A Skipper's Test

In such big-boat races as the America's Cup and the Newport-Bermuda contest, the winner owes as much to his boat as he does to his own sailing savvy.

Within limits, designs vary as widely as money and imagination can make them, and woe betide the skipper of a skow.

The North American men's sailing championships is a test of sailors alone. After summer-long eliminations, eight men are chosen to sail eight races in eight virtually identical boats. After each race, the contestants swap boats to eliminate any possible edge. The victor gets his name engraved on the Clifford D. Mallory Cup--and proud claim to the title of No. 1 U.S. sailor.

The boats chosen for last week's championship on Long Island Sound were Shields class,* stock 30-ft. fiber glass sloops that sell for $8,000 each and are as alike as a school of anchovies. After the first two days, Boston's John J. ("Don") McNamara, 34, and Darien, Conn.'s William Cox, 53, were so far over the horizon that no one could catch them. McNamara, a bronze medal winner in the 5.5-meter class at the 1964 Olympics, was ahead with 371 points (1, 1, 3, 2, 1). Barely 2 1/2 points behind (2,2,2,1,3) was Cox, who at 17 had won the North American junior championship and skippered American Eagle in her unsuccessful bid to become the U.S. America's Cup defender two years ago.

Into the Hourglass. Four times before, Cox had reached the North American finals--and lost each time. "It gets under your skin," he said. Now it looked like it might stay there. Early in the sixth race, he seemed hopelessly behind McNamara. But a wind shift caught McNamara unawares and then, rounding the first mark, the Bostonian and his two-man crew somehow committed the neophyte's gaffe of letting their spinnaker whip into an hourglass snarl. They took 1 min. 30 sec. to unfoul it, and limped in seventh to Cox's sixth. That put Cox only H points behind, 39|-381, and he poured it on in the seventh race--outmaneuvering his shaken opponent, then covering him all the way to a second-place finish against

McNamara's fifth. At last, Cox had the lead, 451-43f.

Now in the final race, Cox merely had to finish one place behind McNamara, and he would win in the overall standings. Easier said than sailed. With a quick start, McNamara put a boat between himself and Cox at the first mark. "We've lost it," thought Cox. Not quite. Slightly misjudging the tide and wind on his starboard side, McNamara headed straight for the second mark--giving Cox, who had shrewdly angled to windward to blanket McNamara's sails, the chance to skim first around the buoy. Frantically trying to make up lost ground, McNamara and his crew then did the incredible once again. The spinnaker was billowing; then as they jibed, flutter, flutter, there it was, snarled around the headstay. This time it took 2 min. 35 sec. to un tangle the mess, and by then Bill Cox was well ahead and home free for the championship.

*Named for and partly designed by Cornelius Shields, first winner of the Mallory Cup in 1952.

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