The first Sunday of March saw air temperatures for the Viking Marine sponsored Dun Laoghaire Frostbite races in double figures with continuous sunshine and a light northerly wind. In recent weeks, when sailing has been possible, the Race Officer has run three races in order to try and “catch up” with lost races. Last week, we managed to get back on track for Series 2 (post-Christmas) so any extra races sailed now are to make up for losses in the pre-Christmas Series. They won’t change the Series 1 results – the effort is to make up for lost races only.

A slightly smaller fleet (44 boats) assembled for today’s races with the PY Fleet and the ILCA 6s having seventeen and eighteen boats out respectively and the ILCA 7s having seven boats with two ILCA 4s making a first appearance.

With the committee boat situated off the ferry dolphins in front of the Royal St George Yacht Club, the weather mark sat just off the lighthouse on the West Pier, with a gybe mark in the middle of the harbour and the leeward mark about 60m astern of the committee boat just to seaward of the bandstand on the East Pier. 

The PY fleet got away cleanly even with a cluster of boats at the pin end. The majority of the fleet seemed to favour a short hitch to the left-hand side of the course before tacking onto starboard to make their way upwind.  The first race of the day was a three-lap Olympic course and at the weather mark it was the coloured spinnakers of the ten strong Fireball fleet that appeared first.

The ILCA 7s and 4s had ample room on the starting line for their nine-boat fleet but a gathering of the majority of the fleet at the pin end resulted in a General Recall being signalled. That relegated them to the start after the ILCA 6s who did get away cleanly.

The wind strength was between 5 and 9 knots for the first race but there was more of it at the lower end of this range and the first race ran a bit longer than might have been preferred.

While the Fireballs were the lead bunch in the PY Fleet, only one of their number made the podium for this race – Alastair Court & Gordon Syme (15167). The Aeros too enjoyed some close racing with Noel Butler, Paul Phelan  and Neil Colin in close company throughout the early part of the race. Noel prevailed to win on handicap with Pierre Long and son, Remy,  in the IDRA 14, separating the single-hander from the two-hander.

In the ILCA 7s, Conor Byrne set out a stall that he maintained for the afternoon, winning all three races. Matteo Valentini and Sam Wilkinson took the other podium places in this first race. Leo O’Doherty won the two-boat ILCA 4 race from Rory Brennan-Hobbs.

Sean Craig won the first ILCA 6 race comfortably from Shirley Gilmore and Darren Griffin.

For the second race, the course was “re-jigged” with the weather mark moving westwards so that it was situated inside the end of the West Pier and with the course changing to a Windward-Leeward, the gybe mark became the second half of a leeward gate. A two-lap race was signalled and all three fleets got away at the first time of asking. Yet again the Fireballs set the pace in the PY fleet and despite some place changing going on during the race among the Fireballs, they managed to save their time to give the class a clean sweep of the podium places – a rare occurrence this Frostbite season. Alan Blay & Hugh McNally (14641) were followed home by Frank Miller & Neil Cramer (14915) with Owen Sinnott & Grattan Donnelly (14865) third.

For the ILCA 7s Byrne and Valentini took two of the three podium places but were separated by Roy McKay. Rory Brennan-Hobbs won this race in the ILCA 4s.

In the ILCA 6s, the race positions from the first race were reversed with Sean Craig taking third, Darren Griffin winning and Conor Clancy separating them. However, the distance between these three was much closer than Craig’s winning margin in Race 1.

By the completion of the second race the wind was starting to ease, to a five to seven knot range and even though it was close to 15:45, it would have been remiss not to have a third race. Nobody seemed to voice an objection though some boats did leave the race area.

The PY start prompted the signalling of an individual recall for two boats – an Aero and a Fireball – but both went back to restart quite quickly through the crowded pin end. This time the decision was to tack onto port early to make passage to the weather mark. The Fireballs led the charge and in the early stages the “usual suspects” were at the head of the fleet. But as the race progressed, Jack McNaughton & Theo Lynch emerged from the peloton to lead through the first leeward gate.  However, when they came back down towards the second leeward gate and the finish they had been replaced at the head of the fleet by Pat McGoldrick & Paul ter Horst (14790), Louise McKenna & Hermine O’Keeffe (15016) and Cariosa Power & Marjo Moneen (14854) in that order.

However, on corrected time, the win went to Sarah Dwyer (Aero) with Noel Butler second and the ter Horst combination third.

The ILCA 4s didn’t appear for the third race so the 7 ILCA 7s had the racecourse to themselves. The same three who had taken the podium places in Race 1, repeated the feat in Race 3 only in a different order with Conor Byrne taking first again but this time Sam Wilkinson beat Matteo Valentini into second place.

For the ILCA 6s the controller of the podium places allowed one more entrant from the day’s racing with Owen Laverty the last member to be admitted for the day. Clancy took the race win with Owen second and Craig third – Craig took three podium places, Darren Griffin two, Clancy two, and Gilmore and Laverty one each.

Errata: In last week’s report, Nicole Hemerych was reported as being the helm of Fireball 14676, crewed by Michael Keegan. In actual fact the helm was Cora McNaughton, Jack’s sister. I apologise for the error.

Viking Marine Frostbites: Series 2; Sunday 9th March 2025
	PY Fleet	ILCA 7s	ILCA 6s	ILCA 4s
Race 1	Noel Butler (Aero 6) Pierre & Remy Long (IDRA 14) Alastair Court & Gordon Syme (Fireball)	Conor Byrne Matteo Valentini Sam Wilkinson	Sean Craig Shirley Gilmore Darren Griffin	Leo O’Doherty Rory Brennan-Hobbs
Race 2	Alan Blay & Hugh McNally Frank Miller & Neil Cramer Owen Sinnott & Grattan Donnelly (All Fireballs)	Conor Byrne Roy McKay Matteo Valentini	Darren Griffin Conor Clancy Sean Craig	Rory Brennan-Hobbs
Race 3	Sarah Dwyer (Aero) Noel Butler (Aero) Pat McGoldrick & Paul ter Horst (Fireball)	Conor Byrne Sam Wilkinson Matteo Valentini	Conor Clancy Owen Laverty Sean Craig
Mug Winners	Des Fortune (Finn/Race 1) Cariosa Power & Marjo Moneen (Fireball/Race 2) No winner (R3) Jack McNaughton & Theo Lynch (R1: 2/3/25 – Fireball)	No awards in this fleet.	Alison Pigot (Race 1) Kevin Foley (Race 2) Gaspar Warfield (Race 3)

 

 Next Sunday is the penultimate Sunday of the Frostbites and the middle day of a three-day weekend for St Patrick’s Day. There will be Frostbite racing, weather permitting.