Dart 18 class celebrate 25th birthday...

This year the Dart 18 class returns to its roots - Restronguet SC in Cornwall. Twenty-five years ago the first Dart 18 National Championship was held at the club with an entry of 47. The winner was Ian Fraser with crew Peter Whitfield - a very appropriate result as Ian had been a prime mover, together with Kim Stephens and Terry Pearce in getting the Dart into production.

The original design by Rodney March was entered in the IYRU (now ISAF) trials for a new two-man catamaran and two Darts were shipped to Los Angles in 1976.

The publicity from this gave the class a great start in Europe and by the time of the first championships at Restronguet there were nearly 600 sailing - sufficient to hold the first European Championship in 1978 in France at Carnac, again won by Ian and Peter.

In another link with that first championship, Ian Fraser (photo right) will be the Race Officer for this event.

The first Worlds took place at Abersoch in 1991 with 300 boats entered - the Dart 18 always seems to do things in large numbers.

And things are still 'booming' in the Dart 18 fleet. With the highest number of members in the class association ever, approaching 600, and 45 new boats already delivered and a second hand market where you are likely to lose your fingers, Dart 18 is not having a bad year!

The Grand Prix events boast numbers that are the envy of other catamaran fleets attracting between 40 and 70 boats and the National Championships over 100 boats. The class hit 191 at Stokes Bay SC in 1991, in a short-form championship and more recently had 134, again at Stokes Bay, in 1997 for a full length championship.

In returning to Falmouth, the birth place of the Dart, the class is expecting around 130 entries and has attracted an impressive field of sailors.

With past and present National, European and World champions competing against some of the 'new kids' it promises to be one of the hottest fought competitions on the sailing calendar.

Herve leMaux and Joanna Jones-Pierce are the current National Open Champions and winners of many other European National titles as well as runners up in both the Worlds and Europeans in '99.

Joanna would love to pull off another Open win and they have a brand new boat for the event. "There are so many good teams but Vincent Bouvier is someone Herve always fears," she said.

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