The last Sunday of the Frostbites, hosted by Dun Laoghaire Motor Yacht Club and sponsored by Viking Marine ended on a high with steady winds out of the north that allowed two races to be sailed without adjustment of the course, allowing two 3-lap Olympic courses to be set. The wind strength was up on forecasts on both XCWeather and Windy getting as high as 16/17 knots in Race 1 but easing for Race 2.
This allowed a large course to be set on the N/S axis of the harbour with a mark in the middle of the harbour mouth, a gybe mark in the middle of the harbour and a leeward mark off the end of the Carlisle Pier and close to the East Pier. Indeed, some of the pedestrians on the East Pier were able to enjoy a close-up view of a Fireball trying to get off the wall which at that stage was almost like a lee shore.
All three fleets, PY, ILCA 7s & 4s and ILCA 6s had good fleets out for the first race but the robust conditions of the early afternoon took its toll on the ILCA 6s in particular with nearly a quarter of the fleet not staying out for the second race. The races were sailed in overcast conditions with a bit of drizzle that gave way to drier conditions and late in the afternoon the sun also made an appearance.
A late prompt from a competitor suggesting the start line was very pin biased caused the Race Officer to amend the pin position and this paid off as all three fleets got away cleanly at the first time of asking. In the PY race Frank Miller (14915) persuaded the newest helm in the Irish Fireball fleet, Jack McNaughton, to go on the trapeze and they were rewarded with a big win on the water, romping home by 1:30 on father and son Frank & Hugh Cassidy (14934) with Neil Colin & Margaret Casey (14775) a further twenty seconds adrift and Alastair Court & Gordon Syme (15167) another twenty seconds behind. Court & Syme’s early race was looking much better, but a hail of water at the first leeward mark from Cassidy and a subsequent capsize in dropping the kite didn’t help the Court cause. As usual, however, despite a delta of 2:40 on Noel Butler (Aero 6 3289) and 4:28 on Roy Van Maanen (Aero 6 3822) on the water, Miller & McNaughton were relegated to third on handicap. Behind Miller, the Aero 6 (3433) of Sarah Dwyer and the Aero 7 (3288) of Stephen Oram closed out the top five.
The ILCA 7s have seen an injection of enthusiasm in recent weeks and they had eight boats on the water for the third or fourth Sunday in a row. Racing in this fleet has been tight and as of the previous Sunday less that ten points covered positions 1 – 4 in Series 2. Here the order saw Conor Byrne lead them home in Race 1, followed by Gary O’Hare, Sean Bowden, Gavan Murphy and Niall Cowman.
In the ILCA 6s, the master has been Sean Craig – those that know Sean will recognise the pun! He scored the first of two wins by a comfortable margin with the chasing pack led by Conor Clancy and followed by John O’Driscoll, Brendan Hughes and David Cahill.
In the ILCA 4s Lucy Ives has made a late season entry into the proceedings and has been rewarded with a win in each of the races in which she has featured. On Sunday she took both races with Patrick Foley and Zeta Tempany finishing behind her in the same order, second and third, in both races.
The second race, the starting procedures was blotted by one OCS, but the transgressor was identified and the appropriate flag flown – the boat didn’t return.
In the PY Fleet, Court and Syme made amends for their struggles by winning by a huge margin – they were the only boat to finish in under 30 minutes, 28:47. As a measure of their lead on the water, some random finish times are as follows; Butler, 32:33, Oram, 32:46, Dwyer, 34:38, Colin & Casey 30:01 and Miller 31:11. But on paper they lost out to Butler by 47 seconds, but saved their time against Oram, Dwyer and Van Maanen.
In the ILCA 7s, Byrne and O’Hare repeated their feat of first and second from the first race, but behind them the order was changed with Murphy, Chris Arrowsmith and Niall Cowman closing out the top five.
In the ILCA 6s, Craig took another win, with the order behind him being Hughes, Hugh Delap, Clancy and O’Driscoll.
And that brought the curtain down on the 2022/23 Frostbites!
