| At Aunty Nellie�s Sweet Shop in Kinsale  (L-R) Ruth Lacy, Jack McMahon, Aoife McMahon, Ciara McMahon, Sophie Dix, Alice Lacy & Kirsten Quinn. |
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| The second last Optimist Regional took place on 21st and 22nd September at the newly renovated Kinsale Yacht Club. With a spend of nearly 1 million Euro the club looked fantastic and should be a must "venue" for anyone intending to cruise in 2014. The HYC sailors who travelled to KYC were as follows;
Main Fleet
The weather forecast was for light winds however on the Saturday morning there was a lingering fog that only lifted for a couple of hours that day. After all sailors sailed for an hour to get the the race area only one race was completed for the Senior Fleet. The Junior Fleet managed two races. Thje second race for the Juniors was finished at mark 3 due to the fog. The RIBs circled the fleet and escorted them to the Inner harbour / Charles Fort. The race committee tried to start a race at Charles Fort. Due to spring tides it made the start line impossible and all racing ended at circa 17.00. On Sunday morning the fog had lifted. The breeze was light 5+ knots and due to increase to 8+ later that day. The race area was similar to the Saturday and the race committee called for all boats to be towed to the start line. The racing started on time. In total the race committee managed 4 races for both the Senior's and Junior's. Conditions remained light, shifty and with a confusing tide. All HYC sailors sailed really well. Daniel Hopkins had a terriffic event, on Sunday evening he was leading the Senior Fleet after the 5 races. However this lead was upset by a protest that did not involve Daniel and redress points were awarded to the protest. Max Kavanagh also sailed into the prizes claiming 5th in the Junior fleet. Shane O'Brien made his debut on the podium coming 2nd Silver in the Senior fleet. Again this was a great result and the smile at prize giving was worth the numerous years of hard work and dedication to get the the prizes. Regatta Fleet
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 (L-R) Kirsten Quinn, Ruth Lacy, Aoife McMahon, Luke Turvey, Sophie Dix & Hugh Turvey. |
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| There were 37 entrants in the Regatta Fleet with a total of 7 races sailed over Saturday and Sunday in the Inner harbour opposite Charles Fort . Ruth Lacy managed to hold off Tom Good from Kinsale by just 1 point to finish first overall. Kirsten Quinn, Hugh Turvey, Sophie Dix and Aoife McMahon finished 11th, 13th 15th and 17th respectively with Kirsten finishing 3rd in a very competitive final race. In summery KYC hosted a great event and its a credit to all HYC sailors and families to make the effort to travel to these great events. |