Sailing: Although Nicholas O'Leary's 10 wins in 10 races mean the Royal Cork sailor will lift the Laser National youth title tonight at the National Yacht Club, Dun Laoghaire, he does so without having met Dublin opposition.
None of Dun Laoghaire's waterfront clubs or indeed Howth Yacht Club - representing the bulk of the country's sailing population - could field any competitor under the age of 19 in the boys' standard rig laser class.
Questions such as these will, no doubt, be on the agenda at tomorrow's "Youth in Sailing"conference, run by the ISA, at the House of Sport, Dublin (10 a.m.).
O'Leary concentrated his efforts this week against three Northern challengers in a range of conditions on Dublin Bay for both the national title and also a place at this year's ISAF world youth championships in Poland, to be sailed in the standard rig.
Happily, turnouts are higher in the Laser radial (19 boats) and Laser 4.7 (10 boats) divisions, where along with the 420 class (18 boats) racing for places in Ireland's junior European team, there is a combined fleet of 51.
Jeff Tait is a clear leader in the radial, where he has won eight of 10 races. William Atkinson leads the 4.7 class.
In the girl's selection for the youth worlds, Michelle Doherty and Jenny Murray are level going into today's final rounds.
In Brisbane, Conor Byrne of the Royal St George lies 12th overall in the world laser radial youth championships.
Back in Dublin, entries for the Saab Cruiser Nationals, the first national championships for Class 0, 1, 2 and 3 (May 14th-16th), are expected to reach 100.
Howth Yacht Club, hosting the event on behalf of the Irish Cruiser Racing Association (ICRA), expects a healthy response from its own members and Dun Laoghaire, and also hopes Cork will reciprocate the Dublin support for Cork Week in recent years.
Racing will be provided on both IRC and ECHO and a feature of the event will be the programme of seven races in three days.Entries can be made on-line (www.hyc.ie).
Five of the nine entries received so far for the June 26th start of the BMW Round Ireland race are from Royal Cork in a fleet the Wicklow organisers expect to swell threefold by the entry deadline, May 24th.
The largest entry continues to be the Volvo 60 Spirit (David Nixon, Howth) but there are other big boats on the horizon, says organiser Denis Noonan.
The one entry so far in the new two-handed class comes from the Isle of Man Yacht Club in the form of Andrew Bell's J105 sloop, Moontiger.
Royal Cork claim the introduction of the crew-eligibility rule was the main reason for making Crosshaven one of the most successful regattas in the world and with 400 entries already received for the July 10th-16th event it's hard to argue.
Yesterday, the event - now without a commercial sponsor - received a welcome boost with the news that Fáilte Ireland will this year invest €120,000.
The club maintain the average yacht owner wants to compete against his friends and sail his own boat, with a reasonable chance of success, unaided by highly paid professionals.
More details online (www.corkweek.ie).
Strong winds yesterday delayed news of Olympic qualification for the Irish 49er pairing of Tom Fitzpatrick and Frazer Brown, who must reach the target at the world championships, which doubles as the final qualification series this week in Athens. Racing was abandoned yesterday.
Meanwhile, Feargal Kinsella becomes the latest helmsman to earn qualification for the Athens Paralympic Games. His name goes forward this week to the OCI in the 2.4m class.
Damian Foxall and Justin Slattery, the Irish crew members on Steve Fossett's round-the-world catamaran Cheyenne will recount their exploits on tonight's Late Late Show on RTÉ (9.30 pm).