Frostbites Series 2 Overall
PY Fleet
1st Noel Butler, Aero 6
2nd Stephen Oram, Aero 7
3rd Sarah Dwyer, Aero 6
4th Stuart Harris, Aero 6
5th Pierre & Remy Long, IDRA 14.
6th Alastair Court & Gordon Syme, Fireball.
ILCAs 7s
1st Conor Byrne
2nd Theo Lyttle
3rd Sean Bowden
4th Gavan Murphy
5th Chris Arrowsmith
ILCA 6s
1st Sean Craig
2nd Conor Clancy
3rd Darren Griffin
4th John O’Driscoll
5th David Cahill
ILCA 4s
1st Patrick Foley
2nd Zita Tempany
3rd Grace Gavin.
At the post racing prize-giving in the DMYC clubhouse with Frostbite sponsor Ian O’Meara in attendance the prizes for the combined Series were awarded with Ian doing the honours in tandem with Frostbites Director Neil Colin, who welcomed the competitors to the club.
Principal Race Officer, Cormac Bradley made a few observations on the racing, noting that since Christmas we had managed to race every Sunday, only losing three races, one to rising winds and two to insufficient wind. This contrasted with the pre-Christmas Series when only six races from a potential fourteen had been completed. He thanked those competitors who had discreetly assessed his beats at his invitation to make sure this leg of the course was fair. He also noted and thanked the volunteers who turned out week in, week out to allow racing to take place – mark-layers, rib crews, committee boat volunteers, the results team and the bar and catering staff who look after us after racing. DMYC Commodore, Ian Cutliffe, thanked all the competitors who raced the Series and also thanked the volunteers.
Viking Marine sponsored Frostbites
Overall Series Results 2022/23
PY Fleet (37 entries)
1st Noel Butler, Aero 6, 31pts – Perpetual Trophy
2nd Stephen Oram, Aero 7, 90.5pts
3rd Roy Van Maanen, Aero 6, 112pts
4th Sarah Dwyer, Aero 6, 118pts
5th Stuart Harris, Aero 6, 131pts
6th Alastair Court & Gordon Syme, Fireball 15167, 144pts – Perpetual Trophy.
ILCA 7s (11 entries)
1st Gavan Murphy, 212521, 78pts
2nd Conor Byrne, 181204, 81pts
3rd Theo Lyttle, 211129, 90pts.
ILCA 6s (39 entries)
1st Sean Craig, 218154, 30pts – Perpetual Trophy
2nd Conor Clancy, 213048, 58pts
3rd Darren Griffin, 219867, 65pts
4th John O’Driscoll, 210361, 106pts
5th David Cahill, 186302, 116pts
7th Shirley Gilmour, 143pts.
ILCA 4s (8 entries)
1st Zita Tempany, 211122, 37pts
2nd Patrick Foley, 211274, 39pts
3rd Grace Gavin, 213526, 50pts.
Fireballs only (12 entries)
1st Frank Miller & Ed Butler, Neil Cramer, 14915, 48pts
2nd Alastair Court & Gordon Syme, 15167, 53pts
3rd Louise McKenna & Hermine O’Keeffe, 15016, 65pts.
Aeros only (8 entries)
1st Noel Butler, (6) 3289, 26pts
2nd Roy Van Maanen, (6) 3822, 60pts
3rd Stephen Oram, (7) 3288, 66pts.
In addition to perpetual trophies for the PY Class, the ILCAs and the Fireballs, vouchers for the first three in each of PY, ILCA 7s, 6s and 4s were presented by Viking Marine as well as prizes to Shirley Gilmore and Sarah Dwyer for being the first Lady in the ILCA 6s and the PY Fleets, respectively.
On receipt of his perpetual trophy, Sean Craig spoke on behalf of all the ILCA fleets to commend DMYC and the volunteers for what he considered to be an exceptionally good series, particularly since Christmas. He noted that the day’s racing would not have looked out of place at a more serious championship. He suggested that a racing fleet of 39 ILCA 6s would currently be hard to beat anywhere.
Noel Butler echoed Sean’s sentiments and noted that this was his 28th or 29th Frostbites without missing a year and agreed that the racing in 2023, in particular had been very good.