News Around the World
Only very occasionally does a single yacht designer give us a completely new type of sailing boat. David Raison turned ocean racing on its head in 2011 when his first Mini Scow won the Mini Transat with such ease that it was obviously only a matter of time and development before traditional open class pointy designs were made obsolete – as has now happened. No less than 35 years before Raison’s first fat nose made the headlines, it was Santa Cruz designer-builder Bill Lee who took his passion of ‘fast is fun’ to a new level with Merlin (above) which rated the same as an IOR Maxi of about three times the displacement but left her small crew grinning from ear to ear every time sheets were cracked. Still in our opinion one of the most beautiful modern raceboats of them all, Merlin kicked off more outrageous tales of sailing, music, mind-altering substances, or all three, than any other sailboat that we can think of
race to Honolulu will feature the largest collection of Sleds in 30 years, when the class was squarely in its heydays. Some are modified, to be sure, and one – the SC 70 Rock N
Roll – is currently undergoing some heavy work. But most have just had some tweaking here and there from their original IOR-era trim. So what accounts for all this effort – is it some kind of nostalgia
for these long, narrow light designs? Maybe, but it’s actually more practical than that: great bang-for-the-buck in terms of cost as well as comfort and performance. For example, Roy Disney’s Pyewacket team has been a cohesive
offshore racing unit for decades, and very successful through the years with mostly the same core team members who are now well along in age, maturity… and perhaps wisdom. The team have been keeping up with technology by racing Sleds, turbo-Sleds, a maxZ86 and in the last two years a turbo-Volvo 70. With this new platform they have been chasing down course records in the 2021 Transpac, races to Mexico, and are now taking on the classic Miami-Montego Bay Race, aka the Pineapple Cup, to Jamaica. Yet they keep coming back to Roy’s Andrews 68 Sled to race to
Hawaii, as they will do again this July. One of the core members of the team, Scott Easom, explains why: ‘This class of boats are “age appropriate” for their design and this kind of mostly offwind offshore racing. They are easy to sail, we know them well and they are not as difficult to optimise or as physically demanding as TP52s! ‘We can race with fewer crew on a more forgiving boat in what
ends up being really fun sailing.’ And with 10-11 entries of similar size and type in their class, the level of competitiveness will be keen: most of these Sleds will probably be within sight of each other when they converge on the finish line at Honolulu’s Diamond Head after seven days and 2,300 miles of racing. But this attention to old designs heading for Transpac in July is
not confined to the Sleds: other true classics like the 1960s-era Cal 40s have continued to be upgraded, plus there is a group called the ‘Fabulous 50s’ of Santa Cruz 50s from the 1980s along with
26 SEAHORSE
Santa Cruz 52s from the 1990s racing together in their own class. This year’s ‘50s’ roster is not looking as strong as in some years,
but this has not stopped Chris Messano undergoing an extensive upgrade on his SC 50 Deception at Cabrillo Boat Shop, just a few miles from the race start in San Pedro. SC 50s are from the same designer as the SC 52s and 70s – Bill Lee – and are similarly light, narrow and with a simple masthead rig sailplan. ‘But the SC 50s were all built slightly different,’ explains Messano.
‘This was the last one built in 1987 with a carbon deck. We gutted the interior, kept the bulkheads, then rebuilt and refinished every- thing. Modern port lights were installed along with flush deck hatches. Floating clew rings were installed to inhaul and outhaul the headsail clews, eliminating yards of track, and the cockpit has been reorganised with upgraded pedestals and winches.’ An extension of the stern was made in a stern scoop and a new
rudder installed. The 1980s-era keel was upgraded years ago to the fashionable 1980s-era elliptical blade with the short root chord and curved trailing edge… this will shortly be switched to a Nelson/ Marek-designed modern blade with a T-bulb to decrease drag, increase stability and increase offwind speed. Messano reckons his project is similar to renovations of old 1/4
and 1/2 Tonners in the UK and the revival in old IOR boats in Italy: the philosophy is to renovate rather than dispose, especially for well-built, proven designs. Moreover, he reckons even with the new changes to his own boat it will not take long to get back to optimised trim, unlike when big changes are made to more modern designs. ‘SC 50s are basically great boats that are easy to sail,’ he said,
‘with a very wide groove – unlike racing a modern TP52. I love to refurbish classic cars, and this has been a similar passion for me. We wanted to do this right: take our time, use the right materials, and have not just a better-looking boat but one that performs closer to modern standards of performance.’ Amen to that.
Dobbs Davis q
SHARON GREEN/ULTIMATE SAILING
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