Sailing Magazine
by Richard Crockett
Earlier this year I scanned some negatives of a sliding seat canoe, so was delighted to have found today’s editorial, entitled “Effervescent Sailing” all about these super-slippery speedsters.
The features says “By far the oldest of the many small boat classes in the world, sailing canoes were first raced in England early in the 1870s. At first the craft were adaptations of the paddling “Rob Roy” canoes, but they have developed until they are highly·specialised sailing machines today.
Uffa Fox, himself once a champion canoe helmsman, has this to say about the rule: “The International canoe rules as they stand at the moment, are not in need of any change. They produce the liveliest and most sporty racer I have ever sailed, and my canoe ‘Brynhild’ (an enlarged International Canoe) gave me more pleasure than any craft I have owned.
“After planing along at some 15-plus knots with a canoe, one can never go back to the slower types of dinghies while one still has the energy and ability to sail a sliding seat canoe.”
In the photo accompanying this feature, the caption reads: “John Stothert romps along in a champagne-like frenzy of speed and spray in ‘Spindrift’, an Uffa Fox sliding-seat canoe. There are six of these vivid craft in Durban and a couple in Cape Town and other centres. Once-mastered, all other sailing seems tame to canoe addicts.”
This is a very interesting read.
READ IT ALL HERE: 1960 09-10 – SA Yachting – effervescent sailing – OCR
