YACHTING Chamois, 'Wonder Boat,’ Returns

Press, Volume CI, Issue 30005, 14 December 1962, Page 6

YACHTING Chamois, ' Wonder Boat, ’ Returns

Ihe "wonder boat” of R Class yachting in New Zealand, Chamois, will be racing on Lyttelton Harbour on Sunday.

Chamois, which has won the Leander Trophy for three consecutive national contests, will be sailing during tune-up races for this season’s contest which will be held at Dunedin during the New Year.

The boat’s owner, M. L. Bowden, of Auckland, is taking the opportunity of trying himself out against Christchurch racing dinghies on his way through to Dunedin where he intends to put in three weeks' of intensive precontest practice and familiarisation with local conditions before trying to get the trophy for the craft for the fourth time. In 1960, when the Chamois was last at Lyttelton, it caused a sensation when it broke Canterbury’s nine-years' hold on the Leander Trophy. In the contest it was skippered by G. W. Gibbs whose crew was C. J. Dalziel, both of them comparatively unknown in top yachting, although they had distinguished themselves in North Island Cherub class competitions.

Gibbs and Dalziel went to Sydney for the interDominion 12-footer championships in 1961 and lent their boat to H. D. Poole, the Wellington X Class skipper: and Poole, with R. Spearman, won the trophy at Auckland. Earlier this year, at Worser Bay, Gibbs and Dalziel once more won the trophy and then sold the boat to Bowden, whose handling of Chamois at Dunedin—and at Lyttelton on Sunday aftergioon—will b’ closely watched. Chamois was designed by H. H. Wagstaff, of Wellington; and its tall rig, influenced by the Cherub class, was the plan of Dalziel. The rig has been copied by a number of Christchurch dinghies. Chamois will race on Sunday in company with R. Class dinghies belonging to the Canterbury Yacb* Club.