Something else!
The 2017 J Class World Championship (a remarkable phrase in itself) is done and the Kohler Cup has been awarded, but I think it’s important to take a step back and talk about why this is so significant for sailing and especially big boat sailing. The J Class has very clearly had a resur-
gence. It has been a long time coming since World War II halted progress back in the late 1930s, when most of the boats were scrapped for the war effort and the fleet seemed dead and gone. Long gone. All of a sudden in 1984 Elizabeth Meyer
finds Endeavour rotting away in a mud berth in England and decides she wants to do something about it. Having acquired the bones of the 1934 America’s Cup chal- lenger she sets about the biggest yacht restoration of modern times and in doing so singlehandedly brings about the rebirth of the J Class. Two years later and, with Meyer’s
support, Shamrock is under the steward- ship of the Newport Museum of Yachting and is also being refurbished and returned to class compliance after years spent as a charter yacht in the Mediterranean. Next thing you know Velsheda is also
being completely renovated (initially in rather rudimentary fashion but later, in a second restoration, taking her back to concours standards), Ranger is being built and suddenly there is a bit of energy. All those owners deserve the credit for making this new, unbelievable renaissance happen as it wouldn’t have without their vision. After that along come Hanuman, Lion-
heart, Rainbow and on and on it goes. It has gone from being a 1-3 boat, pieced together, slightly random ‘fleet’ to an organised, competitive group large enough to fill starting lines at world-class events. Looking at 2017, the America’s Cup did
a really nice job of embracing the J boats. I give them credit for this, for not saying ‘that’s old school’. Russell Coutts did say, some time ago, they were talking to the Facebook generation, not the Flintstone
36 SEAHORSE
generation. But good for them, they invited the whole class down to Bermuda and made it a really fantastic regatta to coincide with the 2017 Cup. Smack in the middle of the America’s Cup race schedule was this gem of a regatta, the aura of the J boats offering an unbelievable juxtaposi- tion to the America’s Cup catamarans. So with that catalyst the wheels started
turning and people thinking we need to keep these boats together. We have to get more on the startline than ever before – until this year five was the maximum, but we have seen six on the line twice in 2017 and we had seven at the America’s Cup regatta in Bermuda. We now need these boats to continue to
move around the world together, which is the founding concept of the Kohler Cup: a season-long series that actually means something, to entice owners to stay as a fleet for some of the best racing the world has ever seen. The worlds in Newport last month was the most elegant, extreme sail- boat racing I’ve been a part of. Incredibly tight racing with 180-tonne monsters that are all being sailed so exceptionally well. Boat on boat, crossing by an inch, duck-
ing by an inch, overlaps at every mark. It’s normal sailboat racing except these happen to be monsters and it’s shocking how good it is. This is something nobody ever thought was possible, so it’s an honour for all of us to be a part of it. Some of the
INGRID ABERY
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