Overall winner Jap, with Paralympic sailor Andy Cassell on board, wins another race. Picture by Chris Boynton.
SAILING
ONE of the smallest and oldest boats racing in Panerai British Classic Week in Cowes, won the overall spoils.
The 1897 Cork Harbour One-Design Jap, owned by David Sheriff and measuring 37ft, recorded an unbeatable five wins over the week.
Among its crew were British Paralympic gold medallist Andy Cassell, and the commanding officer of the Royal Navy’s flagship HMS Bulwark, Capt Alex Burton.
Second place in overall event ranking went to Andrew King’s Gluckauf, a 1929 International 30 Square Metre, with David Murrin’s Cetewayo, a past winner in third.
In the classes, winning class 1 for the modern classics by just one point was Hugh Morrison’s Savannah, while Cetewayo won class 2.
Class 3 was won by Gluckauf, while Jap took class 4.
Knowing their world championship started just days after, six of the 8 Metres chose not to race in the final day, with three remaining to battle it out. In the end, Richard Self and Mark DeCelles’s 1937 Raven took the glory.
The 6 Metres class was won by Tom Richardson’s Georgia.
There were several special prizes also given.
The Lallow Cup, for the best-presented new entrant, went to Robert Fabre’s Vagabundo II, a 1945 classic Bermudan ketch. The International Metre Trophy, for the highest placed Metre boat, went to Raven, while Jap won the Brian Keeland Memorial Trophy, for the highest place gaffer.
Crunchie Awards, presented to those who ran aground during the week, went to Eilean, Zarik, Sceptre, Atlantis, Marcita, Cetewayo and Sea Scamp.
And the Cetewayo Cup for the Je Ne Sais Quoi competition, voted for by the competitors to the boat with an "indefinable certain something", went to Andrew Pearson’s 1937 10 Metre deck cutter Bojar.