Podcast Show Notes — Ocean Sailing Expeditions My title

Episode 8: Ken Thackeray Show Notes

Links mentioned in show notes:

SICYC Website, SICYC Facebook Page, Skipr.net

OSP: Hey folks, this week we’re sitting here talking to Ken Thackeray and we’re going to talk about the Shag Islet Cruising Yacht Club and to finding out about that and how that’s quite unique in a number of ways and Ken’s got a great story to share as to how it’s evolved in the last seven years and some of the other things that are happening in the background and that they are not what you would expect from a normal yacht club.

So Ken welcome along, thanks for joining us today. We are at the seventh birthday party of Shag Islet Cruising Yacht Club. I had to tear you away from the proceedings to fit in a little bit of a chat and I appreciate you taking time. So tell me about the Shag Islet Cruising Yacht Club and where the idea came from when you go back to the early days.

Ken Thackeray with a Johnny Depp impersonator at SICYC's 7th birthday party

KEN THACKERAY: Oh it’s a strange thing really because my wife and I were on holidays in New Zealand and we decided to have a look at the Royal New Zealand Yacht Squadron because we wanted to have a look at the memorabilia from the America’s Cup and we got dressed appropriately and arrived at reception and found we weren’t able to enter and having called the manager in, he explained to us that you either had to be a member of the Royal New Zealand Yacht Squadron or another Royal Club or the flag officer of any fleet and we waited for our cab and off we went.

A couple of months later, I happen to be up in the Gloucester Passage in the Whitsundays sitting on the beach having a drink with a avant-guarde, old ex-army friend of mine and he said to me, “If you had been a vice commodore of some crappy little yacht club they would have let you in,” and we just happen to be looking at Shag Islet. So we came home and bought some shirts and bought a pile of vice commodore burgee’s because we figured that everybody should be a vice commodore in this organisation and now, we’ve got 4,625 people from 14 nations involved.

OSP: Wow, fascinating and 4,600 and something people as vice commodores, can get into most of the yacht clubs in the world I guess given they’re officially attached and affiliated to an official yacht club.

KEN THACKERAY: Yeah, I think they’d probably have a little bit of front these days because everybody knows who we are and really the joke’s now has subsided because the group in themselves are just wonderful people doing wonderful things for charity and I think what started as a joke has now turned into something that’s really marvellous and very supportive to the people on water.

OSP: When you read about the things that you do, it’s quite a serious affair now. It’s quite a large organisation if you look at the money that you’ve raised for charity, which we’ll talk more about. You look at the membership base, you look at the community of people that, they’re not just members by name, they gather together, they benefit from the membership and the network you’ve set up including the ability to locate fellow members nearby with online mapping tools, it’s really quite fascinating.

KEN THACKERAY: It is and the biggest thing about it since formation in 2009, is we’ve never placed an ad. Everything has been word of mouth and the people themselves, the ambassadors of the organisation, they’re just the most fantastic people. The demographic basically is about 42 to 75 and they literally carry the banner for the organisation. The fact that we raise money for prostate cancer just happened because we didn’t expect this to be as big as it is.

Ken Thackeray SICYC presents a cheque to the Prostate Cancer Foundation of Australia

Our aim is to still create and maintain a network for cruising yachties and the fact that we raise money is just in consequence to that. But never the less, over the last six years we’ve raised just over $300,000 for prostate cancer. A lot of that has been done collectively and some of this has been done by individuals who have given their own time and effort to raise that money.

OSP: That’s a significant cause and they say now in Australia it kills more men than women that die of breast cancer. How did you choose the Prostate Cancer Foundation, as a cause to support?

KEN THACKERAY: After the first year, I think there were 34 people within the first rendezvous and then we raffled a bottle or red wine and we made $265 and we gave the money to Montes Reef Resort to put our logo out the front as a bit of a joke. A few weeks later I was talking to a few members and I said, “Look, this is in danger of making money. We’ve got to find a charity,” and one of the ladies explained that breast cancer is very well marketed and that the awareness was strong and she’d had male relatives that had succumbed to prostate cancer.

