Sailing Worldの Fall 2018 の目次

YOU KNOW THOSE beautifully quiet, majestically serene offshore moments? Well they don’t happen here.” What Taylor Walker is referring to is the constant drum of conversation among the crew of Dreamcatcher, a 1972 Swan 48 currently being sailed by the young MudRatz Racing Team. Several hours earlier, we are tied to a dock in Stamford, Connecticut, preparing for an overnight practice on Long Island Sound. Two weeks remain until the start of the 51st Newport to Bermuda Race, and with only a handful of practice nights on board, tonight’s objectives are clear: gain experience sailing in the dark, test new instruments and deliver the boat 70 miles to Mystic, Connecticut, where a morning rig-tune session and evening fundraiser await. MudRatz was born in spring 2014 from interest in creating a…

Late in the afternoon on January 6, 2018, the Volvo Ocean Race fleet was charging northward at more than 15 knots across the Coral Sea, sailing a leg of the race from Melbourne, Australia, to Hong Kong. The Volvo Ocean 65s were many miles from the nearest port. SHK Scallywag, in last place on the position reports, was crossing over the vast Lansdowne Bank. On the north end of the bank, there is an area called Nereus Reef, where the water depth is only 12 feet deep in some places. Scallywag drew just over 15 feet. Every boat in the fleet was being tracked electronically, and Rick Tomlinson, the official observer on duty in the event’s race-control office, was monitoring their tracks. According to the international jury serving as the…

At the Thistle Midwinters West, sailed in the Pacific Ocean, off of San Diego, each morning, surfers were eagerly launching off of nearby Sunset Cliffs. Surf’s up! It was great for them, but challenging for us. We sailed two days of clinic, then raced three days, all in significant Pacific Ocean swells, which gave us five days to figure it out, and as a result, we learned some valuable lessons. Though not mountains, they were large, fast-moving hills. In the troughs we could only see the top half of another boat’s sails, and there was no hope of spotting a mark unless we were both on a crest. Going fast in these rollers was further complicated by their direction. On port tack, they came from the windward side. On starboard,…

Few grandchildren can boast that their grandfather won not one but two Olympic sailing medals. Seventeen-year-old Harry Melges IV is one of those. His grandfather, 88-year-old Harry Melges II, more widely known as Buddy Melges, has a bronze and a gold medal to his credit, along with a slew of wins in other big-league championships. And Harry IV is a chip off the old block, already dominating a number of scow classes and recently winning the Melges 14 National Championship. Young Harry and his crew, Wisconsinite Finn Rowe, have jumped into the 49er class, and while it’s very early on in their campaign, the clear goal is to match his grandfather’s achievement. At the Lake Geneva Yacht Club on a mid-June afternoon, Buddy is dressed in his usual khaki pants…

Niklas Zennström’s new jet-black carbon-fiber race boat is likened to Darth Vader’s mask. Thanks to its color and angular looks, “Batboat” is another of the many compliments the craft has earned while turning heads in the waters off England’s south coast this summer. Indeed, Rán VII, the latest grand-prix machine for the Swedish technology giant, is showered with accolades; even Zennström praises his own craft effusively. “Honestly,” he says, “this is the most fun boat I have raced. Downwind I think it’s possibly faster than a TP52 or Maxi72. It just lights up.” He’s right, and while Rán VII’s results stand as proof of its quickness, anyone who’s chased it around a racecourse will wholeheartedly agree, you’d be hard-pressed to find a faster 40-footer today. Grand-prix inshore yacht racing on…

In 10 years, only 10 years, the Olympics return to Los Angeles. If it’s your job to put the United States on top in medals won, that might be the right amount of time. Thirty-four years ago, at Los Angeles, American sailors medaled in every class. Lately, not so much. But on the upside … American kids won four gold medals at the 2018 Youth Worlds. And one silver medal. And the Nations Cup for the best national performance. And it was no accident. Four years ago, Project Pipeline kicked off to join the talent development of regional youth programs with Olympic-level coaching from the U.S. National Team. Now we see what that can do. The kids are cranking, the kids believe, and maybe, just maybe, it’s easier for the…

