OFFICE TRANSPORT
The Fairplay Cup uses Sunfast 37 yachts chartered from Sunsail in Port Solent, near Portsmouth on the UK’s south coast. With 40 of these French-built Jeanneau yachts, Sunsail claims to have the largest identical fleet in the world.
The yacht is described as having a very fast hull matched with a large sail area, giving a lightweight racing feel when under sail.
SUNFAST 37 SPEC
Length, oa: 11.40m
Length, waterline: 10.95m
Beam, max: 3.70m
Draught: 2.07m
Displacement: 6,300kg
Lead keel weight: 2040kg
Mainsail: 36.4m²
Genoa: 40m²
Spinnaker: 88m²
Berths: 5/7
CAN YOU FACE UP TO THE CHALLENGE
The Fairplay Cup was conceived in discussions at Posidonia in 1994 as a way of getting representatives of the different sectors of the shipping industry together in a friendly but mildly competitive environment.
IIt is held in mid-June each year in the Solent, on the UK’s south coast, using a fleet of identical chartered yachts. Most crews meet for dinner the evening before, followed the next day by a breakfast, a pre-race briefing and a shakedown sail.
A first race is followed by a running lunch and the day continues witha second race and refreshments ashore. An informal evening reception is followed by the prize presentations and dinner in a historic venue.The number of participants is limited, but if you would like details of how to enter a team of your staff or guests, visit www.fairplaycup.co.uk and fill in the online form or contact Debbie Winchester at Fairplay on +44 (0)1737 379128 or email deborah.winchester@lrfairplay.com.
No sailing experience is needed: just a sense of humour.
ANOTHER DAY AT THE OFFICE
It’s addictive. That is the only explanation why, year after year, nearly 200 busy people leave their desks for a day to take part in the Fairplay Cup. And this year’s entry of 24 boats was the largest in the event’s 14 outings, with regulars and newcomers drawn to the water. But that, of course, is the point: as one guest put it afterwards, “a bad day on the water beats a good day in the office. And this was not a bad day.”
In fact, it was a very good day; its stiff breeze and sunshine were “Champagne conditions,” said another crewman.
Whether any Champagne had flowed the night before is not clear, but many crews had clearly had a late night and a good meal as they planned their strategy. ABB’s crew, for example, aptly named themselves the Able Bodied Boozers and met the night before for a quiet pint and a discussion of tactics. “On our second pint it was decided that dinner would be delayed while salty stories were swapped and we managed a third beer.”
Dinner, accompanied by “red wine of possibly excellent quality”, lasted into the small hours yet, even then, no strategy or tactics had been agreed. So tactics were decided during a hastily arranged meeting on the coach to the Sunsail premises, they reported later. And they were simple: “get to the front and stay there”. Strategy was just ignored; “what more did we want?”
Others used the day before the race more productively. Trinity House, which had two teams in the race – wearing shirts that were helpfully labelled ‘Number 1’ and ‘Number 2’ – had taken their boats out for a shakedown cruise. Over breakfast on race day, they explained their unique attire: The Number 2 crew – the Beam Team, as they dubbed themselves – are newcomers. They have come, said one of those novices, to enjoy some teambuilding; “we’ll do as well as we can”, he said, but revealed that their practice had included spinnaker handling – a detail that was to prove valuable later on.
The Number 1s insisted that the distinction did not signify departmental rivalries, but they seemed apprehensive. The Beam Team has nothing to lose, observed one of the experts. “We have nothing to win.”
Others had come with scores to settle. Wärtsilä, for example, recalled that their third position last year had been accompanied by grumblings that their corporate spinnaker had been oversized. Not true, of course, whatever last year’s photographs suggested: these are one-design yachts and their canvass is stitched by an approved sailmaker.
There were two eye-catching spinnakers last year, as Fairplay had invested the company’s fullyear profits in a red kite, which had been flown to little effect. Better things would be expected this year.
But there was talk at breakfast of a third new spinnaker – to be hoisted on the Smit Salvage boat. This is a sign of real commitment to the Cup: in its first year, after attending last year as a guest on another boat, Smit is jostling old hands aside with a smart sail. In fact, the sail had only been collected on the day before the race and the crew had not yet had a chance to see it aloft.