Shag Islet, Gloucester Passage in the Whitsundays

She said, “I think guys a bit stupid and I think that we should go with prostate cancer.” So that was it and I think the coincidence has been that there are demographic age is very coincidental with the onset of prostate cancer anyhow. So we’re talking to people in our organisation that are actually potential suffers with prostate cancer.

OSP: And they’re the people that are in that early detection group as well and if they can do something about that early, they’ve got every opportunity of success rather than leaving it until it’s too late.

KEN THACKERAY: And then part of the evolution of SICYC is bringing that awareness and once we got involved in it we started to find people putting up their hands to say, “Look, I am suffering from prostate cancer,” or, “I’ve been operated on it,” and so even within our organisation, we’ve now got a sort of informal counselling group where people are able give one another advice and assistance and the Prostate Cancer Foundation of Australia is one of the leading scientist in Australia heading up their research, in Queensland and she’s been very supportive as well. So there’s been a strong marriage between SICYC and the Prostate Cancer Foundation of Australia.

OSP: Okay, that’s fascinating. So when you look at seven years on, how what’s largely become a significant organisation and how that has evolved, what are the main aims now and have they changed much since those early days?

SICYC members form the Prostrate Cancer Foundation logo on the water each year

KEN THACKERAY: No, the aims haven’t changed. We’re very strong on the idea than it is to create and maintain a network for cruising yachties, and that’s how it will always be. We’re certainly not touting ourselves as a fundraising organisation and if we don’t make more money successive years, well it doesn’t matter at all. But as you probably may know, the people that fly the burgee, which is a Vice Commodores burgee, (at the moment there’s 4,000 of those floating around the world), can identify themselves wherever they might be.

We ask members to place their VHF on 16 and 72 on scan and when they arrive in an anchorage, harbour or marina they can go in and do an open call and ask if there are any Vice Commodores on net and so they can socially meld wherever they are and also from May until October each year, we have the Vice Commodores Net, which runs on 65 and 16 at 0745 Australian eastern time in the morning and that’s straight after the Queensland HF weather and they can talk there. We also have an SICYC page on Skipr.net where you can log in, say where you are and that’s very good for the Vice Commodores keeping in touch and also for their families that might want to know where they are.

Besides that, they have newsletters that come out every six weeks and we’ve got a very active Facebook page. So the involvement of the individuals is what SICYC is all about. They’re the people that make it work, they are the people that keep the momentum going and from the cruising point of view, it’s wonderful for first time cruisers because they can immediately slide into this very social network, which envelopes them and it gives them confidence and assistance and direction to as they go up the coast.

OSP: It’s a great way to start cruising for someone who’s new and when I started five years ago, it was quite amazing from a standing start not knowing anybody,y how friendly boaties are, but those same people, if you walked past them in the supermarket or the street, you wouldn’t even know who they were, but on the water and so having a structure where from the get go, you can identify fellow club members and then on skipr.net see both located on a map is pretty cool. And so with skipr.net, how many of your members actually update their locations when they’re our cruising?

KEN THACKERAY: I think it’s seasonal. We find that our page is pretty dormant during the summer season but during the winter cruising season it livens up again and not everybody cruises the coast each year. So you’d find that there’s a varying number but certainly it peaks out around May, June, July and it’s very little activity at other times.

OSP: Okay and what’s the kind of split between yachties and power boaters of the members, do you know?

KEN THACKERAY: I don’t know. I think the majority would be sail but we’ve got a huge number of power boats and there’s no differentiation at all. Everybody is happy in the organisation and in fact, I think we’ve got about 15% that would get seasick if they looked to the water and don’t own a boat at all, because it’s become such a social organisation that people are joining for just the social aspect of it.

SICYC members gather together in 14 different countries

OSP: Yeah and in most power boaters are friendly people and I know I ran aground recently it was thanks to a power boater who pulled me off the sand and I needed the grunt, so they come in quite handy. So tell me how membership works? If I want to become a member, how does it work? What does it cost? What do I get access to and where do I join?

KEN THACKERAY: Yeah, well to become a member SICYC, you go to www.sicyc.com.au. On there, it explains like everything there is to know about the SICYC, there is a blog site attached to it, there is a Facebook site attached to it and on the home page, there’s a pretty welcoming sort of introduction and then there’s a page specifically dedicated to how to join. So you can just join online. The essence of this networking idea is that people choose a nautical location that they know something about.

