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1938 World Championship - San Diego, CA

1938 World Championship - San Diego, CA

The following results are from George Elder's book "Forty Years Among The Stars". In common with the early Logs it is interesting to note that in his results Elder does not give the yacht numbers of the boats which participated in the World's, but only just their names. It was not until the 1950 Log that yacht numbers were included in the results. From 1950 through 1976 both yacht numbers and names were given, but starting with 1977 frequently only yacht numbers were given. The last time both yacht numbers and yacht names were given was 1989.

In later years sometimes fleet designations were omitted. In these cases some of the more obvious fleet designations were supplied. Also from time to time only last names were supplied. First names, where known, were added.

Abbreviations etc: Dsa - Disabled. Dsq - Disqualified. Dns - Did Not Start.
Wdr - Withdrew. Ch - Chairman. B - Builder. * - Defending Fleet. 0 - No points, reason not given.

1938 - OFF SAN DIEGO

Yacht# Yacht Skipper Crew Fleet
Race 1
Race 2
Race 3
Race 4
Race 5
Pts.
1420 Pimm W. von Hütschler J. Weise Hamberger
2
1
3
1
2
106
1563 Gale H. Nye L. Lehman SLM
1
2
5
2
1
104
1440 Mercury J. McAleese F. Graham WSFB
3
6
8
3
4
91
1560 Stormy C. Baxter W. Hubbard Newport Harbor
4
4
7
7
5
88
768 Phar Lap N. Martin Mrs. Martin Santa Barbara
5
10
2
8
6
84
1581 Rambunctious J. Cowie C. Cowie Santa Monica
Wdr
3
1
4
3
81
626 Jay S. Ogilvy M. Shehan W. Long Island Sound
9
8
6
9
9
74
948 Three Star Too G. Waterhouse L. Conn East San Francisco
13
9
4
10
8
71
1544 Sachem D. Mackenzie L. Donaldson Long Beach
8
11
16
5
7
68
1144 Cene Too C. Ross R. Lanson Puget Sound
7
12
11
14
10
61
44 Draco E. Ketcham W. Hayward Great South Bay
12
7
9
11
19
57
1414 Lecky V. Doyle J. Boue *San Diego Bay
6
14
10
6
Dsq
56
1424 Star Dust C. McNeely R. Scott Barnegat Bay
Dsq
5
19
13
12
43
532 Black Roger J. Waller N. Batchelor Nantucket Sound
10
15
17
12
Wdr
38
1549 Nassau Star R. Symonette H. Knowles Nassau
16
18
12
19
14
37
1606 Trece D. Porterfield No Report Lake Maracaibo
11
16
18
18
20
32
611 Nomana R. Day W. Day English Bay
15
13
22
21
13
32
486 Sparkler II J. Clancy B. Cross New Orleans
18
17
15
20
16
30
1057 Kurush C. de Cardenas W. Rivero Havana
20
Wdr
13
17
15
28
705 Seadler T. Murray III J. Murray Moriches Bay
17
19
20
15
17
28
784 Yaca G. Crozier P. Withington Hawaiian Islands
21
21
14
16
18
26
455 Peggy Wee C. Baker S. Farnham L. Ontario American
19
20
21
22
11
23

Winning yacht No. 1420. B - Abeking & Rasmussen, Lemwerder, Germany 1937.
Ch. Meeting - Glenn Waterhouse. Ch. I.R.C. - G. A. Corry.

Regatta Report from the 1939 Log

Pimm Takes World Championship to Germany
by WOODBRIDGE METCALF

The sunny port of San Diego will long be remembered for excitement, real camaraderie among members of the Star Class, for keen racing under placid skies, and for the marvelous hospitality enjoyed. Arrangements for handling and storing yachts, mooring during the series, and for comfort of the contestants were found to be just about perfect under the capable management of committees set up by the San Diego and Coronado Yacht Clubs and the San Diego Bay Star Fleet. Facilities for housing many of the sailors were available at "International House" adjacent to the Club. A goodly number of guests were entertained at the homes of friends in San Diego. Point Loma, Coronado and adjacent communities.

