1967 North American Championship - Toronto, Canada
Regatta Report
By William H. Lynn, Jr.
The story of the 1967 North American Championship was Alan Holt's from beginning to end. He was moving faster and sailing better than anyone else at Toronto and when the last winner's gun was shot and the scores posted he and his crew, Dick Gates, had racked up a very impressive record of three first and two seconds for a 10 point win over Gary Comer of Chicago.
During the course of these five days of racing, the young engineer from Seattle sailed a near flawless series. He took chances at the starting line to get clear-and most importantly he never misjudged in the slightest where his boat would fit or what he could do. He always got clear, and he was going fast enough so that he could make up with speed for the few shifts he didn't hit right. It's amazing when one boat can do this as successfully as Ariel did, but it's doubly amazing when you note that there were no less than seven World, Olympic and Continental champions represented in the entry list, and about 25 other hot shots going just as fast and sailing just as well as they were.
Wind and weather conditions were quite unusual for Toronto-generally clear and sunny, and the winds for the week all blew from the eastern quadrant. The first race began in a typical "lake slop" and winds of about 15 knots diminish ing to 12 the second time around. The handwriting was on the wall early-in fact about a third of the way up the first weather leg, when Alan Holt tacked over and crossed the fleet, followed by Ding Schoonmaker and Wally Crump from San Francisco, who was going very fast with his new mast and all solid wire, all of which weighed only 37 pounds fully rigged. These three kept moving out and finished in that order.
The second race was almost a repetition of the first. Alan Holt won it again. going away from Bill Buchan and Gary Comer, and when everyone sailed home that second afternoon it was generally agreed that it was going to take a tornado to stop the Ariel because nothing else was going to. At this point Holt had two firsts and a four point lead over his nearest competitor, Bill Buchan; with Gary Comer and Ding Schoonmaker tied for third another two points behind. It looked for a while as if the series would end right there, because it was two days before we got the third race officially on the books and to do even that took all of the Race Committee's ingenuity.
The "first" third race was protested by Gene Corley who didn't make the start, on the grounds that the Race Committee didn't properly account for all the boats, some of whom were still struggling to get to the line. The protest committee agreed that his position was valid and Bill Buchan's win was washed out. About 15 minutes before the start of the "second" third race the whole world turned grey and for the next hour all the contestants spent what was sup posed to be their rest day luffing around in pea soup fog trying to keep from hitting one another. The airport weather reports had Toronto due to be "socked in" all day and on this basis the cancellation notice was given for the second third race. As the contestants sailed home however, the fog cleared as suddenly as it had arrived, and after getting the agreement of all the contestants to race in the sparking Easterly that went with the sun, the third" third race began.
This was Gary Comer's race as he came across the fleet on wings half way up the first leg with Howard Lippincott just behind him. The second time up wind. Alan Holt moved past Howard into second place as the wind dropped and the "glue pots" became more numerous. Ralph deLuca, Mead Bachelor, and Gene Corley also got to Howard and that's the way it ended.
If Gary Comer was happy with the third third race, Bill Buchan, Ding Schoonmaker and Pete Bennett would have been very happy to settle for a day of fog. Bill fouled out while trying to squeeze around the weather mark in ninth place. His theory was that the series was over for him unless he gambled for every inch of water between himself and Holt who was then third. He gambled and lost. While he was attacking marks, Ding Schoonmaker was cooling off with a 13th, and Pete Bennett was sailing into oblivion with a 17th. Now only Gary Comer had a chance of catching Alan Holt, and that was a slim one.
The fourth race finally got started after the contestants were given a lot of practice crowding the weather end of a badly cocked line and the Race Committee was given a lot of shooting and signal raising practice-a long way of saying there were two general recalls. When the race finally got underway in fairly light (8-10) conditions it was again Gary Comer-starting to leeward, sailing inshore and finally coming across everyone for a good lead at the weather mark.
Alan Holt missed a couple of shifts and arrived at the weather mark in 7th place to prove he was really human and at this point in the race Comer led the series by a point. At the end of the first round they were tied because Holt had moved up to sixth. At the second weather mark Holt was back in the series lead by a point as he rounded fifth just behind Bill Buchan. All the way down the last run that's how it stayed-until the last 150 yards when the wind gods pulled the plug on Gary. He, Pete Bennett and Anson Beard had held high, while Bill Buchan and Alan Holt ran low. The wind went light, the low road won, and as everyone got ready for the last race of the double header, instead of being one point behind, Gary Comer was six out, and the third boat, Wally Crump, was almost twenty points away.
The last race was started in a fading five miles of wind at about four o'clock Saturday afternoon, with everyone expressing much doubt that it would finish in the time limit. The hotshots all started at the leeward end of the line going directly down the drain--all except Alan Holt who tacked to port about a third of the way up and footing very fast sailed over into the stronger breeze on the right side of the course. He made it over and that was all anyone saw of him. Bill Buchan and Gary Comer got there fifth and sixth and Wally Crump ninth. Pete Bennett was a hot 13th and Ding Schoonmaker and Durward Knowles were so far behind they just turned around and headed for home.