Spinnaker staysails have three specific tasks: cleaning up the wind going around the front of the mainsail, moving the center of effort forward to help balance the helm and adding more sail area. Genoa staysails are also used when jib reaching, but that’s mostly an offshore setup, and we’re going to focus sailing around the buoys. A spinnaker staysail has a subtle effect. It’s never going to make the boat just light up and really go, but if you average your speed with a staysail over the length of a leg, you’ll discover you’re definitely sailing faster, and the boat will be more controllable. On the TP52, we think it’s important enough to have the staysail on deck, plugged in and ready to go at the start of any race…

“All good up here?” I ask the bowman who is rotating off the boat we are rotating onto. It’s a courteous way of asking if I’ll run into any surprises or potential breakdowns as I get my playground in order. We’re midway through the Argo Bermuda Gold Cup Match Race Regatta. Our skipper, Taylor Canfield, and the rest of my teammates make quick pleasantries with the passing crew. They’re not as upbeat as we are. Perhaps they are not having as good of a day or just lost a match. With four matches going on at once, it’s hard to know how anybody is doing at any given moment. “All aboard?” asks the “barge master” before sending us on our way, making room for the next set of teams to…

Tim Ray only knew of Tom Allen because of his top-notch reputation among the many classes in which the Allen family has served as boatbuilders, champions and mentors to many. So, unannounced, he walked into the Allen Boat Co. in Buffalo, New York, a few years ago and proposed a trade: business consulting for workshop space. Fast-forward to today; Ray is running a rope-manufacturing facility with Allen. What might seem to be quite a leap from that initial barter is not so farfetched. Each of them shares a work ethic and deep passion for the sport. Ray has a degree in environmental science, as well as experience in the field. Besides being able to help companies navigate environmental regulations, he’s the kind of guy who replaces old lights in the…

Striding through the Volvo Ocean Race Village that bloomed out of the concrete around Auckland’s Via duct Harbour, Blair Tuke is on a mission. / When he reaches the Mapfre base out on the Halsey Wharf, he enters a jam-packed shipping container, wedging himself between towers of freeze-dried food and racks of foul-weather gear that are waiting for the next dive into the Southern Ocean. He quickly whips off his team shirt and pulls on a black T-shirt that is distinctly Kiwi. The illustration on the tee is a chalkboard with a tally of some of the country’s more popular fish — snapper, kahawai and kingies. Aside from sailing, fishing is Tuke’s other love. Offshore veteran Neal McDonald, Mapfre’s performance manager, pokes his head into the container. “You’ve come in disguise…

WAYNE ZITTEL, a tall, lanky Southern Californian whose youthful demeanor belies his several decades as a professional sailor, describes the emotions most of his students experience through the early hours of the 1,000-mile San Diego to Puerto Vallarta Race. “The first thing I tell them,” says Zittel, owner of J/World Performance Sailing School in San Diego, “is that 36 hours into the race, you’re going to climb into your berth, you’re going to be wet, you’re going to be cold and you’re probably going to be seasick.” They’ll be thinking, This is the stupidest thing I’ve ever done. Then comes Stage 2: wondering why they signed up in the first place. A strong desire to get off the boat comes next. Then they start questioning why they’ve paid so much money…

We’ve all been there: It’s the last race of a series, and points are close. You do the math to figure out what you need to do to win the championship or pass the boats right in front of you in the standings. Thus was the case for us when we were racing for the title at the 2017 Etchells Coral Reef Cup in Miami. To win the championships, we had to finish sixth or better in the last race and have one boat between our opponent and us. Our opponent needed to keep us out of the top six; if we were in the top six, he had to be in front of us or immediately behind us. Basically, we were in a match race within a fleet race.…