Subsequently after they’ve applied, they become the Vice Commodore of that location and it might be a beach or a reef, a bay, an inlet, a quay or something like that. So as they go through their application they choose that location and it costs them $65 and they’re in for life and that life membership includes a shirt with the Vice Commodore logo on it, it gives you a life membership card and everybody’s card, everybody’s life membership number is 0010 because our motto is that we’re exclusively non-exclusive.

OSP: Especially after your early experience at the Royal New Zealand Yacht Squadron.

The Shag Islet Cruising Yacht Club Burgee is photographed all over the world

KEN THACKERAY: So it kicks off in a happy way. If people want to buy a burgee, they can buy a burgee for $35 and that entitles them to receive whatever they want over the years and once you become a Vice Commodore, you are responsible for running it as anybody else. Even today, if a chap approached me and said, “Look, I can run a function in Port Douglas?” And I said, “By all means” and that’s how it works. People in Hobart have regular functions and it just depends on the vibe in the particular group.

OSP: Yeah.

KEN THACKERAY: But yeah, so there’s no ongoing responsibilities for anybody but once they’re in the network, they’re there for good.

OSP: And there’s no ongoing costs either, other than your time, right or the cost of getting to  wherever you want to go.

KEN THACKERAY: Yeah, so it doesn’t detract and some people get this wrong. It doesn’t detract from the yacht club of origin, but if you happen to be a member of say, Royal Sydney Yacht Squadron. Royal Sydney Yacht Squadron, as a few know, is probably one of the pre-eminent squadrons in Australia and it provides great services to it’s members. The difference is, SICYC doesn’t have that strong geographic grip, it has a universal grip. So while you’re cruising, the chances of you running into somebody on a regular basis from Royal Sydney Yacht Squadron is very slim. But being so strong in numbers, SICYC has a huge cruising fleet out there that enables this association by recognition of the burgee and the radio nets and so on.

OSP: Yeah, it’s a great concept. Have you seen this concept and operation anywhere else in the world that you know off? It’s like a national membership that’s affiliated to what you’d like to do as opposed to where you live. Have you seen that anywhere else?

The members get into party mode at the Shag Islet Cruising Yacht Club Rendezvous

KEN THACKERAY: Well there’s two parts; my wife and I had no idea we were organising something that was going to turn into this. I thought we’d get 50 friends and just have a bit of fun and ho-ho-ho-ho and just laugh about it. And I don’t think you could have written a business plan for it because, I can’t believe it now, let alone perceive it. But yeah, I don’t know really, the only similar organisation I have seen is Hash House Harriers.

And I believe, as I reflect on it now, looking at the Hash House Harriers people, that was started in I think Malaysia during the British military presence and it was established I think by some army people and now it’s a rash. It’s all over the world and it’s a fun way of exercising and having fun but it’s the nearest thing that I can think of to what SICYC might be.

OSP: Yeah, it’s a great example where it illustrates as human beings how we just like to connect to anybody from any background if they’ve got common interest or common passions.

KEN THACKERAY: I think in a lot of ways people like to be a little bit tribal and especially people traveling in isolated environments particularly where you’re two people, just a couple on the water and if they feel that they have other people in their presence that can give them advice and assistance, that might have some experience that they’ve never had and just for the pure thought of having somebody to socialise with on the water I think is particularly important. As we’ve gone on over the years, people tell us that when they first trip up the coast they were very nervous about it and they were just so pleased to have other people giving them a hand.

OSP: It’s amazing how you go from being nervous to being experienced just from one visit to somewhere and it’s a great example too of when you’re cruising and you’re accessing land from the water often you have got limited time, so when you’ve got people that can tell you where to go to get stuff fixed or that can tell you how to make the most of your time on land, places to go and eat or get a coffee or whatever, that community is what makes the whole environment really, really satisfying and enjoyable and it helps you make the most out of it.

200 plus boats gather each year at Shag Islet, Gloucester Passage, in the Whitsundays for the rendezvous

KEN THACKERAY: Yeah well there’s two parts to this, as we go along now, we have what we call a season of sail for SICYC and all the way up to coast for the cruising season, we have marinas and clubs now that welcome SICYC members and they have functions, arrival functions and discounts for them in their location and that’s a big part of it I suppose.

