The German yachts known as Diva came onto the Admiral's Cup scene in 1985, but not to be confused with the French One Tonner Diva, the wunderboot that took individual honours in the Cup in 1983.
The 1985 yacht, Diva G, was designed by Freidrich Judel and Rolf Vrolijk for her owners Peter Westphal-Langloh and Freddy Diekell. The 44 footer, rating 33.6ft IOR, was designed in response to the moves by the RORC to introduce a minimum aggregate rating for teams in the Admiral's Cup from 1985 onwards, and thereby put an end to three boat teams made up of minimum (30.0ft IOR) raters. Diva G was built by Yachtwerf Wedel in Kevlar and glass on a foam sandwich core. She represented the arrival of a new style of fractionally-rigged yacht, with laminated sails and improved spar technology making rig control a better proposition at this size.
Diva G was part of the winning German team in the 1985 Admiral's Cup. While she did not quite match the results of her smaller team-mates (Outsider and Rubin G VIII), she held her own against another small boat onslaught and recorded a respectable 11th place overall. Much of her success was due to the way in which she was handled, with near immaculate crew-work, and because she was skippered by Berend Beilken, who had been in almost every German Admiral's Cup team since 1973.
Diva G powers downwind during the 1985 Admiral's Cup
Diva G seen here (on port tack behind Fair Lady with Panda on starboard) at the start of the Channel Race during the 1985 Admiral's Cup (photo Phil Uhl)
Diva G during the 1985 Admiral's Cup (photo Beken)
Diva G seen here at the beginning of a race during the 1986 Sardinia Cup
The new Diva being launched (photo Facebook)
A new Diva was commissioned by Westphal-Langloh for the 1987 Admiral's Cup. The new boat was another Judel/Vrolijk 44 footer, rating 34.4ft IOR. Westphal-Langloh was again successful in making the German team, alongside Containerand Saudade, even though Diva had been in the water for just a few weeks before the trials. However, the yacht then picked up debris in her propeller while passing through a narrow channel en-route to England, ran aground, and spent a night on the sands off Helgoland as a consequence. Diva's keel was straightened back to true with hydraulic jacks, but she was not 100% right.
The bend in Diva's keel can be seen here (photo Ian Watson)
Diva surges along on a reaching leg, with team-mate Container visible just ahead on the opposite gybe
Diva G and Pinta racing in 1987 (photo Facebook)
The chances of a successful defence of the Cup looked in doubt after Diva's problems, andteam-mate Container suffered from a lack of tune in moderate conditions. The German effort was further undone at the fourth windward mark in the third inshore race, when Diva found the path to the layline blocked by Austria's Pinta and Original Beckmann, and Italy's Marisa Konica. Beilken tried to tack underneath and squeeze up to the mark attempting to extract height out of a low-area/high-lift keel before it was working efficiently. He failed. A few minutes later team-mate Saudade under-estimated the tide and hit the mark.
Diva's error dropped her from 16th to 24th in the race, and she went on to finish in 26th place in the individual standings, as part of a fifth place overall by the German team.
Above and below - deck and cockpit detail on Diva (photo Ian Watson)
The photograph below shows Diva G now on display at the German Maritime Museum in Bremerhafen.
This post features some photographs and video from the 1983 Admiral's Cup series - the regatta was won by a strong German team of two minimum raters (30.0ft IOR), Outsiderand Sabina, and the bigger Pinta(sistership to Container). The light airs in both the Channel Race and the Fastnet favoured smaller yachts, and Germany was ideally placed in this respect, with all three yachts finishing very highly in the individual results to give them a commanding 167 point margin over the second placed Italian team in the final standings.
Shenandoah (US) rounds a weather mark during a pre-Cup race in Cowes, with Panda (K1983) and Container (G-89) ahead and to windward (photo Phil Uhl)
Lady Be, one of the chartered yachts in the New Zealand team, rounding a weather mark withUS yacht Locura in pursuit
The Oyster 43 Stephen Jones-designed Black Topic was the highest placed of the British team (14th) and is seen here in the thick of windward mark action - 1983 saw the British finish well down the placings at eighth overall (photo Phil Uhl)
The video below is from an interview (in German) with crew from the Jacques de Ridder designed Sabina (winner of the Channel Race and second individual yacht overall), Thomas Michaelsen and Tim Kroger. The sailing footage starts at 3:15 and ends at 5:45, with some good top mark rounding shots of the three German yachts.
Espada chases Bondi Tram (centre), Caiman (left) and Too Impetuous (right) in the second inshore race (photo Phil Uhl)
Britain's Dragon (18th overall) crosses behind Diva, the top overall yacht of the series (photo Phil Uhl)
Ossian (ex-Mea Culpa) leads Outsider and Brava around a windward mark, with Pinta visible to the right with spinnaker set (photo Phil Uhl)
Di-hard sets off on the first reaching leg to windward of a Belgian yacht Mariner, with Container 79 G-1999) visible ahead of Italy's Prima Donna (photo Phil Uhl)
Container 79 (Austria) and Swuzzlebubble IV (New Zealand)round a windward mark during the 1983 Admiral's Cup (photo Phil Uhl)
Australia's Hitchhiker, seen here alongside another Australian yacht (sailing for Papua New Guinea), Too Impetuous (photo Phil Uhl)
Sabina (second yacht overall) and Di-hard (15th)in action at a gybe mark during the 1983 Admiral's Cup
From left to right - Hitchhiker, Di Hard, Shenandoah and Caiman on a reaching leg during one of the inshore races during the 1983 Admiral's Cup (photo Guy Gurney)
A second and shorter video can also be viewed here. This features interviews with the same crew from Sabina, and the the sailing footage starts from 1:13 (note, for some reason these links may not work on Apple systems like iPad).