That might be seen as Dutch courage, but the Dutch are also known for their strong work ethic. So, while other crews were looking forward to a day away from the worries of work, the Smit crew were alive to the business possibilities that the race might offer. “We have brought some LOF contracts with us,” one crewman announced, “and we will mobilise as quickly as possible.”
TEAM MEETINGS
Any good manager will, sooner or later, host a team meeting and the Fairplay Cup’s race officer Rob Tattersall is no different. He may not have scheduled it into the skippers’ Outlook diaries, but he nonetheless started with the day’s weather outlook: south westerly, veering westerly, force 5- 6, occasionally 7 at first; westerly 4 later. Skippers, he said, should make their own decisions about whether to use spinnakers. To summarise in a single bullet-point: it will be a brisk day.
He also offered some advice: “Please be aware of shipping”. The Solent, where our races were to take place, is a busy area and already this year one Sunsail yacht has “tried to take on a 52,000 dwt container ship”, he said. This is surely not a reminder that Fairplay Cup competitors need.
MANAGEMENT POLICY
Then the skippers meet their crews. In the Cup, competitors can skipper their own boats or accept the services of an unknown Sunsail skipper. It can be a source of debate: which is better – for a skipper to know their crew or to know the boat and the local tides? It’s another office issue: to know your staff or to know your market? To know your tools or know your trade?
Michael Else & Co were impressed by their allocated skipper “who seemed to spend most of his time on the water either in the Solent or in Australia.” That’s a long commute.
ABB sensed that their allocated skipper was not relishing the day ahead. His mood deepened as two crew announced they were already feeling queasy before even untying from the pontoon; those extra two beers and the wine from the night before were taking their toll. Add to that the apparent lack of interest in the sails among the crew of marine engineers, and the skipper was visibly crestfallen. Then someone threw up over the side. Oh dear.
Others might have wished they had ticked the box to book a skipper. The V.Ships boat, for example, had only four on board, after two guests pulled out due to ‘work commitments’. Yet, as is becoming clear, the Fairplay Cup is nothing other than a supreme work commitment.
Indeed, since their boat had food and drink enough for eight, “at one point it was suggested that the best course of action was to find a nice anchorage and have an extended lunch.” At least there would be no shortage of ballast.
Meanwhile, Fairplay’s snapper was trying to take team photographs. With 24 teams and only 40 minutes to capture them, he has only 100 seconds per team, in which he has to scramble out to boats three or four away from the pontoon, with camera and notebook in hand, find all the crew, take their photo and move on to the next boat. One day his luck will run out and he and all
his expensive gear will end up in the water; time for another office memo: carry out that overdue risk assessment.
But there is another shortcoming in all this haste: there is little time for conversation. There was no time to ask, for example, why there were only six people in Lloyd’s Register Rail’s team, called Eight Men in Another Boat. Nor why Trinity House’s Number 1 crew – the Cardinal Sinners – all dived into their cabin and emerged wearing weird and wonderful wigs, hats or both.
Their post-race report offers no insight either, or comments on how much is owed to the theatrical supplier following the loss overboard of team manager Roger Swinney’s ‘Yum-Yum wig’ “which even now is probably bobbing its way toward Calais”., From the Solent, its destination is more likely to be Cowes than Calais, but it’s an easy mistake to make, despite being responsible for the nation’s navigational aids.
TESTING THE WATER
There comes a time in any product development programme when it is time to test the water. And it is no different at the Fairplay Cup so, eventually, all the crews were sufficiently motivated to move off.
Some took the opportunity of the sail to the racing area to practise their tacking and gybing. Others thought about putting in reefs. A few boats actually did so. There were boats that got their spinnakers ready, while others felt it best to wait until they had rounded the windward mark in the first race before getting their spinnaker bags out of the cabin.
Wärtsilä had a sense of déjà vu, having been allocated the same boat as last year, in which they had come third. “She went well last year” they recalled; “was this going to be another positive indication of success?” Of course, this meant that the gear was a year older than they remembered and a frayed jib sheet called for some early running repairs “and we hadn’t even started!”
