This was the third race of the Matthews of Cork April League in Kinsale and it was a bright, sunny morning with a shifty north westerly wind blowing between 15 – 19 knots over a flat sea.  There was a general recall sounded at the first attempt at getting Classes 1 & 0 away.  No more messing at the second start under “Z flag”; with a clean start for all.

In the Class O second start Jump Juice(Conor Phelan) took the pin end and was able to tack and clear the fleet by a couple of boat lengths and went into an early lead. She led around the first mark and was overtaken near the Gybe Mark by the higher rating Antix Eile (Anthony O Leary).

On the second reach both boats were unable to find the bottom mark and Jump Juice dropped early and went upwind to round the bottom mark first, taking a good lead on Antix Eile which she held to the finish and took the gun by one minute, and 5 minutes on corrected time.  Final result in Class O IRC Jump Juice Conor Phelan, second Antix Eile Anthony O Leary, and Marinerscove.ie Dave Dwyers took third.  In Class O ECHO: Jump Juice was first, followed by Mike McCarthy’s Check Mate & Conor Doyle’s Freya.

A great course for Class 1 began heading north - windward to Bulman, then a run under kites to Black Head. A reach followed to the next mark found (with just a little difficulty!) to the south of Centrepoint. Later boats made a gain by not following the fleet leaders to the south. With the beat to Sandycove, and another lovely run on flat seas to South Mark, this class finished on a squally beat to Charlesfort.

First across the line was Chancer followed closely by Samba and Y-Dream, but on corrected time in Class 1 Echo; Y-Dream won by 2 mins, from Hi-Time in 2nd place, with Chancer in 3rd at 3min 20secs.

In Class 1 IRC it was Peter & Bill Crowley on Hi-Time 1st, with Simon Coveney’s Wavetrain 1min 50secs behind, and in 3rd slot Chaos, Thomas & Kieran Whelan on 3mins 30secs.
In Class 1 IRC Restricted Chaos came in 1st followed by Y-Dream (O’Riordan/Murphy), and the Carroll brothers’ Chancer in 3rd.

In Class 2, 15 boats left the start line with a long beat up to the Bulman.  A combination of wind shifts and gusts saw boat positions change but Slack Alice was first round the mark, closely followed by Zoom, Bad Company and Grin & Bear It!  Heading across to Hake Head was a tight reach with the majority of the fleet deciding not to fly spinnakers.  A gybe set at Hake Head and a long run heading out to South Mark, the boat positions remained much the same for this leg. 

Some boats were confused at South Mark rearranging the overall boat positions on the water.  A beat back to Sandycove with gusts up to 19 knots, and unpredictable wind shifts saw positions change once again.  Back to South Mark for the second time with lighter airs out to sea, it was a long shifty beat into the finish at Charlesfort, boat positions continuously changing.   It was certainly a day when ultimately it was handicaps which determined the final positioning.  After protest hearing between Mac Magic 11 & Obsession VI, the end results were as follows:

Class 2 IRC: Obsession VI, Slack Alice and Grin & Bear It! In Class 2 ECHO: Gunsmoke II, Obsession VI & Madness II doing the business.

Conditions for the Class 3 and Class 4 yachts were much more favourable this week in contrast to last week’s punishing conditions.  In Class 3/4 Echo Brian Hunts Amadeus sailed a great race to take 1st place by 28 seconds from Paul & Gail Swanton's Go Kart followed by Graham Marron's Flashpoint in third place. In Class 3/4 IRC Alan Mulcahys Sundancer shone again to take 1st place over Flashpoint by 39 seconds, with Padraig O Donovan's Chameleon taking third place.

With the Northerly wind, and being just after high water, the White Sail fleet started with a beat up-river to the Spit mark and then the classes split with Class1 heading to Hake Head while Class 2 had a run to the Centrepoint mark. Stephen McCarthy’s X46, Nadie in Class 1 was quick to establish a lead from the rest of the fleet which he held to the finish. From Hake Head a beat to the Sandycove Mark brought Class1 to integrate with the spinnaker fleet. After that, a reach to the Bulman Buoy before a beat to the finish via the Harbour mark.

Full thanks as always to OOD Donal Hayes, assisted by Peter Maguire for laying an unambiguous course.

Class1 finished with The McNamara’s Aras ahead of Nadie with Dave O Sullivan’s Cimarron VI in third.

Class 2 saw Des Lyons and Aine Dunne’s Charisma finish in first place ahead of Kevin & Celia Murray’s Objection in second.

It’s all to play for now on the final days of this year’s exciting Matthews April League, all still in contention. Roll on next Sunday, with the final Race on Saturday 26th April 2008.  The April League Prizes will be presented at the April League Dinner (26th April) which will be held at Kinsale Yacht Club, tickets are available from Ann Kelly in the Club Reception office.