Scottish Series Trophy Holders Brian Hall’s J/109 Something Else set for a return

Among a strong contingent of entries from Ireland who are bound for Tarbert, Loch Fyne and the 2026 Jura Scottish Series are the overall winners of last year’s top award, Brian Hall and the crew of the Dublin Bay J/109 Something Else, are returning to try and defend their IRC Class 2 title.

Hall, from the National YC, has long since considered the Jura Scottish Series ‘unmissable’ but he and his crew are especially enthused at the prospect of trying to win their class again at the north of Britian’s premier regatta which takes place on Loch Fyne over the holiday weekend 22nd-25th May.

They are returning with their well optimised boat and the same crew headed by Irish four times Olympian Mark Mansfield, himself a long-time fan of Tarbert and Scottish Series.

Hall recalls, “Winning last year was such a nice start to the season, it is always a good dust down. Taking the overall trophy was wonderful but the whole thing is such great fun. I've been going up there for years, and there's such close racing, and it's just great to be up in such a good venue.”

Something Else won six of their eight races last May, a scoreline which was judged to the best performance at the regatta.

“Last year it was consistency that won us the class.” Hall recalls, “ We had excellent teamwork, and the boat was fast, but the crew were really well organised, and so it was down to huge team effort and focus. We also had Mark Mansfield, who was great in terms of giving just that extra focus to everybody.”

Tarbert’s craic is half the appeal
Hall says he has been crossing the Irish Sea to compete at Scottish Series for more than 30 years and can’t wait to be back. “ Why Tarbert? So it's the welcome. It's a lovely setting. The people, the locals are great craic. It's a good set-up. The race organisation is A1. And for us it's the start of the season, so it's a real sort of dust-off, a prep, a wake-up for the summer sailing season.”

He enthuses, “We are ready. The boat’s in good shape, and all the crew are very excited. It's the highlight for them over the next couple of months.”

And he believes they can win again but cautions, “Look, the competition is anybody's event. There's really good sailors up there. There are excellent J/109s in the class, a couple of Corbys as well, so the competition is good. We had the momentum last year, and one shouldn't be complacent at all. And who knows? The overall is always up for grabs.”

Hall concludes, “We are looking forwards to the craic’ The evening entertainment is always good. We look forward to that.”

Racing starts on Friday 22nd May and concludes with the prizegiving after racing Monday 25th May.