This St Patrick's Day, Cork, will be the venue for Red Bull City Currach – a high-octane revamp of traditional currach racing...
C urrach
A currach is a type of rowing boat that originates from Ireland's seafaring heritage and was traditionally made from animal skins stretched over a wooden frame. It is similar to the coracle that emerged from Wales, however the coracle is considerably smaller than some of the larger currachs. It has traditionally been used both at sea and on inland waters.
Unique
The currach's design and construction of is believed to be unique to the Irish and Scottish west coasts, allowing for variations in shape and size by region. It is sometimes referred to as a naomhóg in the counties of Kerry and Cork and in West Clare as a canoe.
R ed Bull City Currach
Is a new sporting concept, which will see crews from around Ireland do battle for ultimate honours. The event will see both local & visiting crews competing in three currach heats, with each boat manned by four oarsmen. Red Bull City Currach will begin at 11.45am, directly before the St Patrick's Day Parade, in the section of river along Merchant’s Quay between Brian Boru & St. Patrick’s Bridge.
R ace
Red Bull City Currach offers a brand new racing format that places large demands on the competing athletes – technique, power, concentration, reaction speed. The demanding course is designed to create highly competitive, lung bursting racing & will feature fiercely competitive crews from along the west coast.
A specialised industry
Renowned Cork-based boat builders ‘Meitheal Mara’ will co-manage the event & supply their lightweight, streamlined currachs, which will be used by all the competitors in Red Bull City Currach.
C ourse
As opposed to a straight race, crews will have to slalom their way through a course of buoys, without dropping speed & complete two laps of this gruelling course. Because the course is extremely narrow (a fraction of standard currach racing) and a set of buoys must be navigated – this will ensure each race places huge demands on the crews – requiring strength to power the boat, skill to manoeuvre around the buoys & mental awareness to ensure they don’t crash into their direct competition!
History
The usage of the currach is thought to date back to at least around the year 500 when a Latin account of the voyage of St Brendan describes a similar vessel to the currach in it's modern form. Despite conjecture over the truth of the voyage, the impliction is that the boat was based on one that was widely used at the time. Some accounts claim a much earlier presence of the currach – from 100 BC and accounts of that time speak of large ocean going sailing currachs roving the North Atlantic.
Watch currach racing in Limerick below:
Want more?
- Find out more at Cork's currach racing club site
- Discover more at Meitheal Mara's site
- Check out all the Water Sports action on redbull.ie
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