Admiral's Cup 1981 - Race 2

Following the light airs-afflicted first race of the 1981 Admiral's Cup, a decent 12-15 knot easterly arrived for the second. This saw the fleet get away early and cleanly, with a windward beat to East Bramble buoy.

A better breeze sprung up for the second race, here the Spanish yacht Potitos gets a good start at the windward end of the line just to windward of Holland's Formidable

Another closer view of the start, with Ireland's Moonduster to windward of this group and Potitos maintaining a good position ahead and to leeward (photo Guy Gurney)

New Zealand's Wee Willie Winkie (with Swuzzlebubble III astern) makes a break for the slacker tide on the opposite shore. Britain's Yeoman XXIII carries on to the left

US yacht Scaramouche (above) and Irish yacht Moonduster (below) on the first beat

Canada's Amazing Grace approaches East Bramble buoy on port, just ahead of Italy's Brava

Australian yacht Hitchhiker suffered from another poor start, and needing to improve from the dismal first race she approached East Bramble buoy too low, and found both Canada's Pachena and Potitos blocking her ability to tack, and against a contrary tide Hitchhiker ended up on the buoy. In the following series of photos Hitchhiker falls back head to wind while Pachena and Potitos round the mark. Hitchhiker collected an eleven-place penalty for hitting the buoy, and took just six points from the race.

Hitichhiker comes to grief at East Bramble buoy, having underlayed her approach in an adverse tide

With nowhere to go Hitchhiker comes head to wind as the tide takes her below the mark while the Canadian yacht Pachena makes her approach

Problems continue for Hitchhiker as she waits for the starboard lane to clear before she can tack and round the mark, Potitos comes in overlapped with Pachena

Here Hitchhiker has made it round and is still setting her spinnaker, followed by Regardless (IR-22746), Pinta and Hong Kong yacht Uin-na-Mara IV

Wee Willie Winkie rounds the buoy, following Hitchhiker, Regardless, Uin-na-Mara IV and Stars & Stripes

Noel Robins and his crew on Hitchhiker did their best to make amends in the next three races, but the much-vaunted Hitchhiker could only manage average placings in the Channel Race, the third inshore and the Fastnet race finale, to finish in 34th place overall, the lowest placed yacht in the eighth placed Australian team.  

The spinnaker of Accanito (sailing for Switzerland) catches and rips on the mark, while Britain's Dragon takes a wider approach to her rounding

Accanito's spinnaker problems continue

Pinta rounds a leeward mark

Three minimum raters arrive at the bottom mark - Stars & Stripes leads Wee Willie Winkie and Canada's Runaway

Another view of the fleet on a downwind leg (photo Guy Gurney)

The race was a benefit for the US team, Scaramouche's fifth, Intuition's seventh and Stars & Stripes' 27th saw the US team ease into first place, while a first and second for British yachts Victory of Burnham and Yeoman XXIII, which offset Dragon's 42nd, saw them move up to fourth. Britain went on to win the series, with the US second.