Varnish & Victories | Classic Stories from the British Classic Yacht Club Regatta, Cowes 2026

Now look, I'm worried something's changed because I appear to have spent decades being obsessed and on a diet of carbon fiber, skinny foils, high performance boats, canteen keels and the rest of it. And yet every year that I come here to Cowes for the BCYC I feel myself being drawn to a bit of this. Barnish, elegant looks, fantastic stories and an incredible atmosphere. I don't quite know what's going on but I do know that this year is particularly special because apart from having an incredible turnout of boats, it's not raining and it looks even better. This year's fleet of 42 boats spanned from a 25ft 9in Stellas to the 12m Miquette, that's 75ft 6in, the largest in the fleet. The oldest was Dorothy, built in 1894 and the newest, Belcanto, launched in 2022. So as always there was a wide range of boats to geek out on. And to be honest, it was boat spotters heaven. The racing was also designed to deliver a mix of formats, from around the Cairns to around the island and a pursuit race in between, for which my ride was aboard the 50ft Spirit IO of Dartmouth. But aside from all of this, the one thing you can bank on is that if you are a boat spotter that likes to share stories, you're in good company, because everyone has one. In fact, it's such an important aspect of this event that the organisers work on a 50-50 ratio when it comes to balancing time on the water with social time. Every hour racing means a minimum of an hour socialising, and that means time to tell stories. We got it in 1989, so I was about 25 at the time. The immortal words of my father were, buy a boat before house, because I'd been brought up on his boat. Oh really? Even conceived on his boat, if you work out where we were for the summer holidays in Holland. And so I'd been brought up sailing all my life, and I wanted a boat. And he just said, buy a boat before a house, and buy a big enough boat, then you can have it for life and it fits all your needs. Sound advice. It was sound advice if it wasn't good for my bank account, it was good for my soul. Well, I mean, she's looking absolutely superb. And the thing that really strikes me about it, it's a very complex boat. I mean, has she always been like this? Since, well, these boats were simpler, but they were vastly underpowered in light airs. And so what happened for us is, as we started to race, we realized we were competitive at 15 knots, super competitive at 18 knots, and awful in no wind. So how do you go to regattas where you just die? So we spent a long time, how do you evolve power? And then you've got too much power very quickly and how you control it. And of course, unlike a modern boat, you can hide lines, you can't hide lines. So it all comes back to the cockpit, masters the pit as well, so there's no pit in here. And it is a boat that has an awful lot of things to pull. And the other problem, because you've got a very high weight to waterline ratio, you need power, so you have to change gears, you have to change sails all the time, and you have to rotate them, get it just right. If you want to sail above your handicap or to it, you'll cause a lot of crew. So it's quite unique. It's not two people sailing and everyone's on the rail. It's 13 people who have to coordinate all the time to make it work. And then in 2002, after the big American centenary, Tim Blackman and I had a conversation. He said, why don't we start a club? And I said, great, you can be the Commodore. I'll be the vice Commodore. You can look after the socials. And I really believe we should have super fair racing because they could optimize their boats to channel handicap IRC and then we'll promote a healthy classic fleet that didn't really exist at that time. And 24 years later, here we are. Yeah, I mean, it's a very, very impressive fleet. And I mean, people race seriously. There are some serious, serious boats with serious crews who are doing everything they can that if you insert them into a modern fleet, we were fifth on the round, the only race in our division. And we would have been first if the smaller boats hadn't gone over the sandbanks and we couldn't. Right. So we are competitive against modern boats like Whopperers. So, you know, it's no coincidence that classic boats and IRC have become competitive within the general fleet. I suppose it's a stupid question. But I mean, is that part of the appeal, though? It's just saying, look. Being bloody minded. Yeah, look what we can do, you know. I think there's something, I mean, OK, we all have that probably genius and we're all very competitive. So doing the impossible is really exciting for me. Sailing a heavy boat so it's competitive in an eight in eight knots of breeze is a huge challenge we've risen to. It's taken years. So I love the impossibility of the process and how you get to it through understanding your machine and how it operates and the variabilities. If you change your boom, e-fitting, e-length, what does that do in your P&E dynamics? You have a relationship with something you're evolving. You're really becoming a designer and an owner. Yeah. That is immensely rewarding. So I think that appeals to people that are thought provoking and creative. Yeah. And innovative. And you can't do that in a modern boat. It's a much more fixed structure, fixed versions. So I think there's a good reason why you see innovation in an older classic boat. So I'm James Youngman and we've owned Lutine of Halford for the last 11 years. She is a beautiful classic yawl built by Lloyds of London in 1952. So she was rebuilt down in Gweek in just 1999, 2000. And as a boatyard project boat, the boatyard owner had unfortunately passed