After three days of varying conditions Pat Kelly and his crew on Storm posted an almost perfect series to win IRC 1 at the ICRA National Championships in the Royal Cork Yacht Club over the weekend.
After some medium wind and a huge tricky sea left over from the overnight gale Storm got off to the perfect start on Friday by winning the first race by the slenderest of margins, only 1 second. After coming back from the abyss in the second race to capture a second place they were in a great position leading the class going into the weekend of racing.
With three races scheduled on Saturday to include a harbour race they never took the pressure off the rest of the fleet. Starting well and finishing 2nd in race 3 behind the wet and wild Antix Beag who was revelling in the strong conditions downwind they went on to win the next two races in the day with the wind between 25 and 30knots. Some great sailing in the strong breeze without any big wipe-outs Storm powered through to win race 4 and 5 convincingly to leave a generous lead going into the final day.
With light wind forecast for Sunday some of the lighter crews fancied their chances against Storm. Another great start in race 6 set them off and when they took the lead at the weather mark they sailed off and were never seen again in the race. So with the event all wrapped up with a race to spare another bullet was added to the tally in the final race to cap off a fine series by the team.
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