The Safety at Sea boat had other priorities. One of its guests was “tea-crazy”, its log notes. “He made a cup as soon as we were on board, after the races and at lunch. Tea-making was never too much trouble.” At least it kept him dry: the same guest had earlier been sitting out and basking in the warm sunshine. “This is wonderful,” he said, just as the boat hit a large wave and drenched him in its spray.
PRODUCT LAUNCH
When all the strategy meetings have been held, the focus groups reported, the redesigns rubbished and the market research ignored, it is time to launch the product. And the Fairplay Cup is the same. The crews have assembled, the briefings have been forgotten, the strategy has been over-ruled and the forecast was fiction, so now it is time to start racing.
The first course is posted on the side of the committee boat and called over the radio so everyone knows where the start line is and where the first mark is.
Well, not quite everyone. V.Ships blamed its low manning level for its mistake but, having lined itself up for the yellow buoy at the outer end of the start line they began to wonder why, with just 30 seconds to go, all the other boats were close to the committee boat. “Too late we realised that we were at the wrong yellow buoy and the start line was on the other side of the committee boat.”
At least the AIS Live boat got the right start line
but its skipper made a bold decision to take an inshore route while the rest of the fleet set out into deeper water. “It fooled everyone”, said one of
the crew later. “We wondered what the chances were that everyone else had the wrong course and we’d got it right.” The final results tell their own story.
It was one of the cleanest starts in Fairplay Cup history, which has seen general recalls and
ignored recalls in the past. This time, there was a clear winner for the first-legally-over-the-line prize
– Trinity House’s Beam Team – as most of the fleet
set off on starboard into what had now become a
steady westerly breeze.
“Five minutes into the race and it is all coming
together”, Beam Team found. “The wet and cold
training weekend in March and the pre-race day
has paid off, we all know our
jobs and are doing them well.
We are sailing like a well oiled
racing machine, working like
cogs in a Swiss Watch”.”
Despite being reefed, they
seemed to maintain their lead
over Michael Else & Co and LOC,
both of which also had good
starts. But that first leg spread
the fleet, especially as the LPG
carrier Sigas Margrethe motored
through. As Rob had said, look
out for shipping.
For the Cardinal Sinners, the
distraction was not unwelcome,
as the tanker caused them “to
make a dive for the left hand
side of the beat – a handy distraction as it was the
favoured side,” their report says.
At the mark, it was Michael Else that turned
first, with LOC and Beam Team in close pursuit.
In fourth place was Fairplay’s Press Gang with
Holman Fenwick & Willan in fifth. It was here that
the Hell For Weather crew made their move,
being the first boat to hoist a spinnaker and doing
it efficiently. “The crew work on the spinnaker was
superb”, their skipper said in the bar later. Their sail
was up in a trice and they were away.
Others were less efficient. Some had clearly
made the decision that this was not a day for kite
flying, and one of those was Fairplay’s Press Gang
boat, despite being entrusted with the corporate
cargo. “We set off into the wind with the
confidence of 18-year-olds”, said its subsequent
report, “but once the first reef went in, a more
mature thinking settled over the boat and the
spinnaker was set aside for the first race.” It was a
decision that immediately cost them one place as
HFW cruised past them.
Then there were boats that decided rather late
about their spinnaker work. Some had the sail
ready and waiting, but only sent crew forward
once the buoy had been passed, while one crew
was seen passing the spinnaker bag forward
as they rounded the mark – a small detail had
obviously been left off someone’s to-do list.
The downwind leg gave an opportunity to
assess the situation. Which as was better – a
reef or full sail? A spinnaker or not? To broach or
not? That last option was forced on a number
of boats throughout the day as the stiff breeze
and rolling swell proved too much to handle for
some crews and hard-won places were lost. And
it was not only those with spinnakers aloft that
found the wind a handful. Wärtsilä, for example,
had full sail up on this second leg but “at one
point the boat took a gust at the top of a wave
and we performed a kind of handbrake turn”, its
log recounts. Fortunately, their skipper reacted
smartly and kept control and “although we lost
momentum, we felt we earned full marks for
artistic impression.”
By the second mark, HFW’s efficient sail work
had edged them into second place behind
Michael Else, pushing LOC into third place
with the rest of the fleet spread out over a
considerable distance behind.