Check-up of hulls and measurement of sails was started on Saturday and continued through Monday by measurers Taylor and Hesselberger with some assistance from Doyle in the later stages. There was great interest on the part of everyone in the details of the hull, spars and sails of the challenger Pimm from Hamburg, but it seemed to be generally agreed that her hull, keel pattern, skeg and rudder were very close to the standard Star plans. Her sails were well within the limits prescribed and were cut with only moderately wide roach. They were only moderately drafty but beautifully constructed to give drawing power and smooth, even flow of air from the leech. Everything about her standing and running rigging was arranged with the greatest attention to detail but was not particularly different from that found on several of the other boats.

Measurements of sails brought out the fact that several entries were using the maximum allowable length on hoist and foot, and that several of the sails had excessive roach. After much discussion at the Annual Meeting that evening it was voted to empower the Governing Committee and the Measurement Committee to study the situation and set such limitations on sails as well as on contour of hulls as would adequately safeguard the Star as a true one design class. (The new specifications in this LOG include latest revisions.)

The Race Committee under the chairmanship of Commodore G. A, Corry included Commodore Wm. Day of Vancouver, Commodore Samuel Dauchy and Holly Sumner of San Diego, and Woodbridge Metcalf of Berkeley. The Navy provided a large Y P boat for the committee and the officer Griffin and his men did everything within their power to facilitate the smooth running of the races. The windward mark was set two and a half miles up the wind which had freshened to about six miles and blew with fair steadiness throughout the first race.

The start was a beautiful affair with all boats on the starboard tack and most of them near the line, but all clear at the gun. Sparkler II was forced on the windward side of the stake boat, had to come about and so got a poor start. Draco was well ahead but to leeward of Nomana, Jay and Three Star Too, while Pimm started in about the middle of the fleet in a close brush with Mercury. Most of the boats took the inshore port tack as quickly as possible and sailed off into the light haze towards Point Loma. There were several spirited encounters on the beat, but Pimm worked out a lead of forty-eight seconds at this mark over Gale with Mercury third by twenty-one seconds and Phar Lap rounding forty seconds later. Blue hulled Stormy followed over Rambunctious. Then followed Three Star Too ahead of her rival for Olympic honors Draco which in turn rounded with but one second to spare over Cene Too of Seattle. The defender Lecky of San Diego was tenth with Star Dust of Barnegat Bay eleventh.

The wind freshened somewhat on the run, but there were no essential place changes until eighth where Cene Too and Lecky bettered their positions one by one. Pimm had the lead by forty-one seconds over Gale and the other boats followed at intervals. At the end of the first round Draco in the middle of the fleet was over ten minutes behind the leader, while Yaca in last place had been bested by over twenty minutes.

On the next beat in the slightly freshening breeze, the first five boats held their positions except for Rambunctious from Santa Monica which had the misfortune to break her main halyard. Her crew gamely tried to make emergency repairs and continue the race, but she reached the weather mark under shortened rig in last place and withdrew. Cene Too and Lecky again pulled up a place, but Three Star Too dropped to eighth. Pimm here led Gale by a minute and twenty seconds while Mercury trailed two minutes and thirteen seconds later and just twenty-one seconds ahead of Phar Lap.

On the run to the finish mark, Gale's larger sail paid dividends in no uncertain fashion. She not only passed the German boat but beat her to the line by forty-three seconds. Mercury was third by thirty-four seconds and Stormy took fourth. Then followed Phar Lap, Lecky, Cene Too, Sachem, Jay, Black Roger and Trece to complete the first division boats; Three Star Too having dropped five places in the run. During this run Star Dust engaged in a luffing match with Nomana of British Columbia which resulted in a protest by the latter for contact of a boat passing to weather. After a hearing, the Race Committee upheld Nomana's protest on two counts.

Thus, the first race demonstrated the fact that Pimn was not invincible and that anything might happen in fluky airs in the series. The contestants towed rapidly to shore and left in high spirits for a dinner dance at the Plata Real ballroom of the U. S. Grant Hotel where they were guests of the City of San Diego and presentation of the daily prizes by the Mayor. On the way to the party several  of the yachtsmen stopped off at the local radio station in the Pickwick Hotel for a radio broadcast. After singing of the song "We're From Sunny San Diego" with a couple of special verses, Glenn Waterhouse interviewed Pop Corry, Von Hutschler and Weise, Harry Nye, and Hook Beardslee and they told some features of Star racing to the radio audience.

