Amazing video - 1974 One Ton Cup at Torquay

dunedin

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An amazing video has been uncovered called Gumboots and the Golden Apple, about the 1974 One Ton Cup. Narrated by a young Bob Fisher, it has some great footage of boats from a previous era - huge overlapping genoas and crews in orange nylon waterproofs :cool:

Enjoy One Ton Cup video emerges from 1974 OTC sailed off Torquay

Spoiler alert, but it was even won by a Contessa - though not one with a long keel
 

Frogmogman

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An amazing video has been uncovered called Gumboots and the Golden Apple, about the 1974 One Ton Cup. Narrated by a young Bob Fisher, it has some great footage of boats from a previous era - huge overlapping genoas and crews in orange nylon waterproofs :cool:

Enjoy One Ton Cup video emerges from 1974 OTC sailed off Torquay

Spoiler alert, but it was even won by a Contessa - though not one with a long keel
Nice find, thanks for posting.

It was for the rescue of the crew of the burning French yacht whilst winning the one ton cup that year that Jeremy Rogers was made yachtsman of the year.

Edit: which is evident from the film (I didn’t ha e time to watch the whole thing until this evening).
 
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dunedin

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I remember around the time there was a Albin Scampi 1/2 ton cup style boat at our club. It was like a super yacht compared to the routine fleet of Silhouette, Alacrity, Felicity, Kingfisher and Hurleys. Even bigger than the previous super yachts, a pair of Albin Vegas.

One Ton Cup boats were enormous vessels, only read about in Yachts & Yachting (and I remember reading about Golden Apple & Gumboots at the time).
Now these boats look tiny compared to what most of us sail these days.
 

Capt Popeye

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An amazing video has been uncovered called Gumboots and the Golden Apple, about the 1974 One Ton Cup. Narrated by a young Bob Fisher, it has some great footage of boats from a previous era - huge overlapping genoas and crews in orange nylon waterproofs :cool:

Enjoy One Ton Cup video emerges from 1974 OTC sailed off Torquay

Spoiler alert, but it was even won by a Contessa - though not one with a long keel

thank you Mr D a great video , encapsulating the thrills and spills of Yacht racing in those days
 

Frogmogman

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I’d not made the connection before, but the Irish politician Simon Coveney, who has been much in the news with you-know-what, is the son of Golden Apple’s owner, Hugh Coveney.
 

Robin

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Those were the days my friends, those were the days. Having later owned a Sun Legende 41 a Doug Peterson designed one ton cupper built by Jeanneau where the original was raced by Jeanneau under the name 'LEGENDE' I can truly appreciate the performance which even in the2000s when I owned her was still astonishing unless in amongst the new kids on the block 's big dinghies. Back in the early 70s these boats were to dream about or drool over in pages of Yachting World

Thanks indeed for the link to that video. (y)
 

Minerva

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It's quite staggering - £30k boats back then (>£300k in todays money) which even the designer of the boats admired to being obsolete the following year.

Absolutely Bonkers!

Thankfully those days are gone and buried.
 

Robin

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Just look at those ollies. I wonder if anybody would wear them now?
I had some excellent orange pvc ones that were wearable in summer temps. Later switched to the more designer stuff but ditched that eventually as too darn hot for even a UK summer, plus they were near impossible to dry well enough to put away with getting serious mildew. Re-discovered Guy Cotten pvc stuff, in a more supple white this time, and am still wearing these 20 years later on the rare occasion I bother at all.
 

Bajansailor

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I remember seeing Golden Apple (of the Sun) out here in the Caribbean after she had taken part (and collected some hardware along the way) in one of the ARC rallies in the late 80's, still with her immaculate varnished hull.

Didn't she have a sister ship called Silver Apple of the Moon?
 

Frogmogman

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I remember seeing Golden Apple (of the Sun) out here in the Caribbean after she had taken part (and collected some hardware along the way) in one of the ARC rallies in the late 80's, still with her immaculate varnished hull.

Didn't she have a sister ship called Silver Apple of the Moon?

Yes, but she wasn’t a sister ship, she was bigger; a flush decked 44’, still by Ron Holland, built in wood by souters. Silver apple was mouldering away at Bucklers Hard. Don’t know if she’s still there.

IIRC, she was one of the 1977 Irish Admiral’s Cup team, along with sister-ship, Big Apple and one tonner Irish Mist II.

FWIW, Jeremy Rogers captained the British team to victory in 1977 on Moonshine, along with Marionette and Yeoman XX

Edit: found some pics online for you. Silver Apple and Big Apple
7D3C40DC-1992-4124-976F-9EC0AD8FD4C9.jpeg

only racing yacht I can think of with a poem inscribed on her transom
4DFC4F12-1102-4902-ADAD-D11E18804D2F.jpeg

looking a bit sad at Buckler’s hard
1D954014-DE67-427A-AF48-99B25AE0A205.jpeg
 
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doug748

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Golden Apple was disabled in the 1979 Fastnet and the crew taken off. Think it was the same boat, she was picked up later

I saw Ciel (Ceil?) in Plymouth, offered for sale, about 20 years ago, and she has popped up a couple of times since. I recall she had an interesting third career in the hands of a guy who started putting films onto YouTube. He seemed to have a number of East European "girlfriends" who found things so warm in England they felt the need to get their kit off. I think YouTube had enough and the films disappeared..............

...............This looks like it could be the guy:

https://m.facebook.com/watch/boatbabesxxx/

Films below. The bloke was going round the world but never seemed to leave the Solent.

.
 

johnalison

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A lovely film and a wonderful commentary. Did I hear right that the boats weighed upwards of two tons? Even my 34' boat weighs five.
 

doug748

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Further to post 15, Ron Holland was a member of the crew of Golden Apple in that Fastnet. By one of those odd coincidences, I just came across this piece of video:
(It's pretty choppy, just a recording of a Zoom meet)


The whole thing is 2 hours but has some good bits, like they took 15 tons out of the rig of Mirabella V by converting to carbon fibre rigging. They then had to take 15 tons off the keel to compensate and not take the boat beyond it's design parameters due to an increased righting moment. He showed just the end bit of a old mast tang which was so heavy it was difficult to pick up.

.
 

TLouth7

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12 years later, the game looks to have moved on somewhat.... Those boats, in cockpit layout etc, look a lot easier for a full crew to work.

And recently the 1 ton cup has been raced for by the fast 40s....
Interesting that the crew size seems to have increased over time. The 1974 boats seem to have 5 or 6 crew, the 1986 lot 7 or 8, and the 2019 have 10 or so. Still 2 in front of the mast, but need more grinders, and people to tend to running backstays that weren't present in the 1974 fleet?
 
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