OSP: Yeah, well this starts create another whole dimension when you can gather together as you’re travelling up the coast, especially when there’s a couple of thousand of kilometres of coastline.

KEN THACKERAY: At our annual rendezvous, we meet up in the Whitsundays in Gloucester Passage each year on the last weekend in August and we’re getting between 200 and 240 yachts at each of these events and the local accommodation facilities are booked out annually, so you’ve really got to book ahead to be there and the caravan parks are booked out so it’s a little bit like a light to an insect at the moment. People may not be members of SICYC but as they travel up the coast they meet other people and they get to hear about it and then they sort of end up all together.

It’s just a lovely sight to see all of these people in their blue shirts up there enjoying themselves together and then the other side of it comes up on the Saturday of that weekend. We have an activity called Holding Hands Across the Blue for Prostate Cancer and everybody has their blue shirts on in their tenders and we have a series of temporary moorings put in and they hold hands across the blue in the shape of the prostate cancer logo.

We have our VIP guests each year on a super yacht with a band on the back of it and we always have some story to deliver about prostate cancer and our relationship with it while they’re entertained on the water and they’re having a champagne so it’s a nice event too.

OSP: Yeah. It’s really interesting I saw some photos on your website and they might be taken from a helicopter or a drone or something of the boats gathered together in that symbol and it’s quite amazing to see.

KEN THACKERAY: Yeah, HeliTaxis is one of our major sponsors and they provide helicopter support throughout the whole four days of our rendezvous each year and they take scenic flights and they donate back to prostate cancer from a percentage of the money they make. So that’s how those beautiful aerial photos are taken.

OSP: It’s such a stunning backdrop too being in the Whitsunday Islands. So this year, what are the dates for the event?

KEN THACKERAY: The event is actually is the 25th to the 28th of August and our main theme this year is Parrot-head, a Jimmy Buffett type theme and this year, we’re having a radio station operate over the four days as SICYC Parrot-head Radio, to keep everybody informed of what’s going on, giving them tide tables, giving them weather reports, having sponsor half hours for our very important sponsors.

The 1972 HQ Holden Station Wagon being raffled at the 2016 Rendezvous

This year, we’re raffling a 1972 HQ Holden station wagon, which is being done up in Jimmy Buffet Parrot-head wrap and we have over 20 other fantastic prizes that go with it. So we have fireworks on the Saturday night. We have probably five bands that operate over the period and we actually, on the second day, have a function out on the island, which is a kite theme and so kites from all over the place are flying over the area, we have the sausage sizzle and we have a band and the radio station operating from out there so it’s all a lot of fun. 

OSP: Wow, it looks like a great sort of festival.

KEN THACKERAY: It is, it’s good. My wife and I had enjoy the meet and greet, which happens on the Thursday afternoon and we can sit there and have a glass of wine. You look at these people because some of them are coming and meeting people that they haven’t seen since last year and then you meet people or you see people that are obviously new to this and you can see this network just evolving in front of you.

It’s an amazing thing and by the second day, the new people are as part of it as the people that have been in it for years. It just absorbs people’s enthusiasm and their personal commitment and involvement and yeah, it’s marvellous. We get a bit of a tear in our eyes sometimes it’s an amazing thing.

The detailed graphic art work was all provided by sponsors

OSP: Well it appears from being here today, that it’s a great community and a great bunch of passionate people that just have gathered together and a great social time and share stories.

KEN THACKERAY: Yeah, it’s wonderful.

OSP: So what are some of the memorable moments for you I guess over the last seven years and particularly the annual event in the Gloucester Passage at Shag Islet in the Whitsundays, what are some of the things that stand out for you?

KEN THACKERAY: Well the rendezvous always stands out because it’s the key event that we have but members get together wherever they are and they organise things. We’ve had two people, one from Malaysia and one from Thailand who organised sail-aways and we did the sail away from around Langkawi and then another one from Langkawi to Phuket and that was very well attended by people all over Australia and in fact from overseas.

We had one of our members organise a motor home trip around South Island, New Zealand and everybody turned up, hired a motorhome and put their burgee in the back window and motored around the place.

