McNaughton finishes second at Irish Sailing Youth C’ships

CORA McNaughton and her crew Sean Cronin finished second place at the Irish Sailing Youth National Championships in the 420 Class in Howth at the 4-day event over Easter.

Cora from Old Bawn in Tallaght and Sean’s main goal on entering the 4-day competition was to finish the races which presented with the heavier wind conditions.

They successfully achieved this on their first day while navigating through gusts of up to 30 knots (which is impressive for any professional sailor), they even managed to finish with a 2nd and 3rd place in these conditions.

Cora and Sean went onto win three races and even overcame gear failure in the last race on Saturday by doing overnight repairs and going onto win their race on Sunday.

This was a great achievement considering Cora finished in 9th position last year.

Making the result even sweeter was the fact that they were the highest placed sailors in their under 19 category.

Both competitors have since been selected to represent Ireland in the International 420 Class Junior European Championships in Gydnia, Poland in the summer.

Again, this is a huge achievement considering they are only 15- years-old.

Cora is following in the footsteps of her brother Jack who represented Ireland at the 420 Junior Europeans in 2022 and her mother Paula who was a 420 National Champion and represented Ireland in the Optimist Europeans in 1989.

Sean is also following in the footsteps of his brother who was the Irish National Optimist (dinghy) Champion in 2022.

The Irish Youth Nationals celebrated 180 sailors from all over Ireland across 6 different classes battling through testing conditions from 30 knot gusts to light winds and strong tides.

Many of these young sailors have been training throughout the winter in gale-force, ice and snow conditions in preparation for this event as it is the qualifying event for all classes for international competitions.

Every single participant should be commended for this!

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