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the 1851 club was short-lived and really existed solely to organise a single one-off regatta. A more substantial effort to launch a yacht club came in 1859
– going as far as to print a set of rules and elect flag officers and a committee. However, those attempts appeared to exhaust the founders and the club sank from view. Even the 1871 date has some mystery to it. According to club
lore the founding moment came after a boozy prizegiving at the conclusion of Auckland’s Anniversary Regatta, an annual event to mark the founding of the city as we know it today. The prizegiving took place at the Thames Hotel in Auckland and a group of yachts- men attending decided that a one-day regatta every 12 months was not sufficient for their needs. Urged out onto the street at the 11pm closing time, members
of the group continued their deliberations under the light of a gas streetlight. And thus, the legend goes, the Auckland Yacht Club was born anew.
and other business’. This meeting, as much as the charming story of the gas-lamp caucus, appears responsible for fixing the foundation in 1871. Why have an annual meeting unless it marks the passage of a year? Certainly, every RNZYS annual meeting thereafter takes its numerical order from the first AGM of 1872. While the founding date might be slightly clouded there is no
doubt that the RNZYS has become a member of substance and standing in the world community of yacht clubs. Marking the cel- ebration year, current RNZYS Commodore Aaron Young reflected on the ingredients of its success: ‘Our size and (geographic) position add to the challenges of competing on an international stage. Yet those same factors also play into the resilience and can-do attitudes that are associated with the Kiwi character. New Zealand’s success in a wide range of endeavours – with sailing prominent among them – has drawn great benefit from those qualities. ‘The story of New Zealand’s outstanding sailing achievements
is built on a coalition of effort and contribution from right around the country: from clubs large and small, from tiny coastal commu- nities to the major cities; from a marine industry willing to explore the edges of technology and from thousands of families who have grown up with the sea in their recreational and sporting DNA. The Royal New Zealand Yacht Squadron… has played a central role in that story and in shaping our sport and pastime.’ Ivor Wilkins
If readers would like to read more, Salt in the Blood is the official history of the RNZYS. Penned by our much respected New Zealand columnist, the 464-page lavishly illustrated coffee table tome is available through Seahorse or at
rnzys.org.nz.
USA Alive and well Much has been said about the effects of the pandemic on partic- ipation in offshore races, and for sure 2020 was a bad year in the US with the cancellation of the Chicago-Mackinac Race, the ORC/IRC Worlds in Newport and that year’s Newport Bermuda Race, among others. This lingered into 2021 as well, with relatively weak turnouts for the Transpac and other events. However, it all seems to be coming back this year, and with
strength. The SORC winter series in Florida gained a new race (filling a void left by the cancellation of the Pineapple Cup to Montego Bay, Jamaica) and attracted a solid turnout despite being unable to go ashore in the Bahamas due to Covid restrictions. Instead organisers innovated with new races and courses to keep up interest among both the snowbirds and the south Florida locals. For example, the fourth race of the series charted a new course
Harsh… in the 1956 Newport Bermuda Race Carlton Mitchell’s 38-foot Sparkman & Stephens centreboarder Finisterre won the Lighthouse Trophy for Class D and two years later in 1958 she won the overall Bermuda Race Trophy. Yet these days Finisterre lends her name to the slowest division in the race, the Finisterre Trophy being awarded to the overall winner of the cruising class
Regrettably, no documentary evidence has been unearthed to
fix the date of this meeting or identify its participants. That does not mean it did not happen, however (and it is certainly a good story). Many a lasting enterprise – both magnificent and madcap – has originated in a bar-room conversation, or its post-eviction resumption. But something more tangible and formal than a few dim memories of an alcohol-fuelled, gas-lit meeting would clearly be helpful. It is possible records were lost in the aforementioned club fires,
but no newspaper accounts have been discovered mentioning any such club through the remainder of 1871, a surprising silence given that both of Auckland’s major newspapers had long championed the establishment of a yacht club in the city. But in September 1872 there was a flurry of activity, with notices
in the newspapers announcing the Annual Meeting of the Auckland Yacht Club, which duly took place with the ‘appointment of officers
26 SEAHORSE
starting in Miami’s South Beach with a finish in Port Canaveral, adjacent to the Kennedy Space Center on what is known as the Space Coast in central Florida. This is an entirely new territory to host offshore sailing, and perhaps a welcome alternative to the usually overcrowded and expensive environs in south Florida. The fleet first sailed northeast across the Gulf Stream to a virtual mark positioned north of the West End of Grand Bahama Island, then back across the Stream towards the finish in Port Canaveral. Participating teams got lucky with this inaugural edition, taking
advantage of not only the strong northward Gulf Stream current, but a consistent and veering southerly breeze as well. John Evans and Trey Sheehan’s TP52 Hooligan completed the 300-mile course in only 14 hours, an elapsed time mark that may sit unbroken for years to come. The fast race also left plenty of time to tour the Space Center, or just relax until the excellent awards party. The final race of this series also enjoyed an innovative format.
Dubbed the Sailor’s Choice, it starts and ends in Ft Lauderdale, with rounding marks on the western edges of the Bahamas at Great Isaac Cay, northern Cat Cay and the Miami Sea Buoy. As in the Canaveral Race, entries cross the Stream twice, but they also had a choice of whether to traverse this course clockwise or anti-clockwise… Thus, as in all the races of the SORC, the navigators on every
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