OSP: Land cruising.

KEN THACKERAY: Yeah, land cruising but you always find that somebody will come up with something that really strikes you. You know, some individual that will come up with something and just do something extraordinary. Last year one of our very pretty young members decided to shave her head for prostate cancer and she raised $25,000 in doing it and she worked her behind off for that year and culminated it with a haircut.

Fun was the theme of the day at the Shag Islet Cruising Yacht Club 7th birthday party

Then another one of our members decided being having diagnosed with prostate cancer, he’d like to raise some money and he and his crew on Great Expectations raised $78,000 for prostate cancer. So there other things where you just sit down and shake your head and you think to yourself, “You know, how do these people do it?” And we’re so proud that we sort of had something to do with engendering this sort of enthusiasm in those people because as you would have noticed from the people around, one these people are in it, they’re in it up to their ears and they get so involved.

OSP: That’s pretty satisfying for you to think you planted that seed in the early days and its gathered some momentum and then suddenly this mushrooms into something that’s got it’s own momentum now and as people join it, one in every hundred have got something special that they bring that starts to add another dimension.

KEN THACKERAY: One of the chaps that is here today pulled up in the Galapagos Islands, dropped his anchor and he and his crew were pretty tired so they made sure the anchor was set and he said they went to sleep and they woke up just before dusk and they looked up and the boat beside them had the SICYC burgee flying…

OSP: What are the chances?

KEN THACKERAY: Yeah, what are the chances of anchoring side by side in the Galapagos. Another day in Borneo where a guy saw the SICYC burgee on a boat and he brought four other boat’s crews over and they all got a photo taken together. We had a Special Forces guy who’s been one of their fellows for a fair while and he arrived in the Kabul and he was operating out of Special Force Headquarters and we wondered why we got all of these French and strange nations joining up.

Then he sent a photo of them all with their bloody glasses on and the SICYC burgee on the wall up behind them. So there’s some incredible stories to be told about how people joined SICYC.

Another georgeous sunset for cruisers anchored at Shag Islet

OSP: That’s amazing, how it starts to spread like that. And when you’re think about 15 odd countries and with the way the events are planned by the members or the Vice Commodores in their locations, do you understand how many events are being run in the locations?

KEN THACKERAY: Some of them actually have discrete groups, but most of them don’t and they let me know wherever they are in the world and then I just send out e-mails to those geographic locations and people turn up.

OSP: Oh right, to invite people from the membership base, to a members event?

KEN THACKERAY: Yeah.

OSP: Yeah right, great.

KEN THACKERAY: But we have a group of about 12 I think coming from Key West in Florida for the rendezvous this year and they have their own little gathering and sometimes they have them discrete but other times they have engendered more enthusiasm from other people. The people in Amsterdam are pretty busy. They have a function every six months. One function they sail on the water and the other one they ice sail.

OSP: Yeah we take for granted here in Queensland how winter’s not winter everywhere is it?

KEN THACKERAY: Yeah, no, no.

OSP: Okay and I guess when you got something like this that sort of mushrooms from n idea into something that’s quite large, how do you manage the administration workload?

KEN THACKERAY: Well that’s the other extraordinary thing. You look at the band that you saw today and they’re Vice Commodores and they give their time. We’ve got solicitors, barristers, accountants, disc jockeys, all sorts of people in the organisation and one of the strong organisation is iSonic, which is a software development company and they write all of our software.

So people are just join online and once they join online, their application is sent to our supplier. The supplier sends the membership packs out to them and once a month the supplier sends us a bill for what’s gone out. So gone are the days where we had some people write things out on a piece of paper and then trying to keep it in bloody Excel or something.

OSP: So you’re not packing and posting from the back office anymore.

KEN THACKERAY: No, no we sometimes don’t even know if people have joined, such is the process but we always send them out a response to let them know and what actually they have got themselves into and where they can contact us if they need to. Yeah, so it’s not as bad. Actually, strangely enough, as the years go on it’s easier to manage than it ever has been before.

OSP: Okay, so how do members get feedback to you in terms of photos of what they’re doing and the activities and other things?

