Racing classic sailing yachts

[Blue439]

Sailing has been the sport of my life. I practiced it at a fairly high level (back in the day, there were no “professional” sailors, and those who made a living out of it were frowned upon), which means that I had no time and no inclination to take photos while I was doing it. Later, and for a few years around 2010, I photographed regattas of classic yachts. I was quite into it for a few years, and the photos I will upload below are from that period. Many of my pictures were published, a few won awards, and one of them even won me a very expensive (in the range of 600 dollars) jacket from the UK brand Musto!

Of course, everyone is welcome to post their own sailing pictures here.

Aside from sailing, I have not photographed any sport, except competitive riding, and more specifically eventing. I am not a rider: on a horse, I can barely tell the front from the back, but for a number of reasons which would be too long and uninteresting to explain, I shot a lot of eventing, also around 2010–15, and even made a book about that wonderful and little-known sport. I will upload them for your enjoyment (I hope!) in a separate thread in this Sports category.

Mariquita racing off Marseille. All EXIF were stripped from this one, I guess the camera was the D3 or D3S, the lens a 70-200mm Nikkor, or the 200-400mm.

Sailing is tough ! No EXIF on this one either, sorry!

 

[bluzman]

Your post reminded me of my first experience on a sailboat. I was in college in the early '60s. A buddy who was an accomplished sailor, recruited me and a couple of other guys from school as deckhands to help him sail a beautiful 45' wooden sailboat from Marblehead, MA to Boothbay Harbor, ME. The purpose was to put the boat in winter storage in the inland Maine waters where the currents prevented ice formation. As a total novice, I simply did what I was instructed to do. It was a fun trip and I discovered a love for being at sea.

As fate would have it, my profession took me to sea on more than a few occasions. After I retired, I joined a club, took lessons and learned how to sail. Through the club, I was able to rent small sailboats at several locations on the West Coast.

 

[Blue439]

Interesting experience, bluzman, thank you for telling us about it. You’re welcome to post here any sailing photos you may have!

Below, Nagaïna racing off Marseilles in front of the Château d’If castle and prison, of The Count of Monte Cristo fame...

Below, the jury boat at the starting line. Traditionally, all signaling between race organizers and participants took place using naval flags. Each flag stands for a letter in the alphabet, plus has another, more conceptual meaning, such as “I am being towed” or “I am under quarantine”, etc. Nowadays, they still use flags, including for the countdown before the race starts, but countdown signals are also given over the VHF radio.

The big yellow cylinders at the back are course marks, buoys that the organizers moor at specific places and around which the boats must circle.

 

[bluzman]

Your pictures stir up memories of when The Americas Cup was a contest between 12 meter boats. Much more interesting than what it eventually morphed into IMO.

 

[Blue439]

Your pictures stir up memories of when The Americas Cup was a contest between 12 meter boats. Much more interesting than what it eventually morphed into IMO.

Oh, I totally agree with you! Today’s America’s Cup is a big circus, it’s got very little to do with actual sailing. It’s got more to do with the Wright brothers’ attempts at getting and remaining airborne! I still get my kicks watching and re-watching feature films like Wind and Masquerade —I recommend them both to you if you haven’t seen them already, the opening sequence in Masquerade is the most gripping and realistic bluewater racing footage I have ever seen in a thriller movie: expert actual sailing filmed by a master director and skilled camera operators, and great editing and sound effects to follow!

In fact, I agree with you so much that I have decided to feature today two of those traditional twelves of yesteryear that we loved and still love: first below, Ikra, the 1964-built, former UK’s K-3 Kurrewa V, racing in the bay in front of Marseilles (the big black and yellow tower behind the boat is a so-called “cardinal” navigation beacon signalling an underwater danger, and in this case it was also used as a racecourse mark), and then the older US-9 Seven Seas, built in 1935, sailing off Cannes during the “Régates royales”.

Sorry for the stripped EXIFs on those as well, but you know the drill: Nikon D3 or D3S, and the lens would be either the 70-200 ƒ/2.8 or the 200-400 ƒ/4 Nikkor.

 

[Blue439]

The gulf of Morbihan (in Breton, “the Little Sea”) in southern Brittany is a very unique place for sailing. A deep bay, almost entirely enclosed and thus protected from the rigors of the ocean, it numbers 365 islands and islets, and still offers very challenging sailing and racing conditions, owing to the very strong tidal currents that fill and empty the gulf twice a day. And when the wind blows strongly and against the current, the best sailors brace themselves!

After the regatta, the refined quiet of the marina of Cannes during the Régates royales...

 

[Blue439]

On large classic yachts, the guy playing the acrobat on the tip of the bowsprit is called “the Number One”, because he is the farthest from the rear of the boat where the helmsman (now often called “the driver”), the navigator and the tactician are. Other crew members are numbered according to their position on deck, from bow to stern. The Number One needs to be there as the helmsman cannot see what’s happening in front of the boat and needs to be told if there’s any danger, risk of collision with another yacht, etc. So, the Number One is connected by VHF radio with the rear of the boat and sometimes has pretty tough and nerve-racking calls to make: do we need to tack right now and very quickly, or are we truly going fast enough to cross ahead of them guys who are barreling down on us with the right of way?