It was a turn of events that LOC found
frustrating. “We sniffed victory twice”, said one
of its crew in the bar later, and their first whiff
was that second place at the first buoy. But their
rivalry with HFW was equally acute: LOC won the
cup last year despite tying on points with HFW,
the final split being decided on the second race
positions, so to be overtaken by HFW was not
easy to accept. “They flew their kite well and that
made all the difference,” said the LOC crewman
magnanimously.
Leaving the second mark to port brought
the boats onto a reach and HFW gybed and
hardened in the spinnaker, keeping it aloft, while
LOC collapsed its kite as it approached the buoy.
They set examples that the rest of the fleet would
have watched closely. Trinity House’s Beam Team,
despite flying down the run had lost two places
and decided to kill their spinnaker. So did ABB, in
eighth place, managing a broach as the sail was
furled. Further back, in 13th and 14th places, two
LR boats kept theirs aloft.
Trinity House’s Number 1 team, the Cardinal
Sinners, gybed their spinnaker by dropping it,
repacking it quickly and rehoisting it, which
would have worked but for two things: when it
emerged from the bag the sail had a twist “for
all the world like Hagrid’s wife’s bikini top” and
bag itself was several feet above the deck and
blowing overboard.
ABB tried a similar approach, except that they
overlooked the second half of the manoeuvre
until they were well down the leg. “We then
realised we should hoist it again. By the time we
were three quarters of the way down the leg, the
kite was ready to go again.”
GO OR NO GO
These turned out to be crucial decisions as those with close-hauled spinnakers powered along the reach. It made their ‘go or no-go’ business decision easier than those behind when the aframax tanker Atlantic Galaxy came into view
well to the left of the course, but closing fast.
It would obviously split the fleet, but where?
The view from the bridge must have been nervewracking
and the captain had no way of knowing
that at least some of the yacht crews dicing
with death across his bows did understand the
collision regulations.
The leaders were obviously well clear and
those at the back would clear its stern without
changing course. But for those in the middle,
there came a point when a choice had to be
made. Lloyd’s Register Marine, in their boat Sail
La Vie, reckoned they were last across the bows
of the ABS-classed ship “with five blasts of the
tanker’s horn resounding in our ears.”
Pacific Basin were among the boats
immediately behind and held their course longer
than most. While those around them had turned
to port, and off the racing line, to pass under the
tanker’s stern, Pacific Basin held on to the last.
“We should have gone round the bow; we would
have cleared”, said one crewmember later. “The
bearing was changing all the time.”
Their Sunsail skipper, however, no doubt
recalled the race officer’s morning warning and
wisely decided that 12m of glass fibre will always lose to 250m of steel plate.
With this excitement over, some boats that
hitherto had kept their spinnakers dry followed
the examples in front of them and broke them
out. Smit, with its impressive brand-new kite, was
among them, allowing them to catch up and
pass Wärtsilä, who then unfurled their own huge
logo and creamed through the field.
At the last mark, the race order remains:
Michael Else, HFW and LOC, with Fairplay’s Press
gang, and the two Trinity House boats in pursuit.
There was a moment in the final tacking duel
when Michael Else and HFW were abreast, before
HFW tacked away; victory would hang on the
wisdom of that tack.
Meanwhile, Beam Team made a good choice
of course for the final tacking and pulled up two
places, to finish third, pushing LOC back to fourth.
For all the talk about skilful spinnaker work,
Michael Else’s crew held their position and proved
that victory could be won without one. That is
not to say that theirs did not get some attention:
it was stowed in the same storage locker as the
cockpit fire extinguisher, which had come loose
halfway through the race and discharged. “It
made for a fairly interesting atmosphere (or lack
of it) for those in the cockpit and covered our
spinnaker”, their log notes dryly.
Having taken part in the Fairplay Cup for
ten years and “normally achieving mid-table
mediocrity”, their race notes say, “it came as quite
a shock close to the end when we realised we
were out in front and it took some time to sink in
that we had won.”
A few boats back, ABB was pleased with its
seventh place and wondered what might have
been had they not been hampered at the start.
