The coverage of these quarterly newsletters has been expanded with this edition to cover the Vintage part of the British Dragon fleet.
The definitions used are: A Classic Dragon is of wooden carvel-planked construction built before 1973.
A Vintage Dragon is one of any construction other than wooden carvel-planked that is 25 years old or more.
This means that there is a population of Classics that cannot grow and actually declines slowly as boats die. In contrast the population of Vintage Dragons grows each year as boats reach 25 years old. It is, however, the case that many Vintage boats* have disappeared from the British scene and that, by my estimate, there are only about twenty racing regularly.
The last three months have seen considerably more activity among both Classic and Vintage Dragons. Bluebottle, sailed by Graham Bailey, which is easily the best-known British Classic, warmed up by finishing second at the Southern Championship in Cowes, followed by a success in the French Championship in Deauville, a second in the British Northerns and a fourth in the Edinburgh Cup at Abersoch. Notably she had been to Deauville many years previously by the then common means of sailing there from Cowes.
Other Classic participants in these events were Aurora, sailed by Adrian Green, in the Southerns and Ran, sailed by Crispin Blyth in the Northerns and Edinburgh Cup. Ran finished 12th in the Northerns and 20th in the Edinburgh Cup, with rather mixed sets of results.
Among the Vintage boats Fit Chick, sailed by Jono Brown and Chris Grosscurth, was 3rd in the Southerns, 8th in both the Northerns and Edinburgh Cup and also 3rd in Cowes Week.
Ron James’ Fei Lin’s Flirtation, a wooden cold-moulded boat classified as Vintage was 5th in the French Championship. Six other Vintage boats competed in the Edinburgh Cup and Northerns, all from the local Abersoch fleet apart from Kismet, sailed by Cathy Ogden, which came from Edinburgh.
The BDA Classic and Vintage Championships were held at Aldeburgh as part of the Aldeburgh Dragon Open Meeting. Only two Classics, Harkaway, sailed by Tim Hannon, and Inditine, sailed by Hugh Rich, participated. Harkaway won the Classic Championship and also finished second in the Open Meeting to Basilisk. Basilisk also won the Vintage Championship from Nooka and Panther.
Full reports of both the Edinburgh Cup and the Aldeburgh Open Meeting are available to view within the website (click on each underlined link).
Further afield 17 Classics from three countries took part in the sixth International Dragon Classics at Wolfgangsee in Austria. The event was won by Wolfgang Kuhnke.
More mundanely Meteor, sailed by Peter Cooke, and Wizz Too, sailed by Helen Horsfall, have been racing on the Forth and Harkaway and Inditine have been doing likewise in Aldeburgh. More surprisingly Rainbow made an appearance at the Royal Findhorn annual regatta. There are, of course, a number of events at which Classics are often seen still to come in the season.
Next year the second Wooden International Dragon Championship will be held at Flensburg from 2nd to 7th July. The first of these events, open to wooden Dragons of any construction, was held in San Remo last year and attracted about 20 boats. Flensburg, on the Danish border, is the home port for many German Classic boats and should prove an excellent base for the regatta.
There has also been some activity in the Classic market. Laju has been sold to Rupert Street. She will certainly be the only Dragon competing with the original long cabin and bunks and, built in 1933 also the oldest.
Logie is now advertised on the BDA website here. She is apparently in good condition, having been lovingly cared for for many years by Dick Rycroft and represents excellent value as an entry point into Classic Dragons because she neither needs significant renovation nor has been through any such very full and costly process. She should be easily capable of holding her own in club racing any maybe rather more.
For those wishing to compete at the top level against modern boats, both Carronade and Dragonfly are for sale and competitive at any level. Meantime Chime is upside down in Demon Yachts at Aldeburgh and will ultimately emerge revitalised but not before 2025. More generally there are a number of boats for sale in varying condition and equally widely varying prices. I can provide details and contacts if needed.
- Patrick Gifford
*If you own and/or sail a Vintage Dragon and we have not included you, please do let us know. This not only helps us to update our records but also adds to the promotion of the Vintage fleet across the country.