Flotsam & Jetsam 31.07.26
CYAA pre-event briefing for the 2026 Cup Regatta, The Joe White recognition event and the 2026/2027 Summer Series on Port Phillip
September 18th 2026 at RMYS - Signed Dave Allen event posters available at pre-event briefing
Latest Cup Regatta news from the CYAA
Early Bird 2026 Cup Regatta Entries now open2026 Cup Regatta Notice of Race
Stop the press’s news
Our first entry and our first ever interstate entrant is now listed.ACROSPIRE IV
Our event briefing night at RMYS is to:
1. Provide intending skippers and crews information on what to expect with the social and racing events scheduled for November.
2. Provide the RMYS Race management team the opportunity to met and brief skippers and crews who intend to enter the event.
3. Opportunity to obtain signed copies of the Dave Allen designed Cup Regatta and Joe White posters.
General agenda items to be covered: Each item has a numerous sub item list.
1. 2026 Winter Series presentation.
2. 2026 Regatta program
3. RMYS Marina berthing application process.
4. Friday Invitational race schedule & format
5. RMYS Marina Access during Saturday concours d`Elegance judging.
6. Cup Regatta racing format, courses and pre race briefing sessions.
7. Friday evening ferry to Ferdi Darley event. A ticketed event
8. Saturday evening dinner at RMYS. A ticketed event
9. RMYS catering for Cup Regatta entrants.
10. Other CYAA events scheduled for November 2026
10.1 Joe White recognition sailing program. Nov 8th
10.2 2026/2027 Summer Series on Port Phillip schedule. First race 3rd Oct.
10.3 2026 Lipton Cup program for classic yachts 20th Nov. Free entry.
Saskia and 100-year-old Harlequin win big at British Classic Week
Giovanni Belgrano’s Whooper (right) jockeys with Andrew Haining’s Spirit Vesper. Photo: Chris Brown
Due to the weather conditions the traditional race around the Isle of Wight was replaced by a long 'Cowes Week' style course in the central Solent, concluding the 24th edition of British Classic Week. Today's competition was 'Race for a Case', sponsored by leading family-run champagne house Billecart-Salmon: The crew of each class winner today won a case of champagne while the owner took home (or drank immediately in celebration) a magnum of the finest fizz from Mareuil-sur-Aÿ.
For the 1200 start, taking place from the Squadron line in a 12 knot southwesterly, the fleet was divided in two, both sailing a multiple leg lap of the central Solent, the bigger, faster boats in Classes 1-3 sent off on a longer first beat to East Lepe, while Classes 4-5 cracked off at Gurnard. In most of the five classes, the winner was decided with a day/race to spare and this was despite a discard kicking in after today’s final race. Only in Class Three did it go to the wire – if Giovanni Belgrano’s 1939 Laurent Giles design Whooper won today she claimed the top prize; if Fenton Burgin’s 1926 Anker-designed 6mR was first, then she would. In the event Whooper beat Sioma II by 1 minute 1 seconds under IRC corrected time with Richard Hargreaves' 30 Square Metre Aeolus third, positions duplicated in the overall Class Three results.
Why Cooking Offshore Is Not Optional
From the FirstShift Substack site by Stuart Greenfield
There is a difference between fuelling a crew and feeding one. One keeps them going. The other keeps them human.
It was somewhere off the west coast of Scotland, late afternoon, cloudy, damp beating hard before a building north northwesterly, when the four of us smelled it. Not the sea. Not the diesel. Bread.
Fresh bread, on a damp leaking race boat, in the late afternoon in a steady 25knots with the thought of another 10days of it, it lifted our spirits … a bit, even if we knew it was another ground hog day!
For the Love of Sailing Kathleen
By Lidia Goldburg in Sail Magazine
It was a gray and cold April morning in 2006 when Tim Fallon launched his 28-foot catboat Kathleen. Fallon, a software engineer from Wareham, Massachusetts, was worried about how she would sail. Were the historical documents and drawings he and the boatbuilders at the Beetle Cat Boat Shop had followed accurate? Fallon had opted for a tiller instead of a wheel, sacrificing some mechanical advantages for the steering method he was more comfortable with.
Photo by Ryan Cove
Would there be too much weather helm on the boat as a result? How would he ever handle the 900-square-foot mainsail attached to the 36 foot 6 inch boom? The odds seemed to be stacked against him. Still, she launched with ease, and by July she was ready for her shakedown cruise.
Sell the Company for $400 Million? He’s Giving It Away Instead.
We love it when seriously main stream news outlets cover recreational boating stories… especially when the stories are as happy as this one…….
After his sole heir died, Eddie Smith, the owner of Grady-White Boats, looked for a way to pass on his legacy. He was inspired by Patagonia to pledge future profits to charity.
Eddie Smith Jr., chief executive emeritus of Grady-White Boats in Greenville, N.C., decided to give the company’s future profits to charitable causes. Credit...Kate Medley for The New York Times
Back in 1968, Eddie Smith Jr. bought a fledgling boat maker based in Greenville, N.C. It was a risky move. The company, Grady-White Boats, was in trouble.
But Mr. Smith turned it around, and now the maker of high-end recreational fishing boats designed for coastal waters pulls in hundreds of millions of dollars in annual revenue. Along the way, Mr. Smith kept full control of the company, never taking on outside investors or selling stock to the public.
Now, Mr. Smith, who is 83, has made one last big move: He renounced a potential $400 million payday and pledged all of Grady-White’s future profits to charity.
“God has really blessed me to put me in a position to give away the vast majority of my net worth,” he said in an interview. “I don’t need a 200-foot yacht or to spend the winters in the Mediterranean. I’m really happy here in eastern North Carolina.”
“One of the world’s most beautiful regattas”
Credit: BIlly Black
A gorgeous New England weekend provided excellent conditions for the two days of the Camden Classics Cup. Two races made up the regatta allowing for two additional competitors to fully qualify for this year’s CYCS: Paul Koch’s Ponyo and Jim Wetherald and Ted Huffman’s Kirawan.
Known as one of the world’s most beautiful regattas in the world, the Camden Classics Cup once again showed off its trademark background at Lyman Morse where the mountains meet the sea. “Amazing weekend, amazing collection of boats and some of the best sailing ever in the 10 years of our regatta,” said CYOA board member Drew Lyman.