Giving back
With six (good) America’s Cup and four Whitbread/Volvo round-the-world races on your CV there should be a fair amount of knowledge and technical experience in the bank. Introduce a whole heap of software smarts and the result can be more than a little clever… and useful. Dobbs Davis finds out what Grant ‘Fuzz’ Spanhake’s been up to since stepping ashore 60 SEAHORSE
Tracing the career trajectories of the most accomplished pro sailors is an interesting exercise in itself. Most entered the sport at an early age, excelled in dinghies and one- designs,where some stayed to compete up to Olympic level, while others moved into keel- boats often with great success. Occasional detours into match racing would interest some, but this became less relevant once the America’s Cup became even less about clas- sic match racing and more about speed. Even so, a small handful stay here while
others moved into where the more longterm and sustainable money is in sailing or managing larger offshore boats and pro- jects. Thousands of miles are sailed, races are won, medals awarded, records are bro- ken, and after about 20-30 years or so the accumulation of experience and talent becomes too great to just apply to another paid gig… new challenges are needed. Some break away from sailing and go
into property development, which has proved a popular and very lucrative second career for some of the sport’s brightest stars (including virtually a whole generation of America’s Cup skippers). Others heed the call and find ways to give back to a sport that has given them so much while fulfilling
the ambitions of owners, sponsors and pro- gramme teammates over the years. One of several expat Kiwis now based
in Annapolis, Grant Spanhake (known to all as Fuzz) exemplifies the latter path, and continues to push for better racing, both youth and adult, from his adopted home in the US.
Early days Grant Spanhake started out an apprentice sailmaker for Lidgard Sails in Auckland, where not only did he oversee the construc- tion of the sails for Peter Blake’s 1985/86 Whitbread entry Lion New Zealand, but as a trimmer sailed aboard and helped her earn a runner-up elapsed-time finish in the race. The Ron Holland design was cer- tainly built significantly heavier than her designed displacement (some claimed by as much as eight tons) and so was sometimes a weapon in breezy races like the 1984 Sydney Hobart where she captured line honours. But in light airs she was not a good ship… severely testing the tempera- ment and patience of even the most loyal crew. Not to mention the sailmaker. Next for Fuzz was the run-up to the 1987 America’s Cup in Fremantle. Many
GILLES MARTIN-RAGET
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