This post follows an earlier article about the 1986 edition of the Kenwood Cup (formerly the Clipper Cup) that featured photographs by Sharon Green. The following gallery includes photographs byGuy Gurney and Phil Uhl.
Windward Passageat full power on a reaching leg during one of the triangle races (photo Guy Gurney)
Jubilation, a Frers-designed 53-footer, finished in third place in Class B (photo Guy Gurney)
Challenge III, a Frers 43-footer, sailing for Australia
Some of the competing yachts from New Zealand berthed outside the Waikiki Yacht Club (left to right, Starlight Express, Black Sheep, Night Raider, Thunderbird and Mad Max), photo Phil Uhl
More views of Jubilation (photos Guy Gurney)
The New Zealand Davidson 40 Mad Max, second overall in Class D (photo Phil Uhl)
Tomahawk seen here leading Crazy Horse down the North Shore of Molokai (photo Phil Uhl)
Foredeck action aboard Maxi-yacht Sorcery, the eventual winner of Class A(photo Guy Gurney)
Windward Passage powers upwind on her way to third place in Class C (photo Guy Gurney)
The programme cover for the 1986 Kenwood Cup, featuring The Shadowfrom the 1984 edition (photo Phil Uhl)
Condor seen here in fresh reaching conditions during the 1984 Clipper Cup, leading Nirvana and Ragamuffin (photo Phil Uhl)
Condor was an 80-foot maxi yacht commissioned by Bob Bell, who’s first maxi was Condor of Bermuda, designed by John Sharp for the 1977 Whitbread Round the World Race. The experience with Condor of Bermuda resulted in firm ideas about the performance areas to aim for with a new yacht. Ron Holland’s design notes of the time advised that there had been a great deal of communication between Bell and the design team during the early stages of design development for his new maxi. The outcome was a longer boat, at 80.3ft LOA, with a generous 18.7ft beam and displacement of 75,865lbs, with similar parameters to Jim Kilroy’s slightly earlier Kialoa IV, also designed by Holland.
Condor profile and sail plan
To ensure light air speed, a larger sail plan than for Kialoa IV was chosen, putting the ‘I’ dimension at the magical 100-foot mark, the first modern yacht to achieve this height while also meeting the 70.0ft maximum rating under IOR. This mast was based on a Hood Yacht Systems extrusion fabricated by Proctor Masts, with a three-spreader inline rig geometry supported by Navtec rod rigging.
Condor during the 1981 Seahorse Maxi Series (photo Phil Uhl)
Hull form, keel design and construction all related to this increase in sail area which was expected to develop speed not only in light airs, but in the widest possible range of sailing conditions. The hull was constructed in Cornwall by Mid-Ocean Marine utilising Kevlar and carbon composites, with an aluminium space frame responsible for handling the enormous loads generated by the large sail plan. Condor was instantly recognisable with topsides of a deep plum colour and yellow trim, and yellow spinnakers.
Condor's deck plan and interior arrangement
The design for Condor also made no pretence of being anything other than a racing yacht. The interior layout prioritised the practical needs of sail stowage and handling, either side of the engine, freezer and gear stowage areas. This allowed the weight of sails to be located around the yacht’s centre of gravity rather than up for’ard as typical at the time for yachts of this size. Double hatches near the mast were arranged specially for minimising the effort to move maxi-sized sails to and from the deck. The engine itself was an 8-cyliner 8LXB Gardner diesel that turned a 42” diameter folding propeller.
The deck layout was chosen with full communication between designer, owner and the supplier, Lewmar. As with all other aspects of the yacht, the six-pedestal drive layout was oriented towards maximum efficiency during short-course racing.
Condor sails downwind with her bright yellow spinnaker and blooper set and leading Kialoa IV during the 1981 Seahorse Maxi Series (photo Phil Uhl)
Condor was instantly recognisable with topsides of a deep plum colour and yellow trim, and yellow spinnakers, and she was launched in mid-June 1981, in time for her first major racing event - the 1981 Seahorse Maxi Series held in Cowes. This series was contested by 11 yachts of 52.6 – 70.0ft IOR. Condor, skippered by Dennis Connor, and Kialoa IV were typically at the head of the fleet, with seldom more than several boat-lengths between them. Condor won the first race, but Kialoa IV turned the tables in the next two races, with the Frers-designed maxi Xargo also getting amongst the action with two second places. The fourth race was a 60-mile course around the Isle of Wight, which Condor was leading before she ran hard aground on Hamstead Ledge, promptly handing line honours to Kialoa IV and going on to finish in last place, and fourth overall in the series (on both line and handicap).