The second morning gave promise of a little better breeze as the boats followed by the spectator fleet headed out for the line. The wind was S.W. shifting slightly to W. with a velocity of about ten to twelve miles during the middle of the race. A triangular course (1-CBA) was announced, and the boats got off to a beautiful start. Pimm took an early lead on the beat and after a beautiful piece of sailing rounded Mark B leading Gale by twenty-three seconds. Rambunctious was travelling again after her break down in the first pace and she held third place here behind Gale. Then followed Jay, Mercury, Stormy and Sachem with very little open water between them.

The first reach and run brought only slight changes among the first division boats but Gale closed to within two seconds of Pimm, as Sachem pulled up to fourth, and Jay dropped to fifth and Stormy to sixth. One of the real features of the second round was the showing of Star Dust after her trouble of the previous day. The boys from Barnegat Bay sailed their best race of the series to finish in fifth place-gaining three places on the second circuit. Three Star Too gained seven and Phar Lap four places on this round.

Everything was going so smoothly on the committee boat that the disaster which struck suddenly at about finish time was entirely unexpected. The I.R.C. had given definite instructions to move the stake boat to the opposite side of the committee boat for the finish and arrangements had been made for a power boat to report to do this in plenty of time. Thus, when the leading boats appeared bearing down with the freshening breeze, at the time the power boat arrived, it was too late to pick up the stake boat and it was also too late for Skipper Griffin to move the heavy anchor of the committee boat.

There was nothing left for it but to leave the line as it had been at the start, hope that the contestants would cross it directly after the leading boat had received a gun and take the consequences of the unfortunate and unavoidable situation. Pimm had a fine lead at the finish, crossed the line, received the finish gun, and dropped her sails. Von Hutschler had worked out a lead of a minute and a half over Gale and was loudly acclaimed by the spectator fleet as he crossed the line. The second and third boats also crossed directly but not hearing the whistle from the committee boat, Gale returned and crossed to port of the stake boat and across the line again. Then followed a regular nightmare for the committee with boats circling the stakeboat in both directions and making a wellnigh hopeless snarl out of the last ten minutes of what was otherwise a beautifully sailed race.

On the way in, the Race Committee agreed on a hastily drafted bulletin of explanation and apology to the contestants for the regrettable incident and asking for their indulgence and cooperation in adjusting the situation with fairness to all of the fleet. That the contestants were sincere in their desire to assist the committee in solving this very difficult situation was evidenced by the fact that no formal protests were filed. The committee had decided that the fairest solution was to record the position of each boat as it first crossed the line either on the starboard or port of the stake boat.

For the third race and a triangular course the wind held at about four or five miles per hour for the first round but dropped to almost a dead calm about the time the fleet reached the windward mark the second time around. It was evident that the boats with over-size roach sails were much at home in this type of weather, particularly on the reaches and runs. Rambunctious completed the first round with a lead of over two minutes over Phar Lap which in turn led Gale nineteen seconds. Pimm followed for fifth position but more than six minutes behind the Santa Monica entry. However, the race was called at three and a half hours and the contestants hastened in to attend a delightful cocktail party at the home of Mr. and Mrs. Roy E. Hegg. This was followed by a dinner at the San Diego Yacht Club presided over by Commodore A. W. Daniels, but of course no prizes could be awarded.

The morning of what should have been rest day dawned with a light fog and a six-mile wind reported from North Island as the fleet followed the committee boat to about the same rendezvous off Coronado. All of the boats reported before the attention signal in spite of the one-hour advance in time and the wind seemed to freshen slightly about the time the course signals for the same triangular course were set. The Coast Guard went directly into the eye of the wind to set the mark and the line was set in order to slightly favor the port tack. The fleet again got a fine start with the boats well strung out and the line clear. Rambunctious, Pimm and Gale soon worked out into free wind and assumed the lead with the fleet dividing into two groups. One worked out to sea on the port tack, the others standing towards the battleship Utah which lay at anchor about half a mile east of mark A.

