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Should each SSE Renewables Round Ireland Race from Wicklow Sailing Club have a nominated “Flagship” to remind us that, with the passing of the years, this remarkable Royal Ocean Racing Club-supported 700-mile Classic now has its own colourful and complex history?

The race has involved a total of well over 15,000 miles in all, sailed by hundreds of different boats – some very different - and with the proverbial “cast of thousands” on the personnel side, with an Irish emphasis while being spiced with a strong international flavouring and more than a touch of stardust.

When 2024’s staging gets going from Wicklow in a week’s time, it will be 44 years since the non-stop circuit was first raced under the guidance - and through the dogged determination - of the late Michael Jones of Wicklow Sailing Club in 1980. And with 21 races sailed over the years (Covid prevented 2020’s event ) some boats have become inextricably linked to the Race in their own special way, usually by winning, but by doing so in a special manner that reflects the sometimes eccentric style of the crew.

ENTRIES PUSH TOWARDS 60 MARK

The up-coming 22nd staging has an intriguing lineup of registered entries pushing towards the 60 mark. And with only two notifying possible “no shows” to Race Organiser Kyran O’Grady, former Commodore of the hosting Wicklow Sailing Club, it has all the makings of a very solid turnout which will reflect the way we race offshore today.

At first glance, the logic suggest this proposed role of “Fleet Flagship” should go to the defending champion if they’re on the entry list. This year, that would be Laurent Charmy’s J/111 Fastwave from France, sponsored by SL Energies Groupe, which pipped the fast-finishing J/99 Snapshot (Mike & Richie Evans, Howth YC) by just 5 minutes to take 2022’s title.

Laurent Charmy’s J/111 Fastwave from France getting in the groove at the start of the 2022 Round Ireland, and on her way to a five minute overall win from the J/99 Snapshot (Michael & Tichard Evans, Howth YC). Photo: Afloat.ie

FLAGSHIP WITH DEEPER HISTORICAL SIGNIFICANCE

But with such a rich and varied story behind it all, surely for this year at any rate the Flagship could be a vessel that carries a much deeper historical message? For as it happens, the strong 2024 entry list includes four previous overall winners – Fastwave (2022), Tanit (2014), Searcher (ex-Tonnere de Breskens) 2010, and Imp (2000).

As the most senior of them – George Radley’s 1977-vintage Holland 39 Imp from Cove SC - was the overall winner in 2000 and has sailed the race several times, surely few would disagree with honouring her as Flagship 2024?

For had such a role existed in time past, it would have been fulfilled by Denis Doyle’s mighty Frers 51 Moonduster in the 1980s and ’90s, and the hyper-successful 1978-vintage Granada 38 Cavatina campaigned by Eric Lisson and then Ian Hickey in the noughties.

CORK DOMINATION

Thus the rest of us would have had to suck it up in accepting that at least two previous Round Ireland Flagships over several races would have been – like Imp herself – from Cork. And down in the People’s Republic, of course, they’ll see this situation as a natural out-working of the Divine Plan.

All four boats are historic in their way, but Imp is an active international floating museum of innovation and achievement. When she was designed in 1976-77 in the rapidly expanding Ron Holland office at the Strand Farmhouse across the river from Crosshaven, the client was the wildly-keen Skip Allen of San Francisco, who had already painted the oceans red with Improbable, his mad downwind flying machine designed by Gary Mull.

In Skip Allen’s ownership, Imp showed she could make a reasonable stab at matching Improbable’s downwind performance, and she was much better to windward. Photo: Wikipedia

Things being so hectic in the hyper-busy design office, some of the Young Turks were able to take the new design under their wings, and while other Holland designs of the time, such as the sublime 44ft Big Apple, were showing marked signs of moving away from the pintail sterns of the early ’70s, with Imp it was definitely there, allied to ultra-light yet strong construction based on alloy tubing, which put her in a class of her own for lightness with strength.

When Imp made her Solent debut in 1977, it was clear that her design had moved on from the pin-tailed Ron Holland boats of a couple of years earlier, and her offwind performance could match larger boats like Germany’s Duva.

PREVIOUS CORK IMPS

Naming her Imp as derived from Improbable would have been simple enough, were it not for the fact that doing so made her ultimate arrival into Cork ownership almost inevitable. For there have been boats of significance called Imp in Cork Harbour for many generations, one of the more recent being the Fife-designed Cork Harbour OD Imp, CHOD Number 3, built by Roche of Passage West in 1897 and star of Tom Barker’s famous 1950s photo (below), but now alas no longer in existence.

The 1897-built Cork Harbour OD Imp racing seawards under the rig that was used from 1896 onwards, during the period when sailing legend Harry Donegan Senr was Class Secretary. Photo: Tom Barker of The Cork Examiner

After early success in American waters, the new Imp was brought across to do the 1977 Fastnet, a medium-light winds affair, and won that overall. By contrast, the 1979 Fastnet was of course anything but medium-light, yet she won her class in that too, with Skip Allen arriving into the finish-hosting Royal Western YC in Plymouth in a euphoric haze.

