SAILING:HOWTH YACHT Club's Kinetic is Boat of the Year for 2009, in recognition of its performance in retaining the class two Irish Championship.

The Corby 25 came up against a final shortlist of two class zero boats, Dave Dwyer’s Mariner’s Cove and Eamonn Rohan’s Blondie, plus a fine season performance from Paul O’Higgin’s Rockabill in class one.

But in the end the winner emerged from the depth of talent in class two and was rewarded in Kilkenny last weekend when owners John and Suzie Murphy and Richard Colwell lifted the trophy at the Irish Cruiser Racer Association (ICRA) Conference.

Although ICRA’s high profile comes from the organisation of the Commodore’s Cup team, the association earns its stripes for its dedication to the national fleet. Nowhere was this more evident than when it overlooked the British and Irish IRC class zero champion in favour of Kinetic.

ICRA celebrated its seventh birthday last weekend with a successful conference and a return to the Newpark Hotel venue where it all started in 2002.

Among those in attendance was Mike McCarthy, Admiral of the Royal Cork Yacht Club, Peter Crowley, president of the Irish Sailing Association (ISA), Liam Lynch, Commodore of Tralee Bay SC, Tim Costello, Commodore of Dublin Bay SC (DBSC), and Simon McGibney, Commodore of the West Coast of Ireland Racing Association (WIORA). Event organisers promoting 2010 events were also in attendance.

Although a relatively young organisation, ICRA has achieved a lot for its members, a group of sailors that represent the bulk of the sport here in Ireland.

Having established a very successful annual National Championship, the association will stage its seventh event next May at the Royal St George Yacht Club in Dún Laoghaire and the turnout there is expected to top 100 boats.

Given Ireland’s smaller population it’s worth noting the ICRA event exceeds the entry of its British counterpart each year, the Royal Ocean Racing Club’s (RORC) British Championship.

There has been a call from Wicklow Sailing Club for ICRA to embrace the Round Ireland ocean race as one of its events.

Several ICRA sailors already participate. Wicklow Commodore Charlie Kavanagh has suggested that ICRA should put up a trophy for their best performing boat and include entry into the 700-mile race as part of its annual event programme.

Kavanagh believes it would be a positive step for Irish sailing.

Now that ICRA has firmly established itself, there’s a certain amount of sense in looking offshore to represent other forms of cruiser racing and that is why its responsive committee have adopted the Wicklow suggestion and offered a Perpetual ICRA Trophy for the best ICRA IRC Boat 40 Feet or under.

In the Southern Hemisphere, Richie Fearon was barely off the phone to Cllr Derry Canty, mayor of Co Cork, congratulating the Cork skipper on a win into Cape Town when Fearon was back on the blower advising his sponsors of a set-back.

A stalled rudder is being blamed for the T-bone collision with competitor Hull Humber on the start line of leg five of the Clipper Round the World Race race.

Bow damage repaired, Fearon and crew on Cork set sail again yesterday afternoon, aiming to be in Western Australia for Christmas Day.

Staying in southern waters, the National YC’s Annalise Murphy is in first position after day one in the women’s fleet and in joint first in the Open Laser Radial (men and women) dinghy fleet at the Sail Brisbane regatta.

The Racing Rules of Sailing have got another overhaul in preparation for next season.

The International Sailing Federation has just announced several modifications which will apply from January 1st, 2010.

For most racing sailors the principal changes that apply is that only the boat entitled to mark room can switch off her entitlement by either passing head to wind or sailing out of the zone.

Secondly, the definition of obstruction is changed so that a boat entitled to room or mark room is not an obstruction. This removes a possible ambiguity in the rules in which rules 18 (Mark Room) and 19 (room to pass an obstruction) contradicted each other.

Kingston retraction

THE Irish Sailing Association has issued a retraction to well-known Cork sailor Tony Kingston following the issuing last month of the findings of its ISA racing rules appeals board.

The controversy follows the reinstatement of White Sails boat Fanatix by the ISA appeals board, after two protest hearings by two separate Kinsale Yacht Club Protest Committees, in the wake of this summer’s Sovereign’s Cup.

The Sovereign’s Cup is a national competition cruiser competition that attracts up to 100 boats for four days of racing biennially, and is one of the highlights of the Irish sailing calendar.

The ISA retraction, signed by Ron Hutchieson, unequivocally retracts any “suggestion or innuendo of wrongdoing whatsoever contained” in its report in relation to Kingston, the event director. It points out any such suggestion or innuendo was unintended, and accepts Kingston “was not consulted, nor was his version of events sought or canvassed prior to” the ISA’s decision.

Hutchieson is the chairman of the ISA’s Racing Rules Appeals Board.

Kingston apparently contacted the ISA on becoming aware of its appeals board hearing into the matter, and the publication of its findings. “I was stunned that the appeals board would have conducted an inquiry into what happened in Kinsale, without asking me ­ the event director ­ and then go on to make serious allegations about me.

“At the time, I was stunned, and very hurt. However, the retraction clears things up, as far as I am concerned.”

When contacted, Hutchieson explained: “The sailing rules did not allow Mr Kingston to make comment as he was not a party to the protest, as defined by the rules, and this is the reason why he was not asked for evidence. I am glad this brings the matter to a close.”