Two challenging boat races coming to Plymouth this summer

7th March 2025

Two boat races will be coming to Plymouth, Britain's Ocean City later in 2025.

Both the Round Iceland Race (1 June) and the Centenary Race (10 August) will see boats visit the waters of Plymouth Sound National Marine Park as part of thir respective routes, with entries still available to both exciting races. 

The Round Iceland Race 25 will start on Sunday 1^st June 2025 for what is regarded as one of  the most challenging 2000-mile offshore yacht race there is in the Northern Hemisphere. Entrants include crews who are using this for their qualifying miles for the World Star ’26 as well as those who simply want the ultimate challenge within the northern hemisphere.

The Round Iceland Race (RIR) will be in its second edition and will start from Plymouth Sound National Marine Park. The course, quite simply, is to leave the Eddystone Lighthouse to Starboard, Iceland to Starboard and finish on the Royal Western Yacht Club line.

This ORC Cat 1 race will be open to solo, double handed and fully crewed yachts. Classes will be open to multi and monohulls from 27ft to 65ft. IRC, MOCRA and non-rated yachts may enter, along with Open60’s pre 2007 and Open40’s who will be offered their own class.

Find out more about Round Iceland Race and enter to take part in this year's event.

Following this, the Centenary Race will come to Plymouth in August. The race is set to celebrate the significant part that the Royal Western Yacht Club (RWYC) played in the formation of the Fastnet race back in 1925. It was members of the RWYC who had a bet as to who would win on this new and exciting course from Ryde Bank in the Eastern Solent, exiting Eastward and leaving the Isle of Wight to Starboard, then rounding the Fastnet Rock and ultimately finishing in Plymouth Sound some days later.

This is in fact the second time this racecourse has ever been offered as the following race started off Cowes and went Westward passing the needles to port. The race will once again encapsulate everything that oceanic sailing stands for and recognise in the spirit of tradition what our forefathers set out before us as the classic offshore course.

Starting from the vicinity of Ryde Bank and exiting the Solent due East, the Centenary Race will follow that original course and will finish, as it did in 1925, in Plymouth Sound.

Find out more about The Centenary Race and enter to take part in this year's event.