The horns blared, the guns shot, and the people cheered as Ariel crossed the finish line for her third win and the championship. At the windup dinner that night, Alan modestly stated that his success was due to Dick Gates, and there is no question that a large part of it was; but Alan had just sailed the best series of his life.
Results
1967 NORTH AMERICAN CHAMPIONSHIP - TORONTO Place No. Name Skipper Crew Fleet Daily Places Pts. 1 4861 Ariel Alan Holt Richard Gates Shil 1 1 2 2 1 238 2 4887 Turmoil Gary Comer Bill Bennett SLM 5 3 1 3 5 228 3 5016 Quest Walter Crump Nils Eriksen Ric 3 11 7 7 8 209 4 4809 Inchmaree John Bennett M. Shanahan Mis 8 4 17 4 12 200 5 5133 Cirrus Howie LippincottAsa Colson BB 6 5 6 11 18 199 6 5126 Avante Ralph DeLuca J. McWhorter WSFB 12 9 3 22 9 190 7 4913 Frolic Bill Buchan Jr Stan Lee PS 4 2 dsq 1 3 186 8 4340 Aquarius Mead Batchelor William Summer Mid 11 19 4 26 2 183 9 5218 Addiction Eugene Corley Steve Heater SLM 13 22 5 6 26 173 10 4207 Dingo J. Schoonmaker P. Henderson BisB 2 6 13 12 wdr 163 11 4754 Tackless John Goddard Jeff Goddard CA 14 13 29 20 13 156 12 4667 Big if Thompson Adams Wm. Richards WH 7 12 15 dnf 11 151 13 4756 Daemon Dave Millar P. Van Buskirk LOC 15 20 18 32 10 150 14 5177 Heather William Lynn P. Botsolas WLIS 24 dnf 10 8 6 148 15 4844 Finesse Michael Flynn George Flynn ELIS 22 15 19 13 29 145 16 4322 Blue Moon Steve Haarstick Steve Simon MorB 38 21 11 15 14 145 17 5007 007 David Jewett A. N. D. Hyde CA 21 8 33 27 21 137 18 4867 Caprice Robert Walker Cameron Clark LOC 27 32 9 14 28 136 19 4280 Tranquil John W. Allen Peter Payson WH 16 15 36 31 15 133 20 4067 GG III Steve Andrews Bill Moss HB 20 17 23 24 31 130 21 4860 Volare R. Campanelli Gerard Cayne ERF 30 42 12 17 17 127 22 4949 Quasar Watt Webb Charles Tracy Ith dnf 23 8 18 20 127 23 4870 Tsunami Anson Beard John Huntsman GSB 9 10 dsq 5 dns 123 24 4789 Gem IX Durward Knowles Robert Levin N 10 19 20 25 wdr 123 25 3858 Ingenue George Thomas C. Simpson III CLE 17 26 14 23 dns 116 26 5109 Hiker Bruce Carroll J. Van Dellen CLE 29 29 22 29 27 109 27 4105 Good Hope John Trinter Bob Van Wagnen SLE 32 36 dsq 16 4 108 28 5158 Gorne Bob Lippincott Ted Rapp WJ 18 7 16 dns dns 106 29 4956 Centavos Willard Hodges Robert Black Sun 31 31 37 19 23 104 30 5191 Cookies II David Cook C. Williamson Sun 34 33 32 39 7 100 31 4850 Mavourneen H. S. Moore J. Swanton HB 25 25 27 45 24 99 32 5020 Ampewa Walter Pilcer R. Burgess GrL 23 27 39 40 25 91 33 4985 Magic Robert Rodgers W. Van Arsdale GLW 26 28 dnf 30 22 90 34 4745 Impulse Dave Gaillard Samuel Hall CB 39 37 41 21 19 88 35 4640 Bimbo James King Carey Long StJ 33 43 25 9 wdr 86 36 4720 Gypsy Ken Kirkland Robert Burgess EB 43 34 21 28 34 85 37 4965 Bagaco C. W. Lyon Jr Frank Lyon AH 19 24 24 dns dns 80 38 4454 Donnybrook Jack Lynch Harvey Lekson WS 41 30 40 10 wdr 75 39 4757 Slipalot Stan Lippincott W. L. Nelson WJ 37 38 28 38 33 71 40 3396 Gemini William Watson Ted Watson LOA 35 39 38 35 30 68 41 4995 Gadfly J.M. MacCauslandD. Branning CR 28 16 wdr 36 wdr 67 42 4420 North Star A. Schuster Fred Goodwin LOA 46 45 30 41 16 67 43 5162 Susan V Carl Petersen T. Johannsen EB 42 35 34 37 36 61 44 4635 Lamb Chop D. Kingston W. Simpson BrownAH 44 41 26 43 32 59 45 4797 Chipteen Roger Doane David Doane SLE 36 40 35 34 dns 51 46 5015 Spindrift Dick Poole Fred Glazier GrL 40 dsq 31 33 wdr 43 47 4663 Bottoms Up Gordon Bell Bev Waddell StJ 45 46 dns 44 35 26 48 4040 Try III C. McManus Edward Rich CB 47 44 42 42 wdr 21
