While the bizarre spectacle that is now the Americas Cup lumbers towards a start date in August, and Sail GP (Powered by Nature!) jets its ten 50ft catamarans, and associated paraphernalia, crew and egos across the world from Christchurch to Bermuda, one event took place last weekend in California that has more skill, tradition and competitive tension than both the high profile events put together.

Built as a shallow-draft yacht, WHOOPER was mostly cruised, but her natural reaching and downwind speed exceeded expectations. Anecdotes from Peter Bruce recall crossings back from the Channel Islands in the 1960’s, at average speeds over 10 knots!

Reality check No.1: this is on an island that is a public reserve administered and maintained by the taxpayer-funded National Parks and Wildlife Service. Anyone has a right to be there.

“I had a look, and seeing so much water in, knew something had gone wrong, and that the craft was foundering. The only chance for us then was to square away for Cloudy Bay.”

SALACIA II was commissioned by Arthur William Byrne, the Australian businessman, philanthropist, and founder of B&D Roll-a-Door. The brief at the time to her designer, Olin Stephens, was to match the dominance of Syd Fischer's RAGAMUFFIN on the water

Our EDM goes out at 7am every Friday to 4000 readers. By 8am we had over a dozen emails and comments, rightly pulling us up on our shoddy research!

Entries closed this week for the 78th Rolex Sydney to Hobart. As we did last year, let’s have a quick scan of the timber vessels that are making the trip south. As far as I can tell there are only four genuinely timber boats… unless I’ve missed something.

More than 10 years later, the term Frequency Illusion was coined by Stanford linguist Arnold Zwicky. Essentially, the Frequency Illusion is a perception that something you’ve been thinking about, or recently learned, all of a sudden seems much more frequent in your environment than it was before.

Of the eighty images in the selection, nine of them relate to classic or wooden craft. This reinforces my belief that while traditional sailing craft may not be at the cutting edge of sailboat racing, they play an important role in upholding the values of authenticity and custodianship throughout the whole of the panoply of sailing.

For me the biggest challenge will be avoiding overthinking and the urge to know everything immediately as we’re so used to do due to technology. The first days I’ll have to cope with not having technology at all, but it’s not something that scares me, it’ll be replaced with something better and special and I’ll get used to that.

Flicking back through the years I can’t help thinking the the 12 meters in Freemantle represented the Modern AC at its zenith.

'Exceptionally fast in the hands of a highly talented, motivated and sharply focused crew, Challenge 12 was bristling with potential', wrote journalist Bruce Stannard, who covered the 1983 America's Cup series for the ABC and The Age.

“I was still in school in ’83 and was on the dock during the Trials in 1977 when Ted Turner and Gary Jobson rushed by with cameras following them,” said Courageous Skipper Dawn Riley, who would go on to sail in four America’s Cup races and two Whitbread Round the World races. “It made a big impression on a 13-year-old from Detroit!”

Non of that Gallic rubbish for the Brits! Keep the emotion out of it, tell it as it happened, and for God sake don’t let on that you’re enjoying yourself!

It’s been a month since the announcement of the re-designed and re-energised 2023 CUP REGATTA and the level of interest has been impressive (if a little daunting).

1100 Entries
4 yachts capsized
There were 3 dismastings
2 helicopter evacuations
178 boats did not finish
And more than 20 crew members ended up in hospital.

It would not be an exaggeration to say that for many, it was as traumatic as losing a dear friend. Severn II was built in 1934 at the Bute Slip Dock Company at Ardmaleish, Isle of Bute in the Firth of Clyde in Scotland. To describe Severn II, built of carvel mahogany on oak frame, as ‘beautiful’ is a huge understatement. Gorgeous striking, amazing. These 8s would be museum pieces, were they not still energetically sailed racing boats.

On the waters of Port Phillip Bay, where Melbourne's 1956 Olympic Games races will soon be contested by the yachting nations of the world, Aa triangular contest has just been completed for a silver cup.

Planning and executing Wooden boat events can be a chicken and egg situation. People will sign up if they know it will be a rousing event, and yet it will only be rousing if people sign up! We urge you to take a leap of faith.

A yacht may elect to race using celestial navigation. If a yacht elects to be celestially navigated, she shall have her elapsed time reduced by 3%.