Royal Cork’s Anthony O’Leary is the Afloat.ie/Irish Independent Sailor of the Month for May for his outstanding performance in IRC racing in Ireland and Scotland.
With the purchase of his previously chartered Antix Eile he made his first appearance in Irish waters with the renamed Antix at the Kinsale Spring Series where he finished second to Marinerscove.ie by a mere two points. His results since have proven to be nothing short of outstanding. He went on to be the overall winner of the Cork to Dun Laoghaire race and showed superb form to take the Class 0 IRC title at the Liebherr ICRA Nationals in Dublin.
Immediately after this outstanding victory in Dublin Antix then headed North to Scotland to compete in the four day Scottish Series in Loch Fyne. For this event the racing was extremely tough and demanding with a mix of conditions including extremely light wind. With the risk of your scribe being at the receiving end of criticism yet again from the eastern end of the country for not mentioning the names of the entire team on each boat, dare I mention the crew included son Peter. Also there was the additional factor of French competition at the event adding some flavour of what may be expected at the Commodores Cup in August. However, Anthony had his mind firmly fixed on the sailing and went harder and harder finishing out the series with two wins on the final day. His competitive streak and form is well known and one has only to look back to the Commodores Cup in 2008 when he won Class One (the big boat class) with a score of 24 points and the second placed Class One boat from the winning GBR Red Team Fair Do’s V11 could only manage 45 points.
All in all a truly well deserved title of Sailor of the Month. Congratulations.
No comments yet.