Full Send on Lough Derg

Eight Winners, One Champion at the 1720 Europeans

Ross McDonald's Rope Dock Atara won the 2026 1720 European Championship at Lough Derg Yacht Club over the weekend of September 4 to 6, finishing nine points clear of the fleet after ten races. Sailing with Julian Hughes, Robbie English, Paddy Good and Rory O'Sullivan, McDonald's Howth Yacht Club crew counted nine finishes of sixth or better and closed the series on 26 net points.

Robert Dix's LemonCello was second on 35 points, and Fionn Lyden's Spiced Beef, arriving as defending European champion after winning on Galway Bay in 2025, took third on 43. Rory Lynch's MO was fourth.

All four of those boats were racing one design X-Drive^® sails and Matrix^® spinnakers from UK Sailmakers Ireland, and a good share of the 17 boat fleet was flying sails from the Cork-based loft.

A lake that gave the fleet everything

The championship produced three very different days. Two of them were properly windy, with gusts touching 37 knots and Race Officer Michael Tyrrell calling for smaller jibs and kites as conditions demanded. The 1720s responded by planing at up to 18 knots downwind, and more than one crew found a way to put the rig in the water. The remaining day brought medium air, full sails and Lough Derg's famous shifting breeze, which reshuffled the leaderboard from one leg to the next.

Being inland turned out to be the saving grace.

"We were lucky to be on a lake because we likely wouldn't have gotten racing Friday or Sunday with the strong winds we had," said Rory Lynch, skipper of the fourth placed MO.

Eight different boats won races across the ten race series, which says everything about the depth of this fleet. Olympic campaigners lined up alongside class veterans and a growing group of younger sailors, with mixed male and female crews throughout.

"The sailing was excellent, really tight races all weekend," Lynch said. "The level of racing is really high in the 1720 fleet. And the fact that it's one design racing makes it even more special."

The story behind MO

MO is a family boat in the most literal sense. Rory Lynch is at the helm, and the boat is named for his grandmother Maureen, who follows every result the crew posts.

The regular crew are friends who have sailed together for years, with one notable addition for the weekend. Rory's younger brother Finn Lynch, a full time ILCA 7 campaigner fresh off an eighth place finish at the ILCA 7 World Championship in Dún Laoghaire the week before, joined them on board.

"He rarely joins us on board," Rory said, "but it's definitely an advantage to us to get his tactical insight in that really difficult fleet."

Three seasons old and still going

For a weekend that swung from 37 knot gusts to shifty medium air, sail speed across the range mattered.

"We were delighted with our upwind speed in both the super windy and medium conditions that we experienced," Rory said. "We've had UK sails since we bought the boat, and even though they are now three seasons old, they are clearly going well!"

Congratulations to Ross McDonald and the Atara crew, to everyone who made the trip to Lough Derg, and to Lough Derg Yacht Club for running a championship in conditions that asked a lot of everyone involved.

Talk to Barry Hayes and the team at UK Sailmakers Ireland about 1720 one design sails and get a quote.

Full results from the 2026 1720 European Championships available here.