Condor during the 1982 SORC, with Nirvana to windward and Windward Passage and Kialoa IV behind (photo Phil Uhl)
Condor went on to finish second in Class A in that year’s Channel Race. She later raced in the Sardinia Cup where she was dismasted, with her lofty spar breaking just below the second spreader. From there she was transferred in January 1982 to Florida by freighter to collect a new four-spreader Hood mast, and to compete in the 1982 SORC. She finished seventh in Class A after failing to finish the first two races, before going on to finish with more promising results of 2/2/8/3 in the ten boat fleet.
Condor off the North Shore of Molokai during the 1982 Clipper Cup (photo Phil Uhl)
The next major event for Condor was the 1982 Pan Am Clipper Cup (with stablemate Condor of Bermuda also amongst the competitors), remembered for the fresh conditions associated with a nearby hurricane. Condor was skippered in this series by Dick Deaver and performed well, taking second in Class A behind Kialoa IV, with placings of 1/4/2/2/2. She was third yacht in the overall standings (1/35/8/4/2), edging out Bravura and Kialoa IV on countback (all three yachts finished on 746 points). She again placed second in September that year at the Big Boat Series in San Francisco (placings of 2/2/2/2/2). Her next major race was the 1982 Sydney-Hobart Race, where she narrowly beat Alan Bond’s Apollo for line honours, but was a lowly 95th on corrected time.
Condor during the 1983 SORC (photo Larry Moran)
Condor also competed in the 1983 SORC, but with somewhat lacklustre results, finishing in sixth place of 11 Class A yachts (placings of 6/2/5/5/7/9), a penalty contributing to her ninth place in the final race.
Condor seen here leading Kialoa IV during the 1983 SORC, and demonstrating an impressive amount of mast bend (photo Larry Moran)
Later that year, however, Condor showed her pedigree in the Fastnet Race, where she scored the coveted triple - taking line honours, in record time (beating the time previously set by Condor of Bermuda), and overall handicap victory.
Condor rounds a leeward markduring the South Pacific Maxi Championship off Sydney Heads (photo Phil Uhl)
Another of the more memorable races in Condor’s heyday occurred later that year, with an incredibly close duel with Marvin Green’s David Pedrick -designed Nirvana in the 1983 Sydney-Hobart Race. The two maxis had enjoyed close racing throughout the Burns Philip South Pacific Maxi championship preceding the Sydney-Hobart (alongside the Southern Cross Cup of that year), with two wins each but won by Nirvana after she prevailed in the double-points 180-miler. The close race during the 1983 Sydney-Hobart Race culminated with Condor grounding and left parked for five minutes on White Rock near the finish line in the Derwent River, while Nirvana slid on by to win by 2m 16s.
Condor gybes at a wing mark during the 1983 South Pacific Maxi Championship off Sydney Heads, ahead of Nirvana (photo Phil Uhl)
The facts of the incident were recorded in the subsequent protest decision, which was ruled in favour of Condor:
“Nirvana on starboard tack was being overtaken by Condor also on starboard tack. Condor was sailing faster than Nirvana and overtook her to windward and between her and the shore. At the time the overlap was established there was sufficient room for Condor to establish it in safety. The overlap was established at least five lengths prior to the position of the grounding. Both yachts had steerageway, but were moving slowly with Condor moving faster than Nirvana.
“Condor hailed for water while holding a course to clear the White Rock. Nirvana was sailing higher than Condor and holding a course closing the shore. Condor hailed again for room and Nirvana commenced to pull away. Condor struck the bottom and stopped. Condor did not have sufficient room to clear the shore and her stopping caused a minor contact between the yachts after the grounding...".
Nirvana was disqualified for failing to give Condor sufficient room. However, Condor’s request for a time allowance was rejected (as not meeting the requirements of Rule 69(a), (b) or (c)). While she secured line honours, she was only 73rd on corrected time (won that year by Challenge II).
Condor heads upwind to the first turning mark off Sydney Heads during the 1983 Sydney-Hobart Race (photo Phil Uhl)
Condor lowers her genoa after setting spinnaker and turning south during the 1983 Sydney-Hobart Race (photo Phil Uhl)
Condor was represented at the protest hearing by Ted Turner, who had been at the wheel, relying on his own evidence and the introduction of video film. Nirvana's case was presented by navigator Peter Bowker, who called in crewmen Geoff Prior and Steve Colgate (who'd been at the helm at the time) as witnesses. A dignified Green conceded that the protest committee's task had been a hard one and though he wasn't happy with the decision, he accepted it. Bell and Turner were also low-key, feeling that their rights had been vindicated but "sorry to see it end like this".
Footage from the 1983 finish can be seen in the Youtube video above.
Condor in fresh upwind conditions during the 1984 Clipper Cup, with Ragamuffin visible to windward (photo Phil Uhl)
After a good showing in the 1982 Clipper Cup, Condor was less impressive in the 1984 edition finishing fifth of the seven Class A yachts (7/4/5/6/3), and well behind Boomerang and Kialoa IV which were also the top two yachts of the regatta overall. Her regatta did not start well, after suffering a poor start in the first race having struggled to reef her mainsail properly. Her best race was the final Round the State, which counted for triple points, where she finished third.
Condor crosses behind Kialoa IV during the 1984 Clipper Cup (photo Phil Uhl)
Condor prepares to hoist a new spinnaker after the original sail splits in two during the 1984 Clipper Cup (photo Phil Uhl)
Condor sails upwind during the 1984 Clipper Cup (above and below), being skippered by New Zealander Murray Ross (photos by Phil Uhl)
At around this time Condor was fitted with a new keel with the weight lower and further aft. Her stern was also remodelled, where the flat sloping transom was altered to a more curved shape and shorter length and one that appeared to result in less drag.
Condor undergoing some radical keel surgery sometime during the mid-1980s (photo Facebook)
Condor featured on the front page of the Sunday Tribune on 18 August 1985, after the storm-affected Fastnet Race of that year.
Bell went on to race Condor in the Sydney Hobart from 1986 (finishing 12th) and the 1986 SORC (finishing last in Class A).
Condor seen her in Hobart after the 1994 Sydney-Hobart Race (photo Facebook)
Condor was purchased by Tony Paola in 1989 and after a refit she finished 78th on corrected time in that year’s Sydney-Hobart Race, but improved to 14th in the 1990 edition. She again raced in 1992, for the last time under IOR, where she finished 15th. After another refit in 1994 she won the Sydney-Southport Race, and under IMS finished 72nd in that year’s Sydney-Hobart.
In 1996 she was fifth yacht into Hobart, and was 18th on handicap. She later went on to race at Hamilton Island Race Week, 2009 – 2013, by then owned by David Molloy. She was the winner of Cruising Division 1 in 2010, and third in 2011 and 2017.
Condor with a more cruising oriented set-up, competing in the Hamilton Island Race Week in 2013 (photo Andre Francolini)
Condor’s home port is now Airlie Beach, on the Australian East Coast, where she is used as a charter yacht for overnight sailing adventures with several of her contemporaries for her present owners, ProSail.
The Shadow was a 55-foot Mark Soverel design, commissioned and owned by Richard Rogers, who was based in California and a newcomer to ocean racing. The Shadow was of the same era as Soverel’s smaller 43-foot design Locura and in general design terms she had some similar characteristics, featuring a broad stern and notable ‘S’-curve in her hull profile that minimised hull depth around the After Girth Station, to offset width in this area and reduce the likely after girth penalty measurement that she would have incurred. She also had a proportionally generous sail plan, set on a 15/16th fractional rig, and carried a reasonably high rating of 47.0ft. According to a Sports Illustrated article at the time, the yacht was named after a pulp magazine hero and 1930s-40s radio detective – she had a small tender named Margot Lane (The Shadow’s girlfriend), and the crew played tapes of The Shadow’s eerie laughter when coming in to dock.
The Shadow rounding a mark during the 1984 Clipper Cup, with the Farr 58-footer Orlanda close behind (photo Phil Uhl)
The Shadow was launched in September 1983, just two weeks before the St Francis Yacht Club’s Big Boat Series of that year. She raced in the City of San Francisco Perpetual Class Trophy division, where she finished second to the Peterson 55 Bullfrog, with placings of 3/3/3/1/1.
The Shadow, seen here during the 1983 Big Boat Series (photo John Hooker)
With that strong start she went on to race in the 1984 SORC, by now with a much more optimised rating of 45.8ft. Rogers had hoped that The Shadow would be able to compete in Class B in the SORC, but then Running Tide, a 12-year-old 60-footer with an age allowance that gave her a slightly lower rating than The Shadow's, also arrived. Running Tide's owner, Al Van Metre, asked to compete, as he had before, in Class A with the 70- and 80-foot Maxis. Race officials deferred to his wishes and so moved the similarly-rated The Shadow up, too.
The Shadow ghosts along in light airs (photographer unknown)
With her favorable time allowance relative to the Maxis and weather conditions that benefited smaller boats, The Shadow dominated the results in Class A, finishing first on corrected time in five of the six races and taking overall class honours. She was a less impressive in the overall fleet results, placing 26th, but the top placings were dominated that year by yachts in the smaller divisions, and in particular the crack One Tonners in Class E (such as the German yacht Diva, the top boat in the 1983 Admiral’s Cup).
"The maxis were intensely disappointed that we were in (Class) A", said Rogers in his interview with Sports Illustrated at the time, "and I agree with them. I think they should have their own class. I think it would've been more fair and more fun. It's hard to race a business against a boat like The Shadow".
The Shadow in or about 1984 (photographer unknown)
"The business" Rogers referred to is that of maxi management. Running a Maxi yacht, with a crew of more than 22, with an elaborate shore-support system, a tender, a sail program, and much much more, and moving them from regatta to regatta around the world (because that's where the maxis race, everywhere) is a demanding business. The most visible of the Maxi owners was Jim Kilroy, the owner and campaigner of not one but two dominating maxi yachts— Kialoa IV, which finished second to The Shadow in Class A, and his older Kialoa III which was being readied to compete at Antigua Race Week.
Kilroy, too, didn't think The Shadow should have raced in Class A, but his complaint, like Rogers', was with the race officials. "A 23-foot racing spread is a lot for one class", was all he would say publicly, but as spokesman for the Maxi owners, the men who spend the most on the sport, he had much to say behind closed doors to the SORC officials. Not unreasonably, the Maxi owners felt that if they go to the trouble of showing up for an event, lending it glamour, prestige and publicity it wouldn't otherwise have, they should be treated with greater consideration.
The wide and powerful stern sections of The Shadow are visible here in this image from the 1984 Clipper Cup
It is likely that The Shadow would have done pretty well in Class B. Her wide stern sections, which Rogers calls 'Soverel training wheels' because they prevent the boat from heeling excessively, ran counter to the current thinking in new boats, most of which have moderately tapered sterns. "I wouldn't call Soverel a radical departure, but he's certainly different", says Rogers. Because she resists heeling, The Shadow was never reefed in the whole of the SORC series. Her greatest sail reduction was during the big winds of the St. Petersburg to Fort Lauderdale race, and that was to change down to a No. 3 jib. "If The Shadow had had a masthead rig, I would have had to shift down to the #2 genoa as the wind came up", Soverel explained. "But with a fractional rig like this one, you have the flexibility to power the mainsail up or down. With a fixed foretriangle area you have no flexibility. You've got to change your headsails”. The power inherent in The Shadow's length and overall stability resulted in the reported need for extensions to be welded to her winch handles to ensure enough runner tension could be applied to her lofty rig.
The Shadow sets off on a reaching leg during the 1984 Clipper Cup with Swiftsure to the right (photo Yachting magazine)
The Shadow then went on to compete in the 1984 Clipper Cup in Hawaii. At this regatta she raced in Class B, with a slightly increased rating of 46.2ft, alongside such yachts as the Frers 51 Tomahawk (ex-Margaret Rintoull III), the Peterson 55 Checkmate (ex-Bullfrog), the Farr 58 Orlanda and the Frers 50 Carat (ex-Retaliation). She ended up a surprise winner of this class, with results of 4/4/4/6/1. Although she had a very capable crew, she was out-performed by Checkmate and Tomahawk in the first four races.
The Shadow leads (just) Checkmate in power reaching conditions during the 1984 Clipper Cup (photo Charles P. LeMieux III | Yacht Racing & Cruising magazine)
Adequate righting moment in the typically breezy conditions had proved to be an essential ingredient for the top boats in the fleet, as witnessed by the performance of Checkmate and Tomahawk, which were two of the stiffest boats there. Soverel said later that The Shadow was ballasted to give a minimum Centre of Gravity Factor (0.968), to minimise her rating, which in hindsight proved to a mistake.
Breezy conditions during the 1984 Clipper Cup put a premium on crew-work, here the foredeck crew prepare for a gybe aboard The Shadow (Bruce C. Brown | Yacht Racing & Cruising magazine)
However, in the final race, the Round the State, points were heavily weighted (three times that of the Olympic tracks). During that race, Soverel noted that they started to feel disturbed wind as far as 200 miles out from the Big Island, possibly from other smaller islands up to windward. Later the wind really started to act strangely, “The Shadow would be doing a steady eight knots, just about on the wind, in a nice 20-22 knot trade wind, when suddenly, boom, we’d run into a light spot – maybe 8-10 knots of wind – that would last five or ten minutes, then we’d be back in the breeze. That happened a few times, then we hit a big hole and the breeze went from NNW into the south, so we tacked over onto the starboard tack layline. From here, maybe 60 miles out from the island, the air was light and fluky – sometimes we used a spinnaker – all the way to South Point. Once around the point it turned back into another nice race. The trades just collapse on the back sides of those islands. You get all kinds of different things – thermals, back-eddies and so on”.
The Shadow, seen here leading Checkmate and Jubilation during the 1984 Big Boat Series (photo Sharon Green | Ultimate Sailing)
While Soverel and his team managed to keep The Shadow to the fore in the tricky breezes, Checkmate’s long beat out to South Point knocked her out of the running, opening the door for The Shadow to earn class honours for the race and, by a single point over Tomahawk, for the series. She also finished fifth in the overall fleet standings (with placings of 11/10/14/8/7). The Shadow also formed part of the New York YC team, alongside Nirvana and Artemis, which beat the Royal Akarana YC team from New Zealand (Anticipation, Exador and Shockwave) in the club teams competition.
The Shadow (on port) in a close race with Orlanda during the 1984 Big Boat Series (photo L Gee | Facebook)
The Shadow then returned to San Franciso for the 1984 Big Boat Series, where Tomahawk managed to prevail for Class B honours, with The Shadow finishing second. She competed again in 1985, but did not feature in the top places.
The Shadow races alongside Checkmate during the 1985 Big Boat Series (photographer unknown)
Her racing career after that is not known, and she didn’t compete in the large Class B fleet that assembled for the 1985 SORC, and did not compete in the 1986 Clipper Cup. However, she has been sighted more recently in Greece, and is understood to be in good sailing condition.
The Shadow, as seen in Lefkas, Greece in 2023 (photo Bohumil Kafka | Facebook)
Victory of Burnham was an Ed Dubois -designed 44-footer, commissioned by Peter de Savary for the 1981 offshore racing season and that year’s Admiral’s Cup in particular, and as a ‘warm-up’ for his bid for the 1983 America’s Cup. She was a good-looking yacht, with a low coachroof, raked transom and blue and gold paint scheme. Her design characteristics, with a return to more conservative design style, mast-head rig and narrower aft sections, marked something of a departure from Dubois’ previous breakthrough yacht, Police Car.
Victory during the 1981 Admiral's Cup (photo Phil Uhl)
Victory was skippered by Phil Crebbin and made it into Britain’s three-boat Admiral’s Cup team, alongside Yeoman XXIII (a Frers 45-footer) and Dragon (a Dubois 39-foot minimum rater), racing with a very competitive, but ultimately inaccurate, rating of 33.1ft IOR. She finished as top boat in the trials, only once dropping out of the top three places in nine races. While this gave some indication of the issues to come, Victory sailed well and her anomalous rating is not understood to have greatly affected the outcome of the British trials, although Robin Aisher, skipper of second-placed Yeoman, recalled that Victory was tough to beat on corrected time.
Victory (K-302), seen here on the right, pursues Marionette during the 1981 British Admiral's Cup trials, with Caiman visible in the centre (photo Guy Gurney)
After the windless first race of the Admiral’s Cup, Victory won the next inshore race, with team-mate Yeoman second, covering the poor result of Dragon in 42nd and lifting the team to fourth. The team had a strong Channel Race and leapt to first place, and in another light airs inshore race, Victory finished second, with Yeoman in sixth, which saw them take a commanding lead into the Fastnet Race finale. In contrast to the storm-affected 1979 edition of this ocean racing classic, the 1981 race was affected by calms throughout and was a long drawn-out affair. Incredibly, Victory finished just under three hours behind the line honours winner, the Maxi-yacht Kialoa IV. It was a minimum-rater benefit, however, and Victory just managed 15th on corrected time in the Admiral's Cup fleet. Nevertheless, this gave her second place overall, just one point behind New Zealand’s Swuzzlebubble III, and helped her to lead the British team to an Admiral’s Cup win, by a whopping 98 points over the second-placed US team.
During the series, and between the fourth race and the start of the Fastnet race, Victory and Australian yacht Apollo V owned by Alan Bond, held a match-race, as something of a forerunner to the upcoming competition between these two syndicates for the 1983 America's Cup. The boats were considered at that time to be evenly matched (Apollo V had a slightly higher rating of 33.4ft). The race was held in very light airs, and Apollo V managed to establish an unassailable lead before the breeze eventually died and the time limit for the race expired. The race is covered in a film of the 1981 Admiral's Cup that can be seen here.
Victory during the 1981 British Admiral's Cup trials (photo Seahorse)
The analysis of the Admiral’s Cup series contained in ‘The World of Sailing 1981-82’ noted that, in an immediate post-series review, the British victory could be attributed to three key factors – the first being that their boats suffered no broken gear, the second being the consistent sailing of Victory and Yeoman, and thirdly the performance of the minimum rating Dragon in the points-loaded offshore races. Of interest to the story that follows, it was also observed that only Britain completed the series without incurring a penalty, with team captain Aisher emphasising that the British team must keep out of trouble at all times.
Victory seen here during Cowes Week 1981 (photo Facebook)
Victory was later bought by Trevor Bailey of London, and she changed hands in January 1982, with a new measurement certificate issued by the RORC. She was transported to Florida for the 1982 SORC and put on a dominant performance, finishing first in Class C (1/1/3/5/2) and third overall.
Victory on a tight reach and preparing for a spinnaker hoist (photo Facebook)
Unfortunately, as it would transpire, Victory would be remembered mainly for the rating controversy in which she became embroiled after this success in the SORC. The preceding 1981 edition of that event, which doubled as the US Admiral’s Cup team selection series, had been impacted by controversy after the top three selectors’ choices of Louisiana Crude, Acadia and Williwaw were all found to have suspect ratings (and in the end the two reserve yachts, Stars & Stripes and Intuition were selected to join Scaramouche).
Victory has a strong start in the light-airs first race of the 1981 Admiral's Cup, seen here to weather of Australia's Apollo V, and US team-mates Scaramouche and Intuition
There had been a feeling in the British fleet during the 1981 season that Victory's rating of 33.1ft was too good to be true. The designer, the late Ed Dubois, had even given the RORC’s rating office his predicted values for the hull depth measurements, because her rating was lower than he had expected and well below what Dubois thought was the best that could be achieved, at around 33.6ft. The inquiry on the issue that was conducted by the RORC noted that the original measurement was undertaken in April 1981, which came out at 33.3ft. Remeasurement was undertaken in June 1981 after some ballast relocation and Dubois’ recommended bumping of the CMD measurement point (to force another complete remeasurement of the boat), and again later that month (after the British Admiral’s Cup trials had commenced), with the rating now at 33.1ft.
But the re-measurement of Victory, by another RORC measurer, concluded that the rating was correct. Based on this, and her performance during the trials as described above, Victory was duly selected for the British team and went on to finish second overall, and was the top scorer of that team.
Part way through the first race of the 1981 Admiral's Cup, Victory can be seen here just behind Italy's Almagores, with Scaramouche (US) to leeward, and Ireland's Woolly Jumper to windward (photo Phil Uhl)
However (as reported by the New York Times in March 1982), complaints were lodged after the SORC by two rival Class C skippers, William Power (High Roler) and Rodney Wallace (Thunderbird). Victory’s crew subsequently complied with the Race Committee’s request to return the yacht to Florida for remeasurement. When errors were discovered by the Chief Measurer of the US Yacht Racing Union (USYRU) they advised the RORC, who promptly sent one of their measurers over from Britain, and the boat was again remeasured, confirming the USYRU’s Chief Measurer’s work.