Magistri rounding a leeward mark (photo Guy Gurney)
Container 79 and Italy's Almagores charging down the Solent during the first race of the series
Lady Be leads Scarlett O'Hara downwind (photo Alan Sefton | NZ Yachting)
Shockwave(New Zealand) gets off to a great start in the second race, with team-mate Lady Be up to weather, the two boats going on to score third and fourth in this race (photo from Jonathan Eastland's archives)
The Tony Castro designed Justine IV, skippered by Harold Cudmore to third place overall thanks to some very strong performances in the offshore races, but part of an otherwise unsuccessful (11th placed) Irish team
An elevated view from the Fort turning mark, with Japan's Togo VIIin the foreground and Britain's Indulgence to leeward (photo Guy Gurney)
Hitchhikerseen here 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)
Australian yacht Di-Hard (sistership to Hitchhiker), sailing for Papua New Guinea (photo RORC | Facebook)
Top individual yacht of the series, Diva (France) trying to extricate herself after tangling with a buoy during the Channel Race (photo Guy Gurney)
Lady Bewith spinnaker and staysail set tries to outrun the smaller Italian yacht Almagores (photo Phil Uhl)
Caiman II, sailing for Holland seen here after running aground, possibly during the Channel Race (photo Guy Gurney)
Sabina rounding a windward mark (photographer unknown, Facebook)
Start of the Channel Race (photo Phil Uhl)
The 50-foot Midnight Sun leads Canadian yacht Runaway at the start of the Channel Race (photo Phil Uhl)
Australian yacht Bondi Tram, a custom German Frers 41ft design, and top yacht of the fourth placed Australian team (finishing in 13th place overall)
The German yacht Espada sailed for the Austrian team, and seen here in the second race (just behind Bondi Tram)
French yacht Ossian (Frers 42-footer) leads Belgium's Mariner (Van de Stadt 42), possibly during the third race where these two similarly rated yachts finished 36th and 37th respectively (photo Phil Uhl)
The Ed Dubois designed 42 footer Indulgence (32.7ft IOR) - top yacht of the British trials but finished as the lowest placed of the British team. After leading the fleet in the early stages of the Fastnet race she took a long tack into oblivion and never recovered
Black Topic, a member of the British team, is seen here before the Admiral's Cup and before her name change (the RORC thought her original name of Black Top was too close to owner Dixon Atkinson's tarmacadam business)
Outsider began her racing career as Dusselboot, an early design from the emerging partnership of Dutchman Rolf Vrolijk and German Friedrich Judel. She was designed as a minimum rating (30.0ft IOR) light-medium displacement yacht (12,700lbs), constructed in 1980 in aluminium by Yachtafenwerft for owner Michael Schmidt, and featuring a tall fractional rig based on a Stearn three-quarter section. She first made a name for herself in England, when she won the 1981 Round the Island Race (Cowes) on a day when the German Admiral's Cup team for that year gave notice of its strength. Dusselboot won the race as a result of her ability to hitch a ride on the quarter wave of bigger yachts, in this case the Swan 51 Scoundrel, from the Needles to St Catherines Point. Team-mates Pintaand Container finished fifth and seventh.
Dusselboot/Outsider lines plan
Sailing in the 1983 Admiral's Cup
The German team finished the Admiral's Cup in third place that year, a position which may have been improved had Dusselboot not lost her mast in the Channel Race, dropping her to 15th place in the individual standings. The yacht was renamed Outsider when she was bought by Tilmar Hansen, and after some tweaking and improvement she made the German team for Cowes again in 1983, sailing alongside Pinta and Sabina. The German team was totally dominant, and they won the series by amassing a total 847 points, well clear of the second placed Italian team on 680 points. Sabina was top overall yacht, Pinta second and Outsider fifth.
Outsider was bought in the US and went on to compete in the 1984 SORC, where she was photographed by Larry Moran. The last photograph indicates that she was in an unused state in Massachusetts.
Outsider slides downwind during the 1984 SORC
In light airs during the 1984 SORC
Sailing downwind, 1984 SORC (photo Larry Moran)
Sailing in the later 1980s or 1990s
As seen in Massachusetts
Outsider, now for sale (2015) in Portsmouth, Rhode Island
Below is a photo of the later Outsider, designed for the 1985 Admiral's Cup:
The 1985 yacht, Diva G, was designed by Freidrich Judel and Rolf Vrolijk for her owners Peter Westphal-Langloh and Freddy Diekell. The 44 footer, rating 33.6ft IOR, was designed in response to the moves by the RORC to introduce a minimum aggregate rating for teams in the Admiral's Cup from 1985 onwards, and thereby put an end to three boat teams made up of minimum (30.0ft IOR) raters. Diva G was built by Yachtwerf Wedel in Kevlar and glass on a foam sandwich core. She represented the arrival of a new style of fractionally-rigged yacht, with laminated sails and improved spar technology making rig control a better proposition at this size. 
