Ian Moore talks to madforsailing

The new man at illbruck tells Ed Gorman how he started in sailing and talks about the big challenges ahead

Ian, where did you start sailing?
I was brought up in Northern Ireland and I first sailed at the local sailing club in Newcastle, Co Down. It's just a tiny little harbour there and we used to sail Mirror dinghies. My parents were very, very keen sailors and I just got dragged along.

So did you start racing in Northern Ireland?
Yes. When I got a bit older, we moved up to Carrickfergus. They've got a competitive cruiser-racer set-up there and that's where I started my racing on old IOR boats and small one-designs.

And you were educated there obviously?
I did my A-Levels there and then moved across to Southampton University because they had more better sailing than anywhere else in the country. I studied ship science at Southampton - basically a naval architecture degree.

When did you get your first big break?
It was all Eddie Warden-Owen's fault. I was doing the bow - I did a lot of regattas as bowman - and I was aboard David McClean's Babbalaas and we were doing the Commodores' Cup in '96. Unfortunately we didn't have enough Welsh people and they made me do the navigation because they could find a Welsh bowman but they couldn't find anyone else to navigate. So I became the navigator for the regatta and ended up doing the bow as well as it turned out. Eddie said 'you did a good job, thanks very much' and the next year, he said 'we're looking for someone who can navigate and who can do more than just navigate on the Mumm 36 Breeze in the Italian Admiral's Cup team.' That was then, and I've been navigating ever since.

Do you regard yourself more as a navigator than a tactician or both?
A navigator principally. You can't help but be involved in tactics if you are a navigator, but I am essentially a navigator.

Have you had to go out of your way to learn the skills or has it come more or less naturally to you with your background in naval architecture and so on?
There's a bit of both. Doing a lot of cruising as a kid, you learn the basics of navigation early on. And then just by doing a lot of sailing on different boats, you pick up the tactical side of things. And I did quite a bit of match racing with some really good guys. You pick up a huge amount of rules doing that. But there are certain bits and pieces which you just have to study. Meteorology - I've done quite a lot of work to increase my skills in that area. But a lot of it you just learn from experience and by making notes and trying to remember stuff.

Since Breeze, what other campaigns have you sailed with before joining illbruck?
Breeze turned into a 50-footer in which I did the Admiral's Cup again in '99 and since Cowes Week of that year I have been the navigator on Sagamore, Jim Dolan's ILC maxi. We did the Cape to Rio race and were second in that and we won in last year's Newport-Bermuda race.

That's a pretty nice job - navigating on Sagamore?
It's a great job. It's a beautiful boat - a fantastic boat. It's a very difficult game to try and beat Sayonara, our main competition, because they've been at it for a very long time and Sayonara's a very competitive boat. But I've really enjoyed sailing with those guys. Some of those maxis have really glamorous nav stations - Sagamore is not like that - it's just like sitting downstairs in a big empty hull with a laptop and that's about it.

When you stepped up to the big time in the Admiral's Cup with Eddie, did you find it a big leap from club sailing and the Commodores' Cup? Did you feel the pressure?
Massively. It was quite intimidating. Suddenly stepping onto a boat with Tomasso Chieffi and Roy Heiner and just guys that spend 200/300 days a year sailing and they are expecting the information to be right first time, every time. It was very intimidating. But it just made you want to achieve the same level as them and it was quite inspiring in that way.

Was there a moment when you felt 'this is it, I can do this' and the confidence came?
During that Admiral's Cup there was one time when everybody else went round the mark the wrong way and I called that we should leave the mark to starboard. I realised then that everyone else can make mistakes as well and at least it was possible to be in the same league as these guys.

Continued....