Pen Duick will go on

Press, Volume CXIV, Issue 33424, 4 January 1974, Page 10

Pen Duick will go on

C.V.Z. Press Assn.—Copyright) SYDNEY.

The crew of the dismasted French ketch Pen Duick VI yesterday accepted defeat in. the Whitbread round - thevvorld yacht race but sprang to the defence of their formula one racing yacht.

The race organisers had just announced a 23-hour penalty for the yacht, laid up

in Sydney with a broken mast, and the crew had just heard that the owner of another French entrant in the race had called their yacht design “too bold” for such a gruelling race. When told of the penalty, imposed because the skipper.

E. Tabarly, had used his auxiliary motor to reach Rio de Janeiro after he broke a mast in the first leg of the race, the crew said they were disappointed at the attitude of the organisers. “But what does it matter,” said P. Laboutet. “We have no chance of winning now. We have lost the race.

“If we can get another mast fitted within a month we will continue. We must go on, for the glory of France.”

The crew was stung by the criticism of Pen Duick’s design, bv J. Grout, the owner of Kriter, the French yacht now running fourth in the race.

: He told journalists in Marseilles when it was announced that Pen Duick had lost her second mast in the (race that sailing Pen Duick (around the world was like

crossing the Sahara in a formula one racing car.

.1 “It could have happened to any boat,” Leboutet said yes- ' terday.

“Sure it’s a formula one yacht—and it’s superb in the (condition of the race. “What would Jaques Grout know about it? He’s not on board, he's not even sailing in the race—just sitting in an armchair in Paris.”

The latest handican positions for the third leg put the British Royal Navy entry Adventure in first place foi(lowed by another British entry. Second Life, ( The French boats Grand Louis and Kriter are lying I third and fourth with the big Mexican ketch Sayula. at present the over-all leader, fifth.