Classic_Boat_2016-09

CLASSIC BOAT SEPTEMBER 2016

WATER WAGS

58

The 2015 Galey Bay Regatta was organised by

Cathy to mark the launch of her new Water Wag,

Mariposa, which she built with master boatbuilder

Jimmy Furey, and to celebrate the 100th birthdays of

two other Wags, Barbara and Mary Kate. When it

became clear Mariposa wasn’t going to be ready in

time, Cathy decided to have a boat blessing instead,

but two problems presented themselves: how to get

everyone to Jimmy’s workshop to see the new boat,

and how to get 89-year-old Jimmy to the water to see

the fleet gathered partly in his honour. The solution,

she decided, was to part the waters (rushes) and bring

the mountain (Wags) to Moses (Jimmy).

Biblical references don’t seem out of place when

talking about a class as old as the Water Wags. It was

1886 when Dublin lawyer Thomas Middleton had the

revolutionary idea of building a fleet of identical boats to

race together on Dublin Bay. He acknowledged the

double-ended dinghy he proposed might not be the

fastest on the bay, but he wrote: “Speed is only found by

comparison, and as all the boats will be the same a true

and most exciting race will ensue, a race where every

boat will have the same chance, a race that will be a

contest of the crew, not of designers and sailmakers”.

In one stroke the concept of one-design racing was

born and the future of yacht racing transformed forever.

Nearly 130 years later, the Water Wags still race on

Dublin Bay every Wednesday night (albeit with the

‘new’, transom-sterned design introduced in 1899).

In a concerted effort to revive the class for its

anniversary in 1987, many old boats were restored and

several new boats were built, and the class has gone

from strength to strength. A dozen new boats have

been built since then, and last year’s top event, the

Captain’s Prize Race, was raced by 28 boats – the

biggest gathering of Wags ever.

Back on the Shannon, 13 boats turned up for the first

day of racing on Blackbrink Bay, squeezing in three races

around a windward/leeward course. Competition among

Wags is usually pretty intense, and the class has spawned

several Olympic sailors, including Ireland’s very first

Olympic team, back in 1948 – a tradition maintained by

Cathy, who competed in Seoul in 1988. The racing on

the Shannon was more relaxed, however, as the results

didn’t count towards the season’s overall rankings.

That didn’t stop most of fleet bunching up at the start

of every race, anxious to be the first over the line and

prompting at least one general recall. It’s a measure of

how well these crews know each other that the first two

races that day were won by the same two boats that had

been vying for top place for most of the year: Cathy and

Con on Mollie and Guy and Jackie Kilroy on Swift

• both boats built after 2000. The surprise of the day
  came in the third race when Harry Croxon and Killian
  Skay won on the 80-year-old Maureen, which is usually
  to be found towards the bottom of the fleet. But then the
  older Wags have a habit of pulling surprises, and half the
  boats in last year’s top 10 were built before 1940.
  With the racing done, the boats followed Cathy
  and, one by one, sailed into the channel and through
  the rushes to Jimmy’s field. It was a bizarre sight, all
  these boats sailing determinedly into the tall grasses,
  leaving just the top of their sails peering over, and it’s
  another measure of the class’s team spirit that everyone
  went along with Cathy’s madcap idea. Having moored
  the boats in the cut, the crews got a lift back to
  Lecarrow on the committee boat before returning by
  car to admire Mariposa and eat the birthday cakes.

Clockwise from

left: Jimmy Furey

at his house on

the banks of the

Shannon; Swift,

winner of the

Jubilee Cup in

2015; David

Macfarlane (left)

crewing on

Moosmie