Keen readers will notice that there has previously
been no mention of ABB’s outrageous claim that
they – and a number of other boats – had been
hindered by Fairplay’s Press Gang at the start,
claiming that these fine sailors had “sailed down
on top of several leeward boats and refused to
luff to windward when called.” It shows how those
who are not trained reporters can easily make
fundamental errors when recalling events.
Lloyd’s Register’s Sail La Vie reported an
“inexplicable problem” as they approached the
finish line and a jib sheet became stuck and the
only solution seemed to be to cut it. But “no one
could find a knife and then all the cooks waded in
to release the tension from the other end – it took
a while to unravel the spaghetti.”
Despite this, they eventually finished in the
top half of the field and this was despite the drag
induced when one crewmember, Nick Brown,
“was hit on the head by someone or something
and tipped overboard. Known to enjoy surfing,
Nick was left hanging by one finger with his head
in the bow wave.”
V.Ships came in a few places further back, but
pleased with their performance nonetheless,
given their lack of crew. “The best we could hope
for was the prize for best overall improvement.”
We shall see.
WORKING THE AFTERNOON SHIFT
The European Working Time Directive dictates that workers should have adequate time to eat lunch and the Fairplay Cup lunch is always a tasty, though simple, meal. “Top pork pies” was the equally simple comment from the Trinity House Beam Team as they downed a celebratory beer. In the bar later, HFW’s skipper recalled
the pies as providing inspiration for the afternoon’s work to come.
Lunchtime also provided a chance for crews to
plan their afternoon schedule and make use of
mugs placed on board the boats by the charity
Seafarers UK, entering the race for the first time
this year and marking their card with a creditable
14th position in the first race. They might have
done better had they not let the mainsheet run
out with no stopper knot on the end.
Their team name – 2 Million Reasons – reflects
their current fundraising campaign, trying to raise
a further £2M to match demands on its support
last year from the Royal Navy, Merchant Navy,
fishermen and their dependents. Perhaps they
should have changed their name to 2 Winch
Handles, of which they were also short by the
end of the day.
The second race is traditionally designed to
end in the vicinity of Portsmouth Harbour and,
since the first race had finished somewhat to the
west of there and the wind was now set from
the west, it should have been obvious that this
race would provide an opportunity for much
spinnaker work. Whether those – such as the
Press Gang – who had not yet explored these
possibilities would be tempted by the offer
remained to be seen.
For one team, Lloyd’s Register’s IT’s Worth It,
the race is over, radioing the committee boat to
report a broken kicking strap and some sheared
pins in the gooseneck. With an eighth position
in the first race, they had clearly had a hard
morning’s work, but their decision was the right
one from a safety point of view, for which they
were awarded the Safety At Sea trophy at the
evening presentation. Another Lloyd’s Register
team, Gone Fission, also retired following gear
failure, this time with genoa halyard problems.
Reefs were once again crucial, with some
boats deciding to reef during the lunch interval
as the wind stiffened further. Wärtsilä was one of
them and they still found the boat to be “a little
overpowered”. Another was Sail La Vie, but their
log records the decision as “a major mistake”. The
Press Gang, on the other hand, shook their reef
out. Would their spinnaker follow?
At LOC, reefing is for wimps. As one of its
experienced crew explained that evening,
“you just don’t reef” fractional boats. “You might
change down a headsail but it needs to blow
40kts to put in a reef.”
The Cardinal Sinners tackled the problem of
how they would launch their spinnaker, having
thrown their sail bag overboard in the first race.
Should they launch the kite from a bin-bag, a
holdall or “should we just do it 420-style and
chuck it forward and hoist like fury?” They opted
for the holdall, so “old socks, swimming trunks and
towels were released form their prison and no
one spent any longer than necessary in the cabin.”
It was potentially a tricky start, with two knots
of tide taking the fleet towards the start line,
but once again there were no recalls. Sail La Vie
was first across but the press boat was more
interested in how the top boats from the first
race had fared in the second. And for Michael
Else, things were not good. Once the crowd had
cleared, they lay second to last, giving them a
mountain to climb. “Our target was the Hollman’s
boat but we made a poor start and never really
caught up,” they reported later.
