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Windward Sailing Yacht Charters has had many years of experience in organising crews for both the Fastnet Race and other longer distance races, specialising in high performance yachts that will finish the race at least a day ahead of most rival yachts on the longer offshore campaigns.
The Round Ireland Race has many turning points, providing for a range of diverse weather and tidal conditions that serve up a cocktail of complexity for the offshore racer. You will find this race a challenge that is unrivalled amongst any middle distance offshore race.
We are extremely pleased to be able to offer a unique opportunity to race in the Round Ireland Race on a truly competitive pedigree yacht. Forget the concept of "just taking part" and join a team dedicated to racing hard.
The qualifications for the race are similar to that of the Fastnet, which are to have competed in RORC offshore races during the season leading up to the race itself, or if weather intervenes a long passage of over 250 miles.
The race itself should take us around 3 days depending on the weather. After the race we shall celebrate in true Irish style.
| Training week-end | Fully qualified skipper & crew | |
| Two qualifying RORC races | Food and drink on-board | |
| Passage to and from Cowes / Wicklow | Race entry fees | |
| Round Ireland Race | Mooring fees | |
| Return passage from Wicklow | Crew shirt |
| Date | Race | Destination | Distance |
| 21st April | Training Weekend | Solent | TBC |
| 5th May | Morgan Cup | Channel Markers | 120 miles |
| 1st June | Cervantes Trophy | Deauville | 115 miles |
| 24h June | Round Ireland Race | Circumnavigate Ireland | 704 miles |
Venomous is a state of the art 60’ race yacht complete with Carbon fibre mast and boom.
She comes with an impressive 30 sail wardrobe. With her downwind sail area of 4490sq ft she will certainly get the adrenalin pumping and those muscles burning.
Venomous has been developed as a high performance and very sophisticated race machine intended to race – fast.
During the 2011 season Venomous was 1st in Big Boat class of the RORC Championship with many podium places throughout the season. Venomous also won the Transatlantic Race to St Lucia, 2007 and runner up in 2010.
Venomous is ideal for this race as her roomy interior allows for excellent living space rare in this caliber of yacht. A consistent performer in the Royal Ocean Racing Club’s offshore series for the past 4 years. Venomous is fantastic to sail with her masthead spinnakers and powerful main sail. She will allow all crew to experience all parts of big yacht racing. A great boat to learn and improve sailing skills as well as being extremely competitive.
The yacht will come with a skipper and 2 mates all of whom will have extensive knowledge of the boat and all aspects of offshore yacht racing and tactics. The crew will be made up of people such as yourselves who are enthusiastic about sailing, racing, and winning. Full training in racing comes with the package and our aim come the end of the campaign is that any one of the crew members will have the ability and confidence to step onto any race boat and become a key member of any team.
During the races you will have a chance to try all aspects of yacht racing including foredeck, pit, trimming helming and Navigation. For a long distance race it is essential that the crew have sailed together to get to know one another so that a winning team can be formed. Everyone will need to know the boat well before embarking on the big adventure, including training such as Safety at Sea.
The training weekend will be based in and around the Solent. The weekend will be used for sorting out crew positions and generally getting to know each other. During the weekend everyone will get a chance to have a go at all aspects of sailing the yachts and to find out whether offshore racing is for them. The yachts will moor at Cowes in the evenings and you will have plenty of time to sample our local pubs and Restaurants.
This Channel race is designed as a 24-36 hour stamina-building race based on the sailing times for the average boat in the fleet. The race kicks off early Saturday morning. The course will be set 10 minutes prior to the start of the race which will give the navigators 24-36 hours of headaches. The style of course set should have many corners and will no doubt cover all points of sail, so there will definitely be plenty to do on deck. You will get to try out more than one position on this race we do this in order to spread the work load of grinding and also to keep the trimming fresh and alert. Tactically a difficult race as the legs are relatively short it gives no margin for error for the navigator and will test the teamwork of the crew. We should arrive back in Cowes sometime Sunday and it is pretty much guaranteed that you will be exhausted at the end of this weekend!
An evening start to this race sees the fleet head west out of the Solent as directly as they can the picturesque port of Deauville. A total race distance of 115 miles should see us in port for a good French lunch before heading back to the Solent for a Sunday lunchtime finish. A longer race the usual RORC weekend course and should show how a good watch system works.
Because of the evening start you will need to be in Cowes at sometime to suit you Friday afternoon. The initial racing will be done during night hours, so is an ideal race for those who really want to get a feel of what the boat can achieve but with the disadvantage of darkness.
We plan to leave the Solent on 20th June for the passage to Wicklow taking about 3 days. On arrival time will be spent restocking the boat in readiness for the race itself. The Round Ireland Race starts from Wicklow at 14.00pm local time. The course is to leave Ireland and all its islands (excluding Rockall) to starboard. The course distance is approximately 704 miles and we expect to complete the circumnavigation of Ireland in about 3 to 4 days. During the race the whole team will have to work together to keep the racing going 24 hours a day. Watch systems will allow for adequate time for sleep so when on deck everyone is alert and mind set on sailing performance. On arrival back in Wicklow we will celebrate in local style, rest and then set sail back for our home waters of Cowes.
We hope that you have found this information of some use and hope to hear from you soon to book your place with us. Please remember we are not a cruising school, we specialise in racing and race training on yachts equipped for racing.
We have successfully trained up crews for race campaigns. Of which some people have been complete novices and some with just cruising and dinghy background. Our experienced skippers and crew willingly give comprehensive training on board and support ashore.
We are once again offering a staged payment plan, which will be 20% on booking (£390), and then the balance spread out over 4 months from 1 March to 1 June. (£390 per payment)
We hope that you have found this of some interest and if you would like more in-depth information please do not hesitate to contact by email or telephone. We look forward to hearing from you soon.
Once we have received your booking form and deposit we can confirm your place with us on our Round Ireland Campaign.
To download Windward Sailings RORC Round Ireland brochure and booking form, click here.