SUCCESSION OF IRISH OWNERS

Soon afterward, she was into a succession of noted Irish owners, including the Sisk brothers and Michael O’Leary (the sailing one), before passing on to Roy Dickson of Howth who raced her in the 1987 Fastnet, and a decade after she’d won overall, he and his crew took her to the win of the Philip Whitehead Cup.

Despite the passing of the years, Imp remained hot, which meant that if you weren’t winning with her or at least in the frame, then you’d a lot of explaining to do. Roy Dickson – always a boat experimenter in any case - sold her on to Roy Hamilton of Carrickfergus on Belfast Lough, who after a few seasons sold her George Radley of the distinguished Cove sailing family.

Imp in the 1987 Fastnet when – ten years after being overall winner – she was still in the frame by winning the Philip Whitehead Cup.

Since then, some of Imp’s history has been a bit vague, and she showed it at times, but now George has her back in prime order, and she would make such a fine flagship for the spirit of the Round Ireland Race that a special Imp Ensign should be immediately created for her to show during the count-down to Saturday June 22nd.

SUPPORTING SUPER-BOATS

And if by any chance Imp’s entry falls by the wayside before Wicklow, then we’re in the happy position of having of three “Flagship fallbacks”. Way back in 2010, the overall winner was legendary Dutch owner-skipper Piet Vroon’s Ker 46 Tonnere de Breskens. A longtime friend and sporting competitor of Denis Doyle, his new distinctively blue Ker design was so much of a piece, and a real race winner with it, that some enthusiasts reckon that she is the most attractive Jason Ker design of them all.

Classy boat. The 2010 Round Ireland winner Tonnere de Breskens has been racing successfully as Tonnere de Glen, and will return to the Round Ireland 2024 as Pete Smyth’s Searcher (Royal Irish YC).

That certainly was the feeling of Pete Smyth with the Sunfast 3600 Searcher, who has come to the cruiser-racer dry-sailing ranks of the Royal Irish YC by way of Clontarf Y&BC, Howth YC, and the National YC. By the time he was interested, Tonnere de Breskens had become Tonnere de Glen, and was French-owned with successful owner-skipper Dominique Tian, Mediterranean-based at Marseille with significant showings in events like the Middle Sea Race and the RORC Transatlantic.

Tonnere de Glen making to windward off Valetta in the Middle Sea Race

But now the move has been made, and she’s still that special shade of blue, though re-named Searcher to race round Ireland with an impressive array of Smyth family sailing talent on board.

TANIT CAN GIVE IT A LEATHERING

Scottish-owned by leather baron Richard Harris in 2014, the attractive Sydney Harbour 36 Tanit’s name reflected the owner’s day job, but he was right on the sailboat racing money too in getting ace Lough Swilly YC navigator/tactician Richie Fearon on the strength for the 2014 race.

Despite coming down with a serious dose of summer flu as the start at Wicklow arrived, Richie got himself on a course of extra-strong medication and reported on board. Flu and competitive sailing don’t go together, even less when the sailing is the Round Ireland Race. But the ailing navigator made the key input on the strategy and tactics, never more so than in the final slow beat down the Irish Sea.

TOUGH CREW ON THE SCOTTISH BLUE BOAT

Robust in-crew humour was the default mode in Tanit’s tough crew, yet the sick navigator managed to fight his corner. Having insisted that the winning tack would be offshore from St John’s Point onwards, the man in the sick-bunk hauled himself to the companionway when he detected a move in the cockpit to take a tack towards the Irish coast, and croakingly insisted they hold to the east.

“He was like Laazarus, a ghost, the phantom of the St John’s Point Opera” said Skipper Harris at the prize-giving dinner, held in Wicklow town in the post-race Autumn in those days. “But we did as he told us, otherwise he might have dropped dead in front of us, and that would have been a nuisance”.

The sick man was spot on. Tanit won the 2014 Round Ireland Race overall by seven minutes from the Shanahan family’s J/109 Ruth (National YC). These days, the blue Australian-designed and built boat is owned and sailed by Robert Floate of the Isle of Man YC at Port St Mary, but in a week’s time she’s down to be on the line at Wicklow to provide yet another reminder of the SSE Renewables Round Ireland race’s storied past.
The little blue boat gets cleanly away. The start of the 2014 race was a lively affair, with a briskly onshore easterly breeze at Wicklow. But the Scottish entry Tanit - a Sydney Harbour 36 – found her own sweet spot, and was soon showing her speed potential as the heavy metal – including line honours winner Volvo 70 Monster Project (David Ryan, Wicklow SC) - came lumbering through the fleet

Round Ireland Race Overall Winners Since 1980

SSE Renewables Round Ireland Race Entries 2024 here