away and the boat was up for sale. We took her on. It looked amazing condition, but we didn't really know because we couldn't take her into the water to do any water tests. So she was stuck in the boatyard and you needed a six metre tie to get her in and a 200 tonne crane to lift her over the boat next to her. So it was a big adventure. But she did float and we got her down here and then we've replaced everything on the boat over the last 10 years. We've got four kids, so we needed a boat. We thought we needed a boat that had accommodation. She was built as a club boat. She was originally accommodating 12 guests. So unusual for a classic boat to have such a big internal space. So she's 24 tonnes, which means you've got 24 cubic metres of displacement underwater. She looks after you in a storm. She's very well, she's strongly built and she's probably, I think she's a stunning shape. There's something about her shape that everyone looks at and thinks that's just an amazing boat. And she's a one-off. So you don't see any other boat looking quite like routine. But for some, the road to owning a classic boat was different and led to a big project. I was actually given it in 2016 by a really kind gentleman called David Sheriff who, he'd had a boat called Jap and I think he'd won this event in that and renovated that. He found this boat, bought it because it was the first boat he ever sailed and he was going to renovate it and he decided that was probably a step too far having done one. And I just saw him one night and we were chatting about boats and he said, I've got this boat, I think you'd quite like it and if you want to come and have a look at it you can have it and renovate it because I'll know you'll do it. So he lived up near Reading so I went up and saw it one day and saw the hull and just immediately fell in love with the shape. I couldn't look in the inside because all the deck had plywood screwed down over it and I just thought, no, I love that. And so we arranged to have a cradle made and then got it delivered back to our boatyard in Cowes and took the plywood off the top and thought, oh God, what have we got here? So it was basically structurally unsound so we had to replace every frame and every timber and the planking was good, the backbone was good, we did put a new stern post in it and obviously the ballast keel was fine but basically everything else is new. And you own a boat that is how old? She was built in 1926 so she's 100 years old, well the original books are but we just decided we'd have a dock party just to celebrate it. Although it was a busman's holiday I really enjoyed doing it. I got some of the lads to help me with the more heavy duty stuff like spining the hull and sheathing it. How long did it take? It basically took six and a half years before she was ready to launch so we had it outside the shed in the tent and after, I don't know, three or four years the tent destroyed itself in a lot of breeze one day so we moved it into the workshop and then we had COVID so basically in COVID I did the whole of the inside of the boat because I'd go into work and there was a little bit of email traffic but there was nobody working I think and so I had all these days on my own just working on Harlequin and that was great. I'd phone up Laurie Gore at Lalo's could you leave a couple of sheets of firewood outside trying to stitch all the COVID stuff on there so that was a great help and then we just gradually came together and then you do all the hard work the hull and all that's hard work and then you start on the nice woodwork and the inside and then think about the deck gear and I decided that I wanted a really modern, nice, easy to use fit out because I wanted a race set and I wanted it to be nice to sail. I know you can do that with modern classic box but I looked at the fittings we've got on there now the Hark and Black Magic stuff they look really nice and she's really good to sail. There's no shortage of opinions on how to rebuild a classic either. Yeah so you're on the yacht Miquette now or Black Owl as they know me and we bought it from Duncan Fairleigh Restorations in Hamel Point Marina and she's a 12 metre 5 1933 and it's completely restored it's tricker's broom so we've got the original keel and I've lofted everything made the mast made the boom made the deck replanked it reframed it and sub decked it but gentrised it and put hydraulic aids on it. I keep her in Paul Boathaven and I do the regattas. She's been in the water now for about eight years and it took about six years to reconstruct and I reconstructed it which Duncan said you shouldn't do because these lunatics don't want winches with tailors they want wooden blocks that's a load of bollocks you've got to take 15 crew off of this boat or you'll never sail them you can't get the crew and it just turns into a nightmare so what I did I used the technology which was available at the time after I framed her and planked her splined it sheathed it and copied that spirit yacht design which you see in front of us so basically it is a composite boat with epoxy you know Sikaflex etc etc I looked at the planks yesterday and we had a hard day and no the planks didn't open up I've been sailing on Velshida for many years and I cut my teeth with a rawhound it's on the Bloodhounds and Vanity 5 another 12 meter learned how to sail with Alan Bond and did property development with that guy so I've been around for a while and learned the techniques of epoxy Sikaflex and stainless steel fastenings and I think this game is fooled by people want originality but they don't want to use the facilities and if you see that you know before Elizabeth May got a hold of Velshida and I was on with Scrap Iron John and