Sailing Magazine
by Richard Crockett
Jack Gruter, a Jakaranda crewman wrote an editorial on his experiences competing in the first leg of the 1973 Whitbread Round the World Race.
This was no traditional well planned campaign, rather a last-minute, perhaps even a last ditch attempt at getting the boat ready in the UK to race to Cape Town.
“The crowning point of a journey that took us across the wide Atlantic from Portsmouth to Cape Town on the first leg of the Whitbread Round the World race. Jakaranda was seventh across the line, and we heard later that we were placed fourth on handicap out of seventeen yachts which left the coast of England on that hot summers day” he wrote.
He wrote about how the morning of 8 September at 11h00 Greenwich time would be remembered by the crew for all time. “The great excitement is over, but I still have this hollow feeling in my stomach, and this dryness in my mouth. I’ll never forget the tremendous send off” he wrote.
This report is no masterpiece, and rather the account of one man seeking adventure on the very first fully crewed race around the world. It’s an interesting read as to how things were done in those days.
READ IT ALL HERE: feature article – Peter Koehorst – 003801
