sailing Ireland Facebook Page at 18.30 (https://www.facebook.com/IrishSailingAssociation/)

The National YC has three nominees for the Sailor of the Year and the Club itself is a contender for the 2019 Sustainability Awards and the 2019 Inclusion Award. Read More Here

Since the guidelines issued by An Taoiseach last Thursday, Irish Sailing has been in discussions with a number of stakeholders from both competitive and training backgrounds, and have concluded that social distancing is not only difficult to achieve onshore from an organisers’ perspective but also difficult to achieve at a personal level on the water.

For double handers and/or keelboats requiring two or more crew, it is not possible. Even for organised activities involving single-handers requiring safety cover (with two people in the safety boat), it is not achievable.

For this reason, Irish Sailing advises that all organised sailing activity should cease with immediate effect and will be reviewed on 29th March. 

NYC Members can still use their boats and go sailing in a private, non-group organised, capacity. However, the changing rooms are not to be used and we remind all our Members to keep observing the HSE guidelines on social distancing among themselves and with the Boathouse staff.

We will continue to monitor Government announcements and update the advice accordingly.

Thanking you for your cooperation.

We have decided to reschedule the lift-in back to its ‘normal’ mid-April weekend (eg back by one week) to Saturday 11^th April.

The lift-in had been brought forward by a week to Saturday 4th April as the 11^th was during the Easter bank holiday weekend and we were anticipating that some boat owners might be away…

However:

• The weather has been very poor since Christmas and we think the additional time to prepare for the sailing season will be welcomed by owners
• We don’t think that many people will make travel arrangements over Easter or go on with previously made arrangements

If rescheduling the lift-in poses a problem to you, please contact sailing@nyc.ie 

Irish Sailing acknowledges that they are not in a position to give expert advice in respect of the Covid 19 threat and that as a minimum, the advice of the HSE should be followed.

The current advice issued today by An Taoiseach effective until 29^th March, is for indoor mass gatherings of more than 100 people and outdoor mass gatherings of more than 500 people should be cancelled.

Consequently, Irish Sailing has agreed some precautionary measures for their own events to minimise the risk of infection of those involved in their activities: Read More Here

The National Yacht Club celebrated another year of great sailing by its members at our annual awards dinner last Saturday night.

The club, that celebrates its 150th birthday this year, has fourteen annual awards for outstanding sailing achievements by members awarded from nominations received from members of the Committee and Sailing Sub Committee. The awards reflected a great horizon of sailing activity and administration in 2019.

Commodore Martin McCarthy awarded the "Commodore's Award" to Chris and Sandra Moore. The husband and wife team were rewarded for their dedicated and ongoing voluntary service in support of sailing both for the Club and for Dublin Bay Sailing club.

Click here to view the gallery

Dates for your calendar:

First DBSC Races
Saturday 25th April:  Tuesday: 28th April:  Wednesday (Water Wags) 29^th April:  Thursday 30th April: 

Last DBSC Races
Tuesday 25th August: Thursday: 27^th August: Saturday 26^th September

Full details will be published in a further Racing Schedule in Year book.
Download the DBSC NOR here: DBSC Summer Series NOTICE of Race January 2020

Conor has just completed his first transat race on a Lombard 46, Pata Negra. The race proved to be a test of competence in many different areas. A steady breeze off the stern quarter of between 15-30 knots provided tense and fast racing with Bouwe Bekking aboard Swedish VO65,Childhood 1, registering a 24-hour run of over 400nm and taking line honours. Pata Negra with a young crew aboard had to contend with a minefield of problems. A broken tooth on the first day was repaired by Conor with Dalkey Clinic dentist and NYC member, Dr Jill Marshall, giving advice via mobile phone as the boat hit 17knots with spinnaker flying! Worse was to come, with the boat’s water maker failing 28 hours into the race necessitating a pit stop into El Hierro, the smallest of the Canary Islands, to fill up with 400litres of water before heading down to the trade winds.

From then on it was a catch-up race. The team did not miss a gybe and calculated their course so precisely that despite travelling 3767nm, 200nm more than their symmetric-spinnaker’d opponents;snapping both masthead halyards;nearly blowing the mast fitting for the fractional and J3 halyard, Pata Negra not only caught up with the fleet but roared past them to finish 2nd overall, by any standards an amazing result!

Next on the agenda is to take the boat to Antigua and prep it for the Caribbean 600 which starts in February.