I introduced him and he planked up and bodged it and I was one of the bodgers and bodged it up but the new owners now if you look at they've got carbon fiber sails rod rigging bow thrusters etc and they're an absolute delight to sail absolute delight to sail I think anyone restoring a craft of this ilk and you want to be terrified this is a terrifying boat to sail if you don't take advantage of those materials you're a fool a difference of opinion was also evident aboard another elegant meter boat but in this case it was about her name or at least how you should pronounce it my name is Mark Dowie and I'm standing on the back end of my lovely yacht Bojar Bojar? you see someone told me it was Boa today one of your crew actually when I bought her we had a whole load of people from Livington fondly known as the limos they call a Bojar but that sounds so yar that all us Devon people call her Bojar that sounds better to me it does so tell me what she is she's beautiful thank you she's a 10 meter cruiser racer built in Oslo 1937 by Johan Anker and she who was also her designer so the same man who designed the International Dragon and she's like a big dragon really? that's interesting wow and how long have you owned her? six years she was if I'm honest a bit of a Covid purchase I was chief executive the R&Y and we were in the middle of the Covid saga and I thought I need some fun in my life too so I bought this boat when you own something like this you're a bit of a custodian it's like owning a bit of furniture and you continually changing things improving things as my predecessor did you know and so we'll hand her on in good shape I enjoy looking after her making sure she's going to see us into the next 50 years or so she's 90 years old next year and she's in better shape probably than she was 20 years ago and that's important to me I've got a great crew they're all so no one on the foredeck is younger than 70 but there are many America's Cups between them so they all know what they're doing and it's a friendly happy quiet boat a friendly crew was very much in evidence for my ride during the pursuit race aboard the Spirit CR51 IO of Dartmouth we've owned IO for three years we built IO for the Fastnet race I think 2023 horrific that was a breezy one wasn't it? was a breezy one and I'd never done anything like that before and we had crew on board who'd never done anything like that before eight of us we had tried to do all the qualifiers in a chartered boat and it kept letting us down so Karen from Spirit knew that I had my heart set on the Spirit so she contacted me with IO just in the nick of time we went to see her in Dartmouth and Stephen and I both fell in love and we bought her we hadn't even taken her for a test sail we bought her very quickly she arrived in cows and three days later we took her on the Fastnet race so we did the classic event the year after I helmed then and a lovely friend of mine who sadly died last year she was the inspiration behind me actually taking the helm I didn't take the helm on any of our previous boats I was always nervous I don't really like driving and I have a real strange relationship with distance I think my distance perception is a bit... but she said you've got to helm your boat Chippy and she's right so I did two years ago and I did today last year I was sick so I lost my hands the feeling in my hands a little bit but that is coming back today was quite an achievement now of course you look at all these beautiful boats and the other thing that goes through your mind is how much do they cost? well in a lot of cases quite a lot I mean let's face it they're expensive boats to run and maintain but it doesn't have to be like that and actually there's some examples here at this event of a much more affordable way of getting into the classic scene and one of them is with these boats called the Stella and I'm going to go and chat to someone who knows a fair bit about it because he's right at the sharp end of putting them together it's Andrew Gilmore Andrew hi pleased to meet you this is your boat isn't it? it is and you tell us about first of all tell us about the Stella the Stella class there were 110 built on the east coast back in the late 50s early 60s there are about 70 of them left so yeah Kim Holman design built as a fast cruiser racer in the day and still are and you've been telling me that you've been collecting them well sort of collecting them well the class realised that some of these boats were getting lost to the bonfire or the chainsaw so we decided when we realised where they were we'd go and pick them up I'm the mug who goes with the trailer and picks them up in Suffolk Yacht Harbour on the east coast to very kindly store them for nothing and then we've saved nine boats so far five of them have been taken up by new owners restored and put back into commission and we've still got four or five left for anybody who wants them and you were telling me earlier on some of them you can have for free for sure yeah there's one or two that we want a small amount of money for so we can fund collection of more boats but there are boats there that you can have for nothing and if you've got some DIY skills you know you're up and going that's remarkable but what does it so where's the catch what does it take I mean how how would you go about rebuilding it have you got to be a master craftsman or have deep pockets to have someone else do it depends what you want to do if you if you wanted to give it to Suffolk Yacht Harbour or somewhere similar and do a whole job you know ready to race like a new boat you could be 70,000 if you did like I did mine I'd probably cut that in half by doing a lot of the work myself or there's some of the