Menu

Ireland's sailing, boating & maritime magazine

Cowes Week: Radical Changes for IRC Cruiser Classes

9th January 2020
Cowes Week cruiser racing on the Solent Cowes Week cruiser racing on the Solent

Cowes Week 2020 will be running nine IRC classes, up from eight last year, as splitting class five into two classes (called A and B) worked really well. Organisers say It enabled them to separate out lighter-weight asymmetric boats, and the feedback from competitors on this was excellent.

Knowing that in advance means it makes sense to rename the classes Zero through Nine, but it won't make a huge difference to the IRC class splits in reality.

Secondly, organisers are splitting the cruiser division into two entirely separate entities, to be called 'Performance Cruisers' (4 divisions as in 2019) and 'Club Cruisers' (2 divisions). Cowes Week will be making racing available for what, in essence, are two entirely different types of boats and will be encouraging people to enter the right division based on their boat type. Modern cruising boats with bulb keels and epoxy construction deserve a class of their own, as do some of the more genuine cruisers, and the two will now be able to race separately.

The new Club Cruiser division will also enable people who have not entered Cowes Week in the past to be able to do so, even if their boats really are set up for cruising most of the time.

More here

Published in Cowes Week
Afloat.ie Team

About The Author

Afloat.ie Team

Email The Author

Afloat.ie is Ireland's dedicated marine journalism team.

Have you got a story for our reporters? Email us here.

We've got a favour to ask

More people are reading Afloat.ie than ever thanks to the power of the internet but we're in stormy seas because advertising revenues across the media are falling fast. Unlike many news sites, we haven't put up a paywall because we want to keep our marine journalism open.

Afloat.ie is Ireland's only full-time marine journalism team and it takes time, money and hard work to produce our content.

So you can see why we need to ask for your help.

If everyone chipped in, we can enhance our coverage and our future would be more secure. You can help us through a small donation. Thank you.

Direct Donation to Afloat button