Americas Cup Jubilee Celebration  ---   Summer 2001.  

War Baby - 62' SS-designed sloop

It started out with a hard week of preparing and provisioning "War Baby" for the Atlantic crossing and the Jubilee, as well as some maintainance and repairs that always get left to the last minute.

"War Baby", a 62' aluminum sloop, was custom designed by Sparkman and Stevens and built by Palmer and Johnson.
She has girdled the World, including winning the Fastnet Race under the ownership of Ted Turner as "Tenaceous", and has also been within 500 miles of the North Pole under the current ownership of Warren Brown.

We left Westport on June 22 for Newport where we spent three days before leaving for Woods Hole, our point of departure. We enjoyed a very special dinner at the New York Yacht Club, compliments of Warren Brown. We had a mixed crew of nine Americans, Canadians, French and British members, and were spoilt by several gourmet cooks, especially Jill Baty, who has had Cordon Bleu training and is the boat manager. The trip was generally uneventful, with following winds most of the time that were easily handled by the beautifully balanced boat.  We arrived at Dartmouth on July 14 to be met by a number of old friends and glorious weather, and left on July 16 for Cowes, where we arrived overnight.

I returned to the boat on August 16 to the explosive excitement of the coming Jubilee. This event had been eight years in planning between the Royal Yacht Squadron and the New York Yacht Club, and turned out to be the most incredible large sailboat event ever. The participants included 35 America's Cup boats, three 120' J boats, and a total of over 200 classical and modern boats ranging from 45' to 220'. The racing was a huge adrenalin rush, and we finished 2nd. in our class and 3rd. overall