boats that are actually ready to go and with with a couple of thousand maybe you'd be you'd be going really well that's fantastic I mean it's a gorgeous looking boat but they're they're pretty competitive as well aren't they yeah yeah yeah I mean we've we've we were second overall in round the island race and a few years ago we were third overall so you know they compete with the modern modern boats and yeah that's fine and where is it where's the bulk of the fleet it's east coast east coast yeah pretty much yeah there are a few strewn around the country but most of the boats are in the east coast we've got nine boats out for a regatta at Alba week this year so that's that's that's good and there's a little bit of a resurgence going on yeah it's it's it's great to hear as I say it's a gorgeous looking boat I can't get over the fact you can have a classic boat for free you did say that on camera didn't you classic boat for free I wasn't expecting that story the last word has to go to one of the key architects of this event Giovanni Belgrano a successful competitor himself with his Laurent Giles Sloot Wooper his views on what makes this event successful are not only interesting but will no doubt send a message to others that are struggling to maintain or develop their own events and it all started exactly on these docks 24 years ago we were nine of us we founded the BCYC and it was all about the yachts being alongside each other and then the owners all get along absolutely great talking completely diverse mix of people off the boat but when you get the boats alongside each other everyone can't get enough time talking about their own boat learning about the other boat and and just form this community almost did you know that that was going to be the case is that what you sought out to do to start with or did you oh you did it was all started off from there after the jubilee regatta I was actually on my number one favorite boat stealth but there were so many unbelievable classics here that we were all walking up and down the docks I was photographing all the fittings all the details and I bought Wooper straight away after that and then I met the other founders two in particular who were very keen on the idea of starting the British Classic Yacht Club so it started from that we saw how magic it could be and we said maybe we can do something like this of our own here in the UK without looking at any particular events but there are events all over the world now that are struggling because numbers are going down and they're looking at it going what's going on do you think there are lessons that can be learned from this event that would help events around the world do you think we're sort of in the middle of a change well definitely I mean times are hard in the world you know it's the cost of living and all these people are very time poor as well cash poor so we used to do a lot with ABCYC sailing in company going for a weekend to the Beaulieu or Portsmouth or things like that and even to France and people don't have that time anymore so that's gone this is the only thing we can manage and we've cut it down to five days instead of six again because people don't have that time so yeah we just have to keep it as efficient as you can yeah as you have to be in in tune with the times yeah because the fact to be nimble be light and the key thing is we run this regatta on the dynamic plan so we carefully change our plan based on the circumstance we're light on our feet and as you can see you know yes the stars have raised the wind is later so we start later and we party later the other thing that strikes me about this event when you look at the range of boats that you've got is that you're not restricted to boats with particular provenance so they haven't got to be traditional classics I mean you've got spirits you've got fiberglass boats I mean how did you what's the rationale for that? the GFP thing we brought them in when I came in on the basis that we would control it very carefully we only do it by invitation they have to be qualified so pre-1970 or of a certain classic look but we limit the number we have this year we have allowed six yachts to come we've had a lot more inquiries and we carefully pick them it's not just the boat it's also the spirit with which they come the triumvirate classics you look at the Scherzo and the Nora and they're all coming in with the right spirit of the regatta finally I can't let you go without asking you how you got on on your boat we actually really enjoyed it again today was a lot of shore tacking and I worked with Peter on these things and I told him in his first morning meeting I said this is Peter the race officer Peter Saxton and we basically banned them to make us shore tack up the green as a fleet or as a class but I said if there's one day where we can do it today because if you think the small boats can make it against the tide we're not afraid of shore tacking because basically the race this format that we've come up with this time pursuit the first part is basically a match race you're trying to catch the boat in front of you which is a tiny bit lower handicap and the guy behind you is trying to pass you so you're doing a very safe one-on-one match race roughly you try and get out of phases so it's a different experience we're trying to make different sailing experiences and this is the only chance we really get to safely race the whole fleet against each other including shore tacking up both the island shore on the green as well as the lipspit shore by the mainland so a diverse fleet an innovative approach and social events geared to inspire crews to talk boats and share stories it seems so obvious on paper and in reality it was