The 1964 Boyd-designed 12 Metre Ikra was the first boat to be challenged to a race at Saint Tropez, by the 1973 Swan 44 Pride. Ikra won (as expected) but lunch afterwards at Club 55 was so good that the event was repeated and 40 years ago it became the famous Nioulargue regatta
worse; it becomes an accident he survived.’ Describing the regatta as excellent fun
the veteran Nioularguer Mark Ratsey nevertheless said: ‘I think some people don’t realise classic boat racing is becom- ing more competitive. People have to pay attention to the rules. Also, the business of splitting the classes but starting them at the same time needs working out. But the event is designed for a spectator line on shore and you have to be aware of that.’ It’s salient to remark that over the years
Edwardian yachting. The UK’s cooler climes, mud berths, and the happenstance of a housing shortage after World War II made some of our greatest yachts ideal for a semi-floating housing stock, in places like the Hamble, Orwell or Deben. Families were reared in these boats, pumping them out and building roofs to keep the rain off the structure, though with little hope of ever getting sailing again. But thanks to those non-sailing owners, the boats them- selves became a stock from which many restorations were taken. Of course the event, Saint-Tropez’s
lovely architecture, the open-air parties, the wine and the company all pale in com- parison with rounding the outer mark with Victorian yachts Partridge and Avel to lee- ward, and the locally owned Maiastra to windward. There was a jostle as Avel’s tactician, Mark Ratsey, called the wind, bearing up and forcing Partridge up to us and us up to Maiastra. The crew of the latter looked straight
ahead choosing to ignore the cries for water, and there was a tense moment as the bowsprit of Partridge came circling over our starboard quarter. Standing by the mainsheet I could have taped a cotton bud to the Partridge spar and had my ears cleaned. But, in the steady hands of Mike Horsley, Illingworth’s genius paid off and we shot out of the mêlée simply by coming half a point off the wind. It was a nice little close shave, caused by
rules ignorance and slightly robbed of its excitement by the fact that it happened too fast for any adrenaline to make it into the blood. It was a microcosm of the spirit of the Nioulargue, or rather close-quarters Saint-Tropez sailing, where it seems mis- chievous sea nymphs toss potent garlands of combative spirit onto decks at the feet of otherwise impeccably behaved crews. You couldn’t really accuse Mike of
being combative, but nobody is in any doubt that we are racing hard and full concentration is required. This is difficult when you have many of the world’s most beautiful yachts within a cable’s length at times. It’s quite something to lower my
52 SEAHORSE
eyes from those telltales aloft and see the late Eric Tabarly’s 1898 Fife Pen Duick racing by. Or Fife’s 1912 15-Metre The Lady Anne, or Moonbeam, or Tuiga, or Olin Stephens’ Dorade; Luke’s 1907 Veronique and of course schooners like Orion and Mariette. I counted 24 British- built boats out of the 92 classics. It’s easy to rank the favourite designers
as well. There were eight Fifes, five Nichol- sons, five S&Ss and four Aldens. That 1999 event was also the first to
see Tabarly’s idea that centenarians should be cherished. So along with Pen Duick, brought by his wife Jacqueline, there were Sky, Lulu, Avel and Partridge. All five were moored together on the main quay in the harbour, where organisers laid a red carpet to the end of their gangplanks and brought them a 100th birthday cake. The event since then has been run by the
Société Nautique de Saint-Tropez (SNST), which manages to create a world-class sailing spectacle from its modest clubhouse in this one-time southern fishing port with a population of just 3,600. As with any such activity it’s always a
learning curve. At that first edition of Les Voiles 25 years ago clearly not all the lessons of the Nioulargue had been learnt. There were several close shaves at marks, but the unluckiest boat prize went to the 23ft Requin Slim. She lost her boom in a clash with the 47ft Yack on Thursday; then on Saturday she lost her mast when she broached behind the 70ft Comti Bernardi, catching her rig in the latter’s backstay. Two crew were thrown into the water and the town’s artist, Benjamin, ended up spreadeagled on her coachroof. That wouldn’t have been so bad, but
then Windjammer ploughed into Slim, hitting her just forward of the coachroof. Witnesses were stunned to see the 62ft yacht carry on regardless, later to be dis- qualified, leaving Slim and her crew to be rescued later. ‘If she was hit one metre behind Benjamin almost certainly would have been killed,’ local skipper Gilles Chavy tells me. ‘And the excuse that they didn’t see Slim in the water makes it even
the opportunities for collisions between boats of widely disparate size have hugely reduced. The price for that is the loss of such amazing sights as a huge gaff cutter undertaking a 25-footer of the same rig, which created some extraordinary photos. It still happens but today the racing is stag- gered with 30 minutes between class starts and boats heading off to different zones. This year the event started with the
Maxis as it had in the early Nioulargues. The International Maxi Association’s James Boyd said, ‘but now we have installed our own race officer here with robot marks with proper windward- leeward courses and windward starts.’ The event seems as popular as ever,
with 250 boats this year, including 40 maxis and 86 classics. And schooners like Elena, Sunshine and Puritan, with three of Fife’s famous 15 Metres, Tuiga, The Lady Anne and Mariska, forming the backdrop of marvel over smaller boats like the 29ft 6in Jap, the 100-year-old Solent Sunbeam No1 Dainty or the 1959 IOD Josephine. Some owners like Dainty’s skipper Peter
Nicholson, and Richard Matthews with his 48ft 1898 Fife Kismet, truck their boat down from the UK to be here. ‘Nowadays we can get down here and be launched and rigged in two days,’ Matthews tells me. One of the most magic sights in 2023
was the return of the 1973 Swan 44 Pride and seeing her racing against the 12 Metre Ikra, reprising the one-on-one Thursday challenge race as the two boats had back in 1981, and for which this event is famous. Pride has only just been bought back by
Americans Will and Gillian Graves. Gillian is the grand-daughter of Dick Jayson – Pride’s owner when it all started. For the last 20 years she has been in the
Italian Adriatic, and apparently this is the first time the two boats have raced together since those heady 1980s days. ‘But now the boat will be staying local, here in the port of Cogolin,’ Gillian said. Once again Ikra won and once again
the crews repaired via beach jetty to the Club 55, where Patrice de Colmont was pouring the rosé as usual. For sure it’s still the Nioulargue; that’s the name of the buoy offshore they had just raced to. q
DAN HOUSTON
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