Yachts

Trip. Passengers on liners bound down the Solent from Southampton caught a glimpse last week of an ugly little sailboat with a short mast, rigged as a ketch, proceeding slowly a little in front of a steam yacht. It was Sir Thomas Lipton's Shamrock V on her way to the U. S., a trip which under the 1930 rules of competition for the America's Cup she must make on her own bottom. Her delicate racing sails had been replaced by coarse canvas, her mast shortened to almost half its length. In command wasCapt. Ned Heard, veteran skipper. All the King's warships in Portsmouth, the French warship Bison, the King's yacht Victoria & Albert, and the fleet of yachts gathered for summer sail- ing in Ryde, Cowes, Calshot were signaling good luck, but the west wind almost tore their signal flags away and when Captain Heard and Ocean Pilot Henry Paul saw how the Solent looked they put into Ryde to wait for better weather. Sir Thomas Lipton, 80, still weak from a cold and lumbago, was not able to see the start but felt well enough to give out to the press the usual expressions of his optimistic sportsmanship.

Tests. Off Newport the "observation" races of U. S. Cup contenders ended inconclusively. Enterprise proved her ability to move in light airs beating Whirlwind easily and making better time than Weeta-moe, which beat Yankee. Next day Whirlwind was withdrawn and her owners held discussions with Designer L. Francis Herreshoff about changing her rig. The other three boats sailed together. In a smart racing breeze, over a deep groundswell with a chop on top of it, Yankee's broad hull rode away from Weetamoe with Enterprise third.

Little better able to make a choice than when the races started, the selection committee knows only that Enterprise is best in a breeze of five to ten miles per hour, Weetamoe from ten to fourteen, Yankee from fourteen up. Yet this scale is not completely accurate: Enterprise, with her heaviest mast stepped in, heeled over to an 18-mi. breeze and scooted past the old Resolute in an early test on Long Island Sound. Weetamoe has beaten Enterprise in light air. Whirlwind, prettiest looking of all, will be changed a lot before the final tests beginning Aug. 20.

What neither owners nor selection committee can yet be sure of is how well the new type mainsails, hung so that most of the wind-strain falls in the peak, will endure in the September wind of the actual races. In one race last week Whirlwind and Enterprise had their sails ripped out in a breeze that was just good racing weather.

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