Irish Fireball Leinster Champs at Clontarf Yacht & Boat Club

Neil Spain and Matt Treadwell won the Fireball Lenister Championships on count back over locals Damien Bracken & Brian O’Hara at Clontarf Yacht & Boat Club on 21/22 August. Will Moody & Stephen Gill finished third overall. A 34-boat fleet was assembled after good planning allowed for the 8 Irish boats that travelled to the French Nationals the previous week to be unloaded at CYBC on the Friday evening.

Racing got off to a slow start on a wind-ward leeward course with a light breeze which quickly disappeared leaving 17 boats timed out at the finish. Frank Millar and Leo Bishop made the best of the conditions to lead home Bracken and Spain. After a short wait, a steady force 4 arrived from the opposite direction, which provided excellent conditions in a building sea. Race 2 saw Spain lead around the course followed by Moody with Louis Smyth and Joe O’Reilly holding off Alistair Court and John Dunne to take third.

With nice waves now on the course the OOD Scorie Walls opted for an Olympic Triangle course much to the pleasure of the fleet, which provided some exciting reaches. Again Spain showed the pace with Bracken taking second ahead of Noel & Hugh Butler. With gales forecast for Sunday the OOD wisely opted to run a fourth race. This time Butler lead at the windward mark but Bracken got in on the final beat of the shortened race to take first while Michael Murphy & Cormac Bradley from WHSC took third. Spain finished 13th after encountering problems at the leeward mark when trying to make ground.

As the boat retired to a Brass Band and BBQ back at the club Sunday forecast was on everyone’s mind with Spain and Bracken on 5 point Moody on 10 with each of the following 5 boats separated by one point each.

As the crews arrived on Sunday to 20 knots with no change in the forecast the OOD attempted to get a race off given the tight standing in the relative shelter of the harbour. But as soon as the starting flag was dropped the wind rose up a notch to the high 20’s, leaving the fleet to a serious fight up the course. With Spain taking a spill on the beat Bracken sailed conservatively knowing that staying up right should be enough, so he opted to leave the kite in the bag and granny gybed on the run. Spain in the meantime trying to catch up threw up the kite only to take another spill. But none of it was to matter as the OOD hoisted the abandonment flag on the second beat in order to get the fleet ashore in the worsening conditions. So that was the end of racing leaving Bracken to ponder what might have been and the rest of the fleet to recount their survival stories.

In the Gold 2 fleet first went to Ian O’Gorman and Stephen Oram who had a comfortable win with a 9 point advantage over locals Brian Nolan and Tim Leonard while Louise McKenna and Mike Murphy finish third after a capsize before the finish line in race 4 cost them dearly.

In the Silver fleet ULSC’s Ciaran Murphy and Pauline Keaney continued on from their form at the Nationals to take first well up the fleet. Clontarf based Wesley Allen and Kevin Lennon took second ahead of Cariosa Power and Marie Barry from Dunlaoghire.

Overall Results: