Southern Cross Cup 1983

The 1983 edition of the biennial Southern Cross Cup, held in Sydney, Australia, was a memorable regatta for the dominant performance of the New Zealand team that was made up of three 40-footers built to Farr’s latest Design #136: Exador, Geronimo and Pacific Sundance.

Pacific Sundance, top yacht of the 1983 Southern Cross Cup (photo Phil Uhl)

Design 136 was an upsized development of Farr's previous 37-footers (Migizi and Freefall, Design 124) that had shown great speed at the 1983 SORC and were the first of a new generation of IOR designs from the Farr office. The design was finalised in April 1983 and was the first response to the change in the ORC rules that increased the IOR limit for the One Ton class from 27.5ft to 30.5ft. 

Geronimo, second yacht overall, rounds a weather mark during the 1983 Southern Cross Cup (photo Phil Uhl)

Design 136 was pitched to excel in the typical lumpy and windy Australian and New Zealand conditions, with less sail area and more length than boats intended for Northern Hemisphere racing, but it went on to do well everywhere. The boat was considered to be extremely stiff, with small straightforwardly-shaped trapezoidal keels. The design proved a phenomenal performer upwind, and were fast reaching and OK running. New Zealand skippers Tom McCall, Owen Chantaloup and Del Hogg were quick to see the design's potential and commissioned the new boats, while a number were also built concurrently in Australia.

Exador, fourth yacht overall and part of the successful New Zealand team, seen here rounding a windward mark during the 1983 Southern Cross Cup (photo Phil Uhl)

A closely packed fleet in very light conditions during the 1983 Southern Cross Cup - Di-Hard visible to the left, along with Highland Fling (KH-888), Hitchhiker (KA-303) and Indian Pacific (3695) (photo Phil Uhl)

Third yacht overall Di-Hard, seen here after rounding a gybe mark with Geronimo in the background (photo Phil Uhl)

The three New Zealand had yachts all benefited from the one-design nature of their pre-regatta tuning programme, and all secured places in the New Zealand Southern Cross Cup team, edging out the only other real threat in the Hitachi-sponsored trials, from Neville Crichton's Frers 43 Shockwave. Pacific Sundance was the top performer, and Geronimo and Exador finished second equal, and thus the New Zealand team for the Southern Cross Cup in 1983 was comprised of three almost-identical Farr One Tonners.

Britain's Panda seen here to windward of Australia's Sagacious (photo Phil Uhl)

Highland Fling, rounding a weather mark with Taurus II close behind, was a member of the third-placed Hong Kong team (photo Phil Uhl)

Mandrake, a Ken Steinman 50-footer (photo Phil Uhl)

The Frumious Bandersnatch (a Peterson 43), member of the third-placed Hong Kong team (photo Phil Uhl)

The New Zealand team put on a devastating and all-conquering performance in the Southern Cross Cup, taking wins in three out of five races to secure the Cup with 531 points, 111 points clear of the second-placed New South Wales team. The New Zealand boats proved exceptionally fast in all conditions except when the breeze dropped below six knots. Pacific Sundance, skippered by Geoff Stagg and Peter Walker, posted a first, third and fourth among the 27 yachts in the three inshore races to finish as first yacht overall, with 211 points. They also won the 180-miler (short offshore), and the Sydney-Hobart Race which doubled as the final race in the series - in fact she nearly won the Sydney-Hobart overall, but ran out of wind just 40 miles from the finish off Tasman Island and had to settle for sixth place in the 160-boat fleet.

The spinnaker is launched aboard New South Wales' team yacht Hitchhiker (photo Phil Uhl)

Geronimo, skippered by Stu Brentnall, finished as second yacht in the Southern Cross Cup fleet on 182 points (eighth overall in the Sydney-Hobart) and Exador, helmed by Ray Haslar,was fourth (and ninth in the Sydney-Hobart). The New Zealand victory was an even more dominant performance than in 1977 (Jenny H, Smir-Noff-Agen and Swuzzlebubble), and almost as good as New Zealand's first win in 1971 (Barnacle Bill, Inca and Pathfinder).

Australian yacht Black Magic, a Dubois 40-footer, sailed for the Victorian team, seen here heading off on a reaching leg during the 1983 Southern Cross Cup, with Highland Fling close behind (photo Phil Uhl)

An interesting perspective of the Southern Cross fleet making their way downwind in light reaching conditions during the Southern Cross Cup - British yacht Indulgence (Dubois 42) leads the way, with Pacific Sundance (red spinnaker) and Geronimo (green and white) visible on the right (photo Phil Uhl)

Black Magic sails upwind in the light airs and choppy conditions that prevailed throughout the 1983 Southern Cross Cup (photo Phil Uhl)

This second-placed team included two Australian Admiral’s Cup contenders, Bondi Tram and Hitchhiker, both Frers’ 41-footers, and another Farr 40, Indian Pacific (which finished sixth yacht overall). Third was the Hong Kong team of Bandido Bandido (Frers 43), Highland Fling (Dubois 42), and The Frumious Bandersnatch (Peterson 43). Another Frers 41-footer, Di-Hard, sailing for the fourth-placed Papua New Guinea team, finished as the third yacht overall on 167 points.

Hitchhiker in light airs completes a gybe during the 1983 Southern Cross Cup (photo Phil Uhl) 

The Frumious Bandersnatch approaches a gybe mark during the 1983 Southern Cross Cup (photo Phil Uhl)

Australian yacht Too Impetuous, a Holland 42, rounds a leeward mark during the 1983 Southern Cross Cup (photo Phil Uhl)

Di-Hard seen here rounding a windward mark during the 1983 Southern Cross Cup (photo Phil Uhl)

A close up view of the crew of British yacht Jade shortly after rounding a windward mark (photo Phil Uhl)

Indulgence follows Bondi Tram around a windward mark (photo Phil Uhl)

The New Zealand yacht Shockwave - missed selection for the New Zealand Southern Cross Cup team, but sailed in the fifth-placed Australian team (photo Phil Uhl)

The series ended with a controversial protest, which saw the British yacht Panda disqualified for a minor port and starboard incident which occurred as the fleet tacked its way out of Sydney Harbour. There had been many collisions as the fleet had jammed up after a close reach down the harbour and the turn to the south off Sydney Heads. However, few protests had been lodged and no other yachts had been penalised. Panda’s disqualification from the triple-scoring Sydney-Hobart race cost the British team 45 points, dropping it from third place to sixth in the final team standings.

Indulgence seen here amongst the melee of preparations for the 1983 Sydney-Hobart Race (photo Phil Uhl)

Indian Pacific takes a pin-end start during the 1983 Sydney-Hobart Race, with Indulgence (K-959) up to weather (photo Phil Uhl)

Panda, a member of the sixth-placed British team, was unfortunate to be disqualified from the Sydney-Hobart Race (photo Phil Uhl)

Indulgence broaches during the early stages of the 1983 Sydney-Hobart Race (photo Phil Uhl)

Australian yacht Taurus II sails downwind during the 1983 Sydney-Hobart Race (photo Phil Uhl)

1983 Southern Cross Cup team results:

1 New Zealand (531 points); 2 New South Wales (430); 3 Hong Kong (388); 4 Papua New Guinea (353); 5 Australia (350); 6 Britain (342); 7 Victoria (291); 8 Tasmania (191); 9 South Australia (141).

Article updated June 2026

The end of the IOR

I recently came across an article penned by well-known yacht designer Julian Everitt and which had been shared to the One Ton Class Facebook page. Julian has been kind enough to allow me to publish his insightful and thought-provoking article here (to which I've added a few images):

A while back David Macfarlane posed the question: “Why did the IOR die?” The answer is surprisingly simple and has little to do with economic downturns, crazy, escalating costs or the perception that the boats were unseaworthy and slow.

 Australia's Ragamuffin during the last Admiral's Cup under IOR in 1993, not long before the eventual demise of the IOR altogether 

The very people, the members of the International Technical Committee (ITC), who were tasked to protect and develop the rule for the benefit of the owners signed the death warrant some six years before the beast was finally deemed extinct. It wasn’t a deliberate act, by any means, it was just kind of allowed to happen as interests grew in the development of a new ‘super’ rule that would cure all the ‘ills’ of offshore handicapping. It was called IMS. The International Measurement System.

IMS was very much an American based initiative formulated by a burgeoning interest in the power of computers as envisioned by ‘idealists’ at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). This belief in a ‘perfect’ system filtered into the ITC who then increasingly believed that IMS could replace IOR as THE rule for Grand Prix Offshore Racing. At a stroke IMS was perceived as a handicapping system that would allow the return of ‘wholesome’ cruiser racers to the Grand Prix level.

ILC40s, as a level-rating derivative of the IMS rule, seen here competing in the 1995 Admiral's Cup

The 1976 French cat rigged Mini Tonner L'Effraie

And so the scene was set for a showdown between the two rules. Funnily enough however, this ‘conflict’ largely took place behind closed doors - the closed doors of the ITC. This erstwhile Group of designers and boffins had done a reasonable job of helping to develop the original, Olin Stephens/Dick Carter created Mk 1 IOR, into an ever more complex Mk III IOR. They had dealt with the slings and arrows of ‘cat’ rigs, unballasted daggerboards, extreme overhangs, bumps, chines and many other rule dodgers thrown at it by a vast army of new, young designers. The rule really was the ultimate mathematical, but organic and holistic challenge imaginable and so it required a lot of policing and an awful lot of tweaking.

The Farr One Ton centreboarder, Jenny H, 1977

At the annual ITC meeting always held in November and euphemistically called The November Meetings informal submissions were invited from the ‘floor’ for what would eventually become IOR Mk IV. But the minds of the powers that be were elsewhere. Despite impassioned pleas from designers including Tony Castro, Geoff Stagg, representing Bruce Farr, the Dubois office, myself and several owners to use IOR as the ‘baseline’ for producing more user friendly designs, the ITC elected to promote IMS as the rule for the future. Gary Mull, chairman of the ITC at this time, seemed to be heavily influenced by a growing love affair from American designers, like Dave Pedrick, Bill Tripp and the ‘scientist’ Jerry Milgram, with IMS. Together they envisioned a new breed of fair hulled, moderate designs, with great stability, proper cockpits and fitted out interiors.

The IOR Mk IV, proposed from the audience at the 1988 November meetings promulgated similar outcomes, but utilising the proven and robust linear formulas of IOR rather than the largely unknown reliance on unproven Velocity Predictions inherent in the IMS formula.

Turkish Delight trying to stay on her feet during the 1987 Irish Admiral's Cup trials

In the proposed revisions to IOR, stability would be unmeasured getting rid, at a stoke, of the dreaded Centre of Gravity Factor - a measurement fraught with inaccuracies and held largely responsible for producing unstable boats and ones overly dependent on crew weight on the rail. CGF was also directly responsible for such undesirable idiosyncrasies as beam waterline bumps.

Gone too would be the ubiquitous 150 percent overlap on headsails which gave unrated sail area. This change would have opened the door to the development of non-overlap rigs.

Victory (left), Hitchhiker and Pinta sporting their big no.1 genoas during the first race of the 1981 Admiral's Cup 

The accursed creases and distortions around the aft girth measurements was to be addressed also. One simple suggestion was to rule out any form of reverse inflection in the aft profile. The days of the bustle were virtually over anyway and of course all of our proposed rule changes could be easily ‘grandfathered’ to prevent the existing fleet suffering too much. In reality small changes to the aft girth stations and most particularly the girth differences between inner and outer girth stations would have produced fuller, wider and fairer sterns in short order, while maintains an element of choice. Choice being a factor missing from today’s rules.

While the outcomes of such changes cannot ever be accurately predicted, cause and effect is highly influential in a formula like IOR. The simple removal of the penalty on stability would have quickly allowed designers to create lighter boats as stability could have been found in low CG keels rather than hull form and brute overall weight. In turn lighter and more powerful boats would have pointed the way to fuller sterns.

Gunboat Rangiriri - one of the new breed of Farr-designed light displacement centreboarders of 1977, showing the relatively clean lines that were possible before the ITC forced an increase in displacement

But the ITC very systematically destroyed these arguments as unworkable and felt IMS was a much more effective way of achieving the same outcomes. In fairness to the ITC a number of designers, including Rob Humphries - a member of the ITC board at the time - had IMS designs out racing that did showcase the rule rather well. But this was to be a short lived moment.

And so the ITC policy was set at that fateful November meeting in 1988. The two rules would run in parallel while the anomalies inherent in the VPP-driven IMS were sorted out and a new era of dual purpose offshore racers would begin.

Work would continue on the development of IOR, but with none of the suggested fundamental changes implemented. A Mk IV Rule was duly drafted, but few in authority had any real enthusiasm for it. As far as they were concerned IOR was dying and IMS was the new kid on the block to be nurtured.

The Whitbread Maxi ketch Steinlager 2 

In an earlier attempt by the ITC to be more inclusive of heavier, more cruising orientated boats an IOR MK IIIA was introduced, but this backfired spectacularly when Bruce Farr, in particular, exploited the carelessly drafted rule by producing the heavier, but much longer Steinlager 2 Whitbread Maxi in 1989. This amazing own goal of a rule amendment created by the ITC finally allowed the creation of the all conquering inshore Maxi Matador2. Far from allowing the development of heavier, more fitted out boats, the Mk IIIA rule simply promoted heavier stripped out boats which in the case of the Maxi’s allowed them to effectively gain 3ft, or so, of unmeasured length. This was one of many misdirections the ITC took in trying to ‘protect’ the rule and it had a seriously deleterious effect on owner confidence.

Matador 2, the biggest and fastest of the IOR Maxis 

But back to the ITC meetings of November 1988. I remember it like yesterday, Geoff Stagg’s final reaction to the ITC intragency. “We don’t really care what you do. Just give us any rule and we’ll go off and design winners for it”.

Gaucho (above and below)

And that is precisely what happened. Within two years Farr had produced the ultimate Grand Prix IMS boat in the form of the 43ft Gaucho. But it wasn’t the beginning of the new era predicted by the rule makers of elegance and internal comfort. Gaucho signalled a very different future. Her overhangs were very short, freeboard was high, the sheer line straight and the interior just as stripped as an IOR boat except for the introduction of a door on the ‘head’ compartment. Other required features like a galley and saloon table were treated with token gestures expensively built in carbon. But much more significantly, in order for velocity predictions to work ‘accurately’, actual stability had to be measured. It wasn’t long before lead was being replaced by wood at the bottom of keels. Not exactly the promised land of wholesome cruiser racers envisioned by the rule makers.

But while IMS continued to be promoted as the solution to ‘fair’ global offshore yacht racing IOR struggled on, shouldering virtually all of the blame for declining racing fleets.

I remember talking to Olin (Stephens) about it all. He was very sanguine - perhaps even a little surprised by the way IOR had developed, but ever the enthusiast for a mathematical solution he liked the theories behind IMS and perhaps felt that the apparent shortcomings in the IOR could be addressed more effectively by the overarching qualities of IMS. It was a mathematically-based theory that wasn’t born out in practice.

With the advantage of a 21st century perspective and taking into account yacht racing developments since the death of IOR in 1994, would keeping IOR been better for the sport as a whole? In terms of continuity and preventing the explosion of multiple, fleet sapping alternative classes, it would assuredly have been beneficial. But it did need a major shot in the arm at the end of the 1980s to reassure an ever more cynical owner base that their worries were being addressed.

Cookson's High 5 followed the Gaucho theme and was dominant in the 2000 Kenwood Cup 

In the rarefied atmosphere of Whitbread sponsored global racing, Bruce Farr, once again, showed the way. As IOR lay on its deathbed - an outcome accelerated by clumsy attempts to update events like the Admiral’s Cup with the proposed introduction of one designs and IMS handicapping - Farr, in tandem with the foresight of the Whitbread race committee who allowed asymmetric spinnakers to be flown, discarded the ‘heavy’ design route he had produced with Steinlager 2 and produced a new Maxi design that was some 7,500kgs lighter. This much lighter design was a great deal quicker around the world and potentially showed a new beginning for lightweight IOR racers. Sadly, however, these three Farr ketches, La Poste, Merit Cup and New Zealand Endeavour, were one of the last throws of the dice for IOR.

New Zealand Endeavour - one of three new Farr-designed Whitbread Maxi ketches for the 1993-94 race 

But back to theorising about where IOR could have led in design terms. Would keeping a highly modified version of the rule kept ocean racing on its feet? Would it have prevented the almost total demise of classic events like the Ton Cups, the Admiral’s Cup, the Kenwood, the Southern Cross, the Onion Patch, the SORC? Who knows? Maybe it was all about economics or personal time management, but what I do know is that the defining legacy of IOR was its success at global continuity in offshore racing. To have made the decision to ditch this in favour of a hugely more flawed IMS was a grave mistake.

Would a boat designed to an updated version of IOR as suggested back in 1988 at the ITC meetings evolved into something equivalent to today’s high performance designs as typified by the IRC racers, TP52’s and Fast 40’s? Yes. Is the simple answer. Advances in lightweight construction, appendage design, carbon spars would have all contributed hugely, but the biggest single factor effecting overall design and concept would have been the removal of attempting to measure stability. Just as is the case today, boats would not have become more stable, but would simply have become significantly lighter and capable of carrying larger rigs effectively. These are the primary elements driving the performance in today’s designs.

To have arrived at this point in the genesis of the offshore yacht within the IOR style framework would have resulted in far more fleet continuity across the globe and possibly allowed the major offshore championships to survive the various financial challenges and rule uncertainties that killed them off.

Julian's article concludes with the above image of his 43 footer Backlash, with the caption "It's not easy to pick a single picture that represents the entire IOR era from 1970 to 1994, but this comes from a high point of the rule in 1985. Fleets were huge and there was enormous variety of design from a multitude of designers".

Article dated August 2019

Hitchhiker (Frers 40)

Hitchhiker (photo Powerboat-world)

Hitchhiker was a 40.5 foot yacht, designed by German Frers in early 1980 for West Australian yachtsman Peter Briggs. Her lines derived from Frers' earlier SORC champion Acadia, and his previous Two Ton champion Gitana, but with a more modern and conventional approach, with moderate displacement, relatively clean lines, flat garboards and a deep keel (see profile drawing below). Favourable sail area to displacement and wetted surface ratios provided excellent acceleration. The boat was built from Kevlar and Klegecell by Bakercraft in Perth, and featured longitudinal bulkheads to provide immense fore and aft stiffness. Briggs underscored his seriousness with his Hitchhiker campaign by fitting the yacht with a German-made titanium-stocked rudder from Speedwave, and ordered a spare Stearn mast for the boat. All her sidestay turnbuckles were connected below deck, and like most competitive IOR boats of the day, she carried a huge amount of internal ballast under the floorboards, with all possible weight centered amidships and down low. Hitchhiker measured in at 31.2ft IOR, a reasonably high rating for a 40-footer but reflected Frers' thinking at the time to not give up too much speed through excessive hull shape deviations in a quest for a lower rating.

Hitchhiker during the 1981 Australian trials (photo Offshore magazine)

So advanced was Hitchhiker’s design and construction, and her performance so competitive for the era, that she was selected to represent Australia at two Admiral’s Cups (1981 and 1983). Briggs commented in 2013 (during preparations for that year's Hamilton Island Race Week) that the reason why Hitchhiker was a great boat in its early days was because it was an all-rounder and was quick in all conditions. 

At the 2013 event, a bold battle flag donning a large red thumbs-up signal flew proudly on Hitchhiker’s forestay while the crew was immaculately dressed in matching red and white crew uniforms. Briggs explained that the concept behind the boat's moniker and flag came from the brainstorming of names in 1980 when they came up with ‘hitchhiker’. “Initially we thought ‘what a dumb name!’ but 'hitchhiker' means ‘free lift’ and that’s what you want in sailing, rather than when the wind knocks. The thumb went with the hitchhiking and red is my favourite colour so we went with that". 

Hitchhiker during the 1981 Australian Admiral's Cup trials (photo Chris Furey)

One of her former crew recalls that Hitchhiker had all her halyards exiting the mast below decks. "Our 'platform' had all halyard winches mounted along the front edge. I did the bow and I would knock on the deck signals to the pit man down below. One knock hoist. Two knocks stop. And so on". 

Hitchhiker was the star of the 1981 Australian Admiral's Cup trials, counting five wins and line honours in two of the races to confirm her place in the team, alongside Alan Bond's Apollo V and Syd Fischer's Ragamuffin (both Peterson 43-footers).

Hitchhiker amongst the fray during a general recall in the first race of the 1981 Admiral's Cup

Hitchhiker during the first race of the 1981 Admiral's Cup, with Pinta astern and to windward, and Britain's Victory to weather

Hitchhiker arrived at Cowes with a terrific reputation and this was further bolstered when Harold Cudmore was brought on to join skipper Noel Robins for the inshore races. Unfortunately, however, Hitchhiker's reputation came undone right from this first race when she got tangled up with US yachts Scaramouche and Stars & Stripes, and Spain's Bribon III, and ended up over the startline early. More photos from that race can be seen here. Although Hitchhiker went on to finish the race, she was disqualified, presumably for the startline collisions.

Hitchhiker gets caught on East Bramble buoy in the second race of the 1981 Admiral's Cup (the full sequence can be seen here)

Hitchhiker suffered from another poor start in the second race, and needing to improve from her dismal first race effort 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. Hitchhiker collected a two-point penalty for hitting the buoy, and a further ten points for fouling Bribon III, and took just six points from the race.

Another view of Hitchhiker's predicament at East Bramble buoy

Robins and his crew on Hitchhiker did their best to make amends in the next three races, but 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.

Hitchhiker in power reaching mode during the 1981 Admiral's Cup (photo Guy Gurney)

Leeward mark action aboard Hitchhiker during the 1981 Admiral's Cup (photo World of Yachting 1981-82)

Hitchhiker stayed in Europe after the Admiral's Cup to compete in the Two Ton Cup in Porto Cervo in September 1981. She was small for a Two Tonner, and having not been designed for the event, it was necessary to fit a larger mainsail to lift her rating closer to the 32.0ft Two Ton limit. In generally light airs, Hitchhiker was the best boat at the series and won the Cup from Smeralda Prima (Peterson design), an Italian yacht helmed by Australia's John Bertrand, and Aries (Holland design), a US yacht helmed by Harold Cudmore.

Hitchhiker chasing Italy's Yena during the 1981 Two Ton Cup in Porto Servo, Sardinia (photo World of Yachting 1981-82)

Hitchhiker then went on to sail for the Australian team in the 1981 Southern Cross Cup, alongside Alan Bond's Apollo V and Syd Fischer's Ragamuffin. She finished with placings of 4/12/1/6 and 201 points, just two points behind top individual yacht Smuggler (Dubois 40), and the best of the third-placed team, with the series won by the New South Wales team (Smuggler, Szechwan and Beach Inspector) and Britain second (Wee Willie Winkie, Mayhem and Yeoman XXIII).

Hitchhiker seen here at the start of the 1981 Sydney to Hobart race, with Envy (808), Apollo III and Britain's Yeoman XXIII (K-711) to weather, and Challenge II visible to leeward (photo Phil Uhl)

Hitchhiker was the first and only boat to represent Australia in the Admiral's Cup, Clipper Cup and Southern Cross Cup teams. The strong breezes and choppy waters of the 1982 Clipper Cup in particular suited the boat, and she was consistently fast. Hitchhiker also benefited from an all-star crew, with Robins (skipper), Jack Baxter, Skippy Lissman, Joe English, Peter Gilmore, Peter Cavill, "Chas from Tas", Phil Smidmore, Geoff Gale and Dave Forbes ("4 Bears"), an Olympic gold medalist and America's Cup sailor. 

Hitchhiker powers upwind during the 1982 Clipper Cup

Hitchhiker (right) seen here in a downwind line-up during the 1982 Clipper Cup with Canada's Will O the Wisp alongside (centre) and an unknown US yacht

One of her crew recalls that "Noel had a habit of doing a conservative (late) start and simply sailing through our division and into the bigger boat division (that started five minutes before us) by the windward mark. By the end of the race we often found ourselves two divisions ahead of our division.

"4 Bears was brought on board to add to our steering depth for the long races at Clipper Cup. Hitchhiker would death roll like a pig square running in strong breezes (see photo, left). Most IOR boats did. In one of our triangle races at Hawaii Noel steered for the first four legs in a fresh breeze. When we turned the top mark for the square run Noel turned the tiller over to 4 Bears. It was the first time he had touched the tiller. Three death rolls later (30 seconds) the spin pole tip went under and the mast got pushed sideways and went over the side. In hindsight not the best time to introduce a new helmsman. Still, we got back together for the next race (unlike her team-mate, Police Car).

"In the Molokai Race we blew apart our favourite Kevlar mainsail. We knew it was on the way out but it was still fast. We carried a spare. However, because of the earlier dismasting the headboard slug would not go past the join in the mast. We removed both headboards off both mainsails and bolted the headboard off the torn mainsail onto the spare main. The whole process took over an hour while bucking our way to windward with just a #3 jib up (see photo, right). Once we got going again (in last place) we sailed through many divisions to arrive at the windward mark (as usual) leading our division and amongst the division of bigger boats that started five minutes ahead of us. We ran out of water in the Round the State race and found stainless steel nuts in the toolbox to suck to promote salivating".