Rambunctious and Phar Lap again showed their heels to the fleet in the very moderate breeze and held first and second positions at all marks. Pimm was fourth at the outer mark the first time and fifth the second time, but by some beautiful sailing pulled up into third place on the run home, beating Three Star Too in a luffing match above the line by twenty seconds. Gale was seventh, sixth and fifth at the marks on the first round and repeated this the second time, finishing lower down than in any other race of the series. Stormy and Mercury were also down to finish seventh and eighth. Nassau Star sailed her best race of the series to finish twelfth, just ahead of the Cuban entry Kurush which also did her best work after the discouragement of being so far back during the second race that she did not finish.

All the boats finished this race and there were no protests or other untoward incidents. The contestants enjoyed a dinner and quiet evening at the San Diego Yacht Club as guests of Mr. and Mrs. Fred Fernstrom. It was really a very pleasant day and with Pimm just two points in the lead over Gale it was realized that anything could happen in the light going.

The fourth race turned out to be the shortest contest of the series as the wind hauled several degrees to the south shortly after the start and allowed several of the high pointing boats to reach the windward mark with only a short hitch. The wind was six to eight miles from the S.W. but was dying so fast at the finish of the race that everyone agreed as to the desirability of the earlier start. Pimm stepped out into the lead again and held it by over a minute on the first round over Gale. She was still ahead at the windward mark the second time by nearly two minutes and completed the race more than a minute in the lead.

Mercury showed her consistency by taking third and Rambunctious sailed her best race by pulling up from eighth on the first round to fifth, ahead of Lecky which scored her second sixth of the five races. Stormy, Phar Lap and Three Star Too finished in that order. The race was over early so that the contestants had a partial rest before the dinner as guests of the San Diego Star Fleet while the Race Committee enjoyed a delightful dinner at the home of Commodore Dauchy.

Again, the committee selected a windward - leeward course for the fifth race and this time the wind held fairly steady and with a velocity of approximately eight miles until the last boat rounded the upper stake boat on the second round. Some of the best action of the series occurred at this mark the first time after Gale, Pimm, Stormy and Rambunctious had rounded in order. The boats got to the mark in groups of three or more and there were several situations which but for careful sailing and good luck might have resulted in fouls. The same thing was true at the leeward mark where there was very little open water between a good many of the competitors. Gale was out to show her mettle and refused to yield first place anywhere during the race. She crossed the finish line nearly two minutes ahead of Pimm, having consistently increased her lead as the wind freshened to about twelve miles during the second round.

One of the real features of the race was the thrilling battle between the next three boats. Stormy, Rambunctious and Mercury rounded the windward mark in that order after the first beat, but Rambunctious won out on the run to round the leeward mark just four seconds ahead of the Newport entry and forty-six seconds ahead of the tan-hulled boat from West San Francisco Bay. The latter however, found the beat to her liking and reached the windward mark ahead of both the southern California boats. She and Rambunctious staged an exciting luffing match downwind which Rambunctious won in no uncertain fashion during the last half mile to cross ahead of her rival by half a minute. Stormy came in nearly two minutes later followed by Phar Lap at about the same interval and just nosing out Sachem of Long Beach.

It was a bad day and a bad series for former championship boats. Lecky and Cene Too had fought savagely all around the course with last year's leading boat nosing out the Seattle entry by ten seconds at the finish. However, they had come into too close quarters at the windward mark and Cene Too protested the other boat for tacking unreasonably close in front, causing her to strike both Lecky and the stake boat. The 1.R.C. sustained this protest which gave Cene Too tenth for the race and eleventh in the series. Former top boat Peggy Wee now representing the Lake Ontario American fleet sailed her best race of the week to take eleventh place, but this was not sufficient to pull her out of the cellar position in the series standing. Sparkler II, another former champion boat from New Orleans was a little too eager at the start of this last contest and provided the only recall of the series.

Everyone heaved a sigh of relief that the series was over; hurried to put the boats up, dress and enjoy the first banquet at Hotel Del Coronado as guests of the Coronado Yacht Club. Pop Corry did the honors in presenting the trophies to the honored guests who were loudly acclaimed as each was called forward. Von Hutschler and Weise assured us that they had enjoyed and greatly appreciated the many kindnesses extended to them and invited us all to accept their hospitality during the series at Kiel next year. Willy Rivero of Havana pleased the crowd with his singing and radio imitations and "Glenn and Woody" contributed a couple of songs to the program.

w. von hütschler world championship