Victory struggles towards the finish line of the first race in the 1981 Admiral's Cup, with Germany's Pinta ahead on starboard gybe
Victory’s remeasured freeboards showed her to float very slightly higher than expected, although this was of marginal consequence. The most significant issue, however, was that her out-of-water hull depth measurements were badly amiss (by an average of 1.65”) and all the errors added cumulatively to reduce the boat’s rating, as the computer rated the boat to be 1,675lbs heavier than she really was. The other major discrepancy related to her stability, with remeasurement showing her to be 13.5% more stable than originally assessed (noting that stability was a penalised feature in the IOR, up to a point). The USYRU remeasurement found that Victory’s rating was in fact 34.5ft.
The Chairman of the SORC disqualified Victory from that series on 23 March 1982, and High Roler was declared the winner of Class C.
A study in IOR sterns during the 1981 Admiral's Cup, with Victory on the right, alongside Australia's Hitchhiker, Rebel Country and Sweden's Ra Carat (ex-Louisiana Crude)(photo Phil Uhl)
In early May 1982, therefore, it became clear to the RORC inquiry team that a full remeasurement of Victory was desirable, where the yacht was prepared for measurement by Dubois himself. This remeasurement was within the expected tolerances of the early USYRU measurements. The inquiry exonerated Dubois from any fault, noting that he had previously advised the RORC of his opinion that the depth measurements were too large and asked them to be checked, and he did all that could reasonably be expected to warn that something might be wrong.
The question was then whether Britain’s earlier victory in the 1981 Admiral’s Cup should be declared null and void and the Cup handed over to the second-placed US team. However, it does not appear that Victory’s measurement saga was the result of any effort by de Savary or Dubois, who were exonerated in the RORC’s inquiry. That inquiry also found no evidence of fraud or other malpractice, and the issue appeared to be the result of a rushed check of the mid-depths while relying on the original measurement stations. The blame thus lay with the RORC’s measurer and the rating secretary, both of whom subsequently resigned from their posts.
Victory during the 1981 Admiral's Cup, with Italy's Mandrake visible crossing ahead on starboard (photo Facebook)
Further, a re-calculation of the Admiral’s Cup scores, based on Victory’s corrected rating, did not suggest that Britain’s victory was in any way undeserved. Timothy Jeffery in his comprehensive Official History of the Admiral’s Cup noted that a re-calculation only dropped Victory’s contribution to the British winning total by 19 points, which would still leave Britain with a significant margin over the US. This is perhaps not surprising, as applying the formula typically used at the time to convert an IOR rating to a time correction factor (i.e., TCF = [R1/2 + 2.6] / 10) the difference in Victory’s rating would result in a TCF of 0.830, compared to 0.840. In a six-hour race, this would amount to just 3 minutes 36 seconds (approximately 1%). Seahorse also comments (January 2023) that "[i]n pure mathematical terms Victory of Burnham's re-rating would not have changed the outcome of the Admiral's Cup but it did substantiate the repeated urgings from Dubois himself, that the boat's RORC-issued rating needed checking because it was far better than projected...".
It is also not apparent that this would have had a significant effect on the way that other yachts would have raced against Victory, even if they found her rating to be unduly ‘competitive’. Given her strong performance in the British trials, it seems equally unlikely that with a corrected rating she would have struggled to qualify for the team or would have been beaten by the fourth-placed Mayhem.
Victory racing in San Francisco, likely during the 1984 Big Boat Series
In any event, the 1981 Admiral’s Cup result stood as part of the historical record, along with Britain’s winning margin, as does Victory’s second place in the individual standings. This is, however, in some contrast to the USYRU's approach to the SORC results, albeit that the SORC is an individual event, rather than a teams-based regatta.
Victory bashes her way upwind during the 1984 Clipper Cup (photo Yachting)
Victory was later bought by US yachtsman Robert Butkus and competed in the 1984 Clipper Cup (by then with a rating of 34.2ft, and sail number 87312), sailing for the Cabrillo Beach Yacht Club, and with Dubois aboard. She finished in third place in Class C (results of 2/1/3/6/8). She went on to race in Class C in the 1984 Big Boat Series, although her results in that regatta are not known, other than the fact that she did not feature in the top four.
Victory lost her mast at some stage in her racing career (photo Facebook)
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