Hitchhiker after a Sydney to Hobart race (photo Facebook)

Hitchhiker (left) on the start line just to windward of Di-Hard, with Once More Dear Friends (3000) during the 1983 Australian Admiral's Cup trials (photo Australia's Yearbook of Sail 1)

Briggs spent $100,000 refurbishing Hitchhiker for the 1983 Australian Admiral's Cup trials, including $40,000 worth of new sails from North Sails, a new Zapspar mast to replace the one that was broken in the Clipper Cup, and alterations to the deck and interior layout by boat-builder Ken Beashel. She retained a higher rating at 31.7ft (her key rating dimensions were 34.22 L, 12.26 B and 15,264 DSPL). While many new boats competed in the trials, including an updated version of Hitchhiker, Bondi Tram, she finished as unofficial top scorer of the series. Her race placings, 3/6/3/5/4/2/2/2/1/4 told the story of steady improvement through the trials as the crew, comprised of sailors from Perth and Sydney, settled in. She joined the Australian 1983 Admiral's Cup team, alongside Bondi Tram and Once More Dear Friends, a Dubois 39-foot minimum rater.

Hitchhiker crosses Bondi Tram during the 1983 Australian Admiral's Cup trials (photo Australia's Yearbook of Sail 1)

Hitchhiker seen here during the 1983 Admiral's Cup, rounding a weather mark behind Canada's Amazing Grace and Charisma V, with Italy's Almagores just visible approaching on port - also visible, although not an Admiral's Cup contender, is the original Jade (K-747) (photo Phil Uhl)

Hitchhiker put in a more solid performance in the 1983 edition of the Admiral's Cup, opening with a very encouraging first place in the opening race, but then dropping off the pace with placings of 23/15/18/29 to finish as 16th yacht in the individual results, behind Bondi Tram (13th) but ahead of Once More Dear Friends (20th), with the Australian team finishing fourth overall.

Hitchhiker in hard running conditions during the 1983 Admiral's Cup, alongside another Australian yacht, the Holland-designed Too Impetuous, which sailed for Papua New Guinea (photo Phil Uhl)

Later, in the Southern Cross Cup held in Sydney in December 1983, Hitchhiker was first around the windward mark in the short ocean race before being passed by the much larger boats on the return leg, and taking the overall win for the race.

Above and below - Hitchhiker racing in the 1983 Southern Cross Cup series (photos by Phil Uhl)

An epic shot of Hitchhiker during the inaugural Hamilton Island Race Week in 1984

Hitchhiker was transported to the East Coast for the inaugural Hamilton Island Race Week in 1984. In fresh breezes Hitchhiker played the underdog role and won by a mere one point after entering the final race four points behind.

Hitchhiker hoists her spinnaker while Inch by Winch loses hers during the 1984 Hamilton Island Race Week

Later, the beautifully maintained Hitchhiker was again transported 5,000km from Perth, Western Australia, across the bare Nullarbor Plain to Hamilton Island on a semi-trailer, apparently the longest distance in the world to drive a yacht of its size. With his three combined trips to Hamilton Island, in 1984, for the 25th anniversary, in 2008 and 2013 (where she formed part of the "First Fleet" division), Briggs has spent 30,000km on the road transporting Hitchhiker to the world famous regatta.

Hitchhiker during the 2014 Hamilton Island Race Week (photo Charterworld/Andrea Francoli)

“In the old days when we trucked over in ’84 we didn’t have to have a lead car and those sorts of things. Today, there’s a lot of rules and you have to have a car at the front saying ‘vehicle following’ which increases the cost considerably - it’s a big effort,” Briggs said in 2013.

Hitchhiker during the 2008 Hamilton Island Race Week (photo crosbielarimer.com/Sail-world)

Briggs still owns Hitchhiker and maintains her in original condition in Perth. The following video is of Hitchhiker sailing downwind, and giving her crew some white-knuckle moments, during the 2008 Hamilton Island Race Week:

Hitchhiker seen here in a Royal Perth Yacht Club regatta in November 2023 (photo Facebook)

Hitchhiker as seen in April 2024 in her marina at the Royal Perth Yacht Club (photo Facebook)

Hitchhiker is currently for sale (early 2024).

Article updated April 2024