The tagline for the St. Maarten Heineken Regatta is "serious sailing, serious fun." However, for the inhabitants of St. Maarten, the event is more than just a festival of great music and some of the best sailing around. Local blogger Angie Soeffker explains the impact the race ...read more
Music: https://www.purple-planet.com During last week's 39th Heineken Regatta, all eyes were on The Polish National Fund's Volvo 70 I Love Poland (formerly Puma). The team is comprised of ocean racing veterans, Olympians, and promising under 30's who The Polish National Fund ...read more
In keeping with its mission of building an all-American team, Stars + Stripes Team USA, challenger for the 36th America’s Cup, has unveiled an open application process for sailors interested in applying for positions both aboard its boats and onshore. Click here, to access the ...read more
Whatever is in the water in Brittany, it must be powerful stuff. Followers of the singlehanded sailing game are used to pretty heroic performances by Breton sailors, but none of them have come anywhere near the recent achievements of a 74-year-old former math teacher named Jean ...read more
A perennial challenge for professional sailboat racing is striking a balance between boats that are exciting to sail, but aren’t so cutting edge (read expensive) that it becomes impossible to get enough teams to compete. Fortunately for Cup fans, the Kiwi defenders for the 36th ...read more
Following a tough night with 45-knot winds and 20ft seas, 73-year-old French sailor Jean-Luc Van Den Heede aboard the Rustler 36 Matmut is now within 100 miles of the finish of the Golden Globe Race 2018 off Les Sables d'Olonne, French. He expected to arrive to a huge welcome at ...read more
The Rolex Sydney Hobart Yacht Race is best known for the wild weather that often marks the Bass Strait between Tasmania and mainland Australia. However, Tasmania’s Derwent River, which serves as the homestretch into the finish in Hobart, can be no less daunting with its ...read more
The Medalist I bought in 1962 was designed by Bill Tripp and built in Holland by LeComte. The hull was fiberglass and the interior finished to a very high standard in wood. Bill Tripp was a big man and the scale of the boat reflected this. A combination of wide beam and high ...read more
The Mirabaud Yacht Racing Image competition once again captures the excitement that is sailing from around the world An impressive 109 photographers from 25 countries took part in last year’s Mirabaud Yacht Racing Image 2018 competition. And while Portuguese photographer Ricarado ...read more
With less than 1,700 miles to go to the finish in Les Sables d'Olonne, France, second-place Mark Slats of the Netherlands has cut another 393 miles out of the lead held by French sailor Jean-Luc Van Den Heede in the Golden Globe 2018 race. Jean-Luc aboard the Rustler 36 Matmut ...read more
Even more than a year and half later, the scars from Hurricane Irma are still all too visible on the island of St. Maarten. But if Irma couldn’t prevent the famed Heineken from taking place in the winter of 2017-18, you can bet it’s not going to put a crimp in either the racing ...read more
Because modern yachting is in many ways an invention of the early to mid 20th century, in recent years sailors have been celebrating any number of milestone anniversaries. Now it’s the biennial Transpac’s turn, as it prepares for its 50th race from Southern California (following ...read more
It was a memorable year for the quadrennial solo Route du Rhum race from Saint Malo, France, to Guadeloupe, with everything from storm conditions to plenty of disabled boats and nail-biting finishes at the end to mark the event’s 40th anniversary. The 11th running of the ...read more
I arrived in Rockland, Maine, on an early afternoon in July with a backpack, my camera and little else. Though traveling to an unfamiliar place to race with a crew of strangers has been a common theme in my sailing career, I had no idea what to expect from the massive wood and ...read more
If you’re over 40 and know anything about sailing, you probably know exactly who Bill Lee is. The image is clear: bushy brown hair escaping from a Gilligan-style bucket hat, oversized sunglasses and a wrinkled flower-print button-down shirt. We (I’m 43) can also picture the ...read more
Russell Coutts and Larry Ellison may have lost the America’s Cup back in Bermuda in 2017, but it appears they are intent on stealing a march on current Cup-holders Emirates Team New Zealand with the launch of what they are calling the SailGP sailing circuit. Announced in early ...read more
It was “Sonar month” at the Noroton Yacht Club in Darien, Connecticut, this past September, as it hosted not only the Sonar North American Championship regatta but the class’s team-racing Kirby Cup. Both events were also attended by famed Sonar creator Bruce Kirby, who is also a ...read more
No one ever said it was going to be easy, and this past fall a pair of competitors taking part in the ongoing Golden Globe Race 2018 were disabled in a major storm deep in the Indian Ocean, with one of them coming away seriously injured. The dismastings took place around 80 days ...read more
Rescue operations are currently underway for French Golden Globe Race 2018 competitor Loic Lepage, whose boat is dismasted and taking on the water some 600 miles southwest of Perth, Australia. According to race organizers, the rescue operation began after the Join Rescue ...read more
After spending months investigating the death of sailor Jon Santarelli, who went overboard from the TP52 Imedi shortly after the start of the 2018 Chicago Yacht Club Race to Mackinac, the Chicago YC is now looking into the question of inflatable lifejacket safety with an eye ...read more
When I was 15, some of my sailing classmates kicked off the summer by sailing the Figawi, New England’s legendary season-opening race held every Memorial Day weekend. A winding course between Hyannis and Nantucket, it was a seemingly epic voyage to a bunch of kids who had never ...read more
This past summer Australian sailor, Wendy Tuck (inset), became the first woman to win a round-the-world yacht race when she and her crew aboard Sanya Serenity Coast claimed the overall victory in the 2017-18 Clipper Race. “I am just so happy,” Tuck said at the finish in ...read more