Number Ones don’t really need to be at the very tip of the bowsprit, they would see just as well from the front end of the deck, but I’m told acrobatic postures help with the ladies back at the marina, after the race...

 

[Blue439]

Catamarans are very stable... until they aren’t. And then, they capsize brutally and uncontrollably. And of course, they are much more difficult to righten than a monohull, as the two-person crew of this Dart is about to find out for themselves... This was shot in the gulf of Morbihan which I mentioned above. It is a very protected environment, ideal for learning to sail and where this sort of thing can happen in conditions as safe as reasonably possible, given the circumstances. The sea is quite choppy because the wind is blowing against the tidal current. This particular spot of the gulf is known as Le chaudron de sorcière, “The Witch’s Cauldron”...

The 90-footer Mariska is a wooden gaff cutter designed by renowned naval architect William Fife and built in Scotland in 1908. It has been beautifully restored in a very respectful way. Sailing her takes at least a crew of 25 because there are no powered winches on board and all the rigging has to be adjusted like at the beginning of the 20th century, with lines and pulleys... Mariska regularly races in classic yacht regattas. This photo was taken during the Régates royales in Cannes 15 years ago. It is the photo that pleased the Musto photo contest jury so much.

 

[Blue439]

Those old ladies are sometimes difficult to keep track of with our eyes of the 21st century, and it’s even more difficult when two happen to have the same name... Moonbeam of Fife, in the foreground, and Moonbeam V, in the background, racing it out among the islands of the bay of Marseilles...

Fiona lazying in the sweet sunshine of early evening in the harbor, after a day of racing... The crew are gone for the day.

 

[Blue439]

What money will buy...

In the early 2000s, there was among a certain fringe of the wealthy and fashionable a marked revival of interest for classic sailing yachts. Many of them were refurbished and beautifully restored. However, some of the rich people quickly found out that those boats were also markedly lacking creature comforts (such as air conditioning!), that heir wood hulls would keep leaking in spite of all efforts or that their outdated rigging required not only a large crew, but a very competent one as well...

Furthermore, there were only so many period vessels left, and it appeared demand exceed supply.

Then, as supply was plentiful on the money side, a new fashion emerged, and those tycoons and moguls took to replicating old sailing yachts, i.e., building them again from scratch, as the plans were in most cases still available. The boats that were replicated were mostly from the 1920s–40s, as those decades where the ones during which the most outrageously enormous yachts had been designed, in particular for the America’s Cup. And for those tycoons and moguls, nothing but outrageously enormous would do, as a matter of course.

For hulls, aluminum and carbon fiber promptly replaced wood, which was reserved for decks and furnishings, where it would achieve the most **bling** effect. “Utterly ridiculous” and ”preposterously show-off” being not a part of the mogoons’ vocabulary, the richest and stupidest of them did not hesitate to populate their decks with the latest generation rigging, such as those enormous powered, multi-speed, self-tailing winches in carbon fiber that each cost the price of a large family car (if not more) and turn at the lazy push of a button (one finger is enough, the other hand can still hold the mojito, or whatever it is they drink these days). However, having a fake classic yacht look like an “ordinary” racing boat wouldn’t do, and so this particular mogoon had everything copper-plated to make it “look, like, old, ya know!”

When you see this thing barreling down on you, it means it’s time to get out of the way, quick!

 

[Blue439]

Classic yacht sailing remains a sport of wealthy gentlemen, at least where genuine classics are concerned, and not replicas: below, 1918-built yawl Runa IV sails close to the wind in the Morbihan Gulf. At the helm is Bruno Troublé, former America’s Cup helmsman, then director of challenge for France, and sitting by his side is owner Yves Carcelle, CEO of Louis Vuitton, who died from cancer in January 2015.

 

[Blue439]

As often in the Mediterranean, the breeze tends to die down as the afternoon whiles away, and the crew on Moonbeam have deployed all the sails they can to reach the port in time for the apéritif...

 

[Blue439]

Partridge in the marina at dawn:

 

[Blue439]

Sailing close to the wind on board 12-meter Ikra in the bay of Marseilles.

 

[blackstar]

Sailing close to the wind on board 12-meter Ikra in the bay of Marseilles.

View attachment 409479

Where were you to take this shot? Exif please. (Assume it is heavily cropped?)

 

[Blue439]

Where were you to take this shot? Exif please. (Assume it is heavily cropped?)

I was on another boat following the regatta. The EXIF are lost through the mists of time, but it was one of the following combinations: D3 with 70-200mm, or D3S with 200-400mm (or the other way around), as those were the two bodies and lenses I brought out to shoot. The 24-70 stayed in the bag down below most of the time. If I remember correctly, I had to crop it because there was another boat to the left which distracted from the action.

 

[Blue439]

One last photo of Mariska racing in the bay of Marseilles, circa 2010. Her owner was Christian Niels back then, and I hear she was put up for sale in 2017. I don’t known if she was indeed sold or not.