It is always difficult to judge the leaders as the
fleet splits on the windward leg, but at the mark
it was LOC, the Cardinal Sinners and HFW in the
first three places, with the Baltic Exchange Sailing
Association, ABB and Sail La Vie close behind,
according to the photographers’ notes, although
ABB were adamant in their report that they had
been third at the mark. It was this brief leading
position that, an LOC crewman said later, was the
team’s second sniff at victory. “But victory didn’t agree with us today,” he said philosophically.
And so to the spinnaker leg, and ABB put
it succinctly: “Up went the kite and off went
the boat!” The Cardinal Sinners described it as
“a sleigh ride”, finding themselves one of three
boats abreast in very close proximity. Broaching
was clearly going to be a risky operation in this
situation, so that is what they did, putting in a
dramatic lurch onto the beam and losing several
places while LOC and HFW marched on.
It provided a learning opportunity for their
nemesis, the Beam Team, which by now had
hauled their way towards the leading pack. “They
performed a perfect example of a broach,” the
Beam Team noted, and “we would like to thank
them as, we being inexperienced sailors, it was a
technique we were not familiar with.”
A succession of broaches under spinnaker
evened up the race for some non-spinnakerflying
boats, with V.Ships reporting that they
gained ground as rivals had trouble gybing
their spinnakers in the freshening breeze.
Unfortunately, it sapped their own concentration
and they lost some of the places they had gained.
There was some confusion on the press boat
at the next mark as the leading boats appeared to
ignore it and, rather than turn to port as expected,
continued on their course. The reason soon
became clear: it offered more of a broad reach to
the next buoy once the gybe had been completed,
which the two leaders accomplished. Yet the
Sinners, despite having now killed their spinnaker,
had recovered well and seemed to be leading.
ABB’s gybe was not so successful. “Main to the
middle, kite flying well, big roll and we broached
and were pinned down.” By the time main and
spinnaker sheets had been freed and boat had
come up again, “10 boats had passed us”. Despite
this, they estimate they had recovered to fourth
place by the next mark.
A SMART OBJECTIVE
This was also a gybe mark and the Sinners hoisted
their kite again and, just as they were closing the
gap on the leaders, it was time for their second
broach of the day. As any executive knows, if it
can’t be measured, it can’t be managed, so the
Sinners gave their first broach a score of seven out
of ten and this one “was a full 10/10.”
Wärtsilä was also in contention for a leading
place and decided to use its spinnaker again. But the jib furling mechanism had other ideas: there
was no cage on the drum and the furling line
had fallen out in disarray. “As we deployed the
spinnaker and tried to furl the jib, a cat’s cradle
of a mess jammed the furling drum and the
spinnaker couldn’t be used.”
So they ended up with no spinnaker and
the jib stuck half out, “so we had to give up
competing on the run” and the skipper – who
until now had been pouring forth a “torrent of
abuse for the opposition and encouragement for
his crew – subsided into a funereal silence.”
For Smit, with its brand-new spinnaker, the
second race was a joy. Although they had used
it in the morning, by the afternoon “we got the
hang of it” said one crewman.
With a full main and no broaches,
this was the highlight they took
away with them and which took
them among the race leaders.
After all these downwind
legs, the final mark required
a complete 180 degree turn
towards the line, tacking against
following boats running the other way.
At the line, HFW took the honours, giving them
the Fairplay Cup. But in second place was the
Beam team, giving them second place overall,
and no one was more surprised than they.
“Unbelievable”, they wrote in their log. “If we had
been on land we would have had a team hug. I
think they heard the cheer back in Harwich.”
Smit came home third and ABB fourth, just a
second behind and sowing the idea that next
year they should buy “a big new kite” as well.
But what of the first race winners, Michael
Else? Remarkably, despite their poor start, they
finished seventh giving them third place overall.
Their log is modest about their achievement,
saying that they had been “chiefly helped by
some of the other boats having a fairly torrid
time with their spinnakers.”
Perhaps so, but there must have been some
who wondered how the result might have
changed had they got away to a better start.
As for the winners, what was their secret?
Skipper Dominic Johnson listed them in the bar:
“Teamwork. A lot of leadership within leadership.
Doing the simple things right ...” He may have
said more, but our reporter had heard enough
management speak for one day.