KEN THACKERAY: Some people don’t get that involved with it. I suppose 20 or 30% of the people have this thing where they’ll send a photo like this morning I received one of the guy’s standing in front of Niagara Falls and we had some people go to the Royal Yacht Britannia in, I think it’s Glasgow, and it was snowing and they’d paid for a dinner in the boardroom or whatever it was and she snuck out during the meal and held our burgee underneath the royal ensign.

So they send you these things, which is just a bit of devilment and that it gives everybody a bit of entertainment and the other things it’s that sense of belonging. They have a strong sense of belonging, these people and those sorts of things are the things that make it. You’ve probably read through our newsletters, our newsletters are having a shot at somebody who drinks too much wine or somebody who’s late all the time or something like that and they developed the relationship with people they’ve never seen before.

OSP: Well you get to the stage where with one-upmanship, where people start looking at even more creative places to have photos with the burgee, right? They start planning, that stuff…

Shag Islet Cruising Yacht Club members are passionate about getting behind each years party theme

KEN THACKERAY: My wife and I are going on holidays next week to Europe and we packed the burgee and the shirt because I’m sure there’s going to be places there where we can sort of add to the culture of the organisation.

OSP: Okay and are you Facebook as well?

KEN THACKERAY: Yep, Facebook. Facebook’s very active.

OSP: And people are sharing stuff on Facebook, do you find that?

KEN THACKERAY: Yeah, that’s good. It’s a closed book, so we don’t have rat bags coming in and going but where people want to put something on there, it comes into us and one of our administrators posts it up and that’s good and we don’t sort of bar things in a general sense, you just want to keep the culture right.

OSP: Yeah and stop blatant promotion and the self-interest type stuff that can happen at times.

KEN THACKERAY: Which is a big problem for an organisation like ours because people now see that we have this reach and so very often, other charities come to us and say, “Can you promote this?” And of course we can’t. We already have our own charity and of course now, we’re sponsored by some wonderful, wonderful sponsors and we’re a good vehicle for them from the nautical point of view because we have such coverage and they’re very good for us because they provide discounts for us and provide all sorts of things that you wouldn’t get in another yacht club over a broad geographic area and so at the moment there’s discounts all the way up to the coast.

OSP: Yeah and they’re also reaching people that are actively cruising as opposed to yacht club members who don’t own boats or they own boats they never use and never leave the marina. So they’re a pretty active, passionate group in terms of taking advantage of what you offer.

KEN THACKERAY: Yeah, I know. I don’t know where it will go from here but it certainly is just a self-fulfilling prophecy at the moment. We did a calculation yesterday and in three weeks, we’ve had 57 people join and when you consider that there’s no advertising in that, its something people would be quite amazed at.

Hundreds gather for the beach party at Shag Islet

OSP: To get from say 2,000 to sort of 4,600 members, how long has that taken?

KEN THACKERAY: Oh initially it was slow.

OSP: It takes a while right, to first start?

KEN THACKERAY: Yeah, we figured we could only get 50 members because we’ve been singlehanded for a long time and had a few names and I just told them what I was doing and that’s the only marketing we’d ever done. It was just evolved from there but I think when we got the burgees, the flag maker said he could only do a minimum of 100 and I came home and my wife said, “How many burgees did you get?” And I said, “I got 100,” and she nearly killed me.

She said, “Where are we going to get rid of a 100 burgees?” And I said, “Ah we might get rid of them in a couple of years,” and seven weeks later they were gone and that’s where the journey began and we were on a journey that we knew nothing about. We didn’t know where we were going, why we were going there, and even how we were going there because it was just something that as we spoke about before, that there must have been a need for and all of sudden it just went.

Yeah, I often think that there could be opportunities for this and all sorts of other things like the grey nomads in the caravans and there’s still, although there are some associations, there’s still not something that is run completely on the idea of SICYC. And even golfing groups, people can’t own a golf club but they could become more of a holistic organisation where they go to all these rat bag golf courses, the little sand courses and have that sort of a culture but I am only smart in hindsight because we had no idea.

OSP: Well yeah and the thing about sailing and being on the water, there’s so many choices of anchorages and there’s so many risks and things that could go wrong and there’s so many great experiences if you just know about them and it is quite unique, isn’t it? When you think about yachting down the water being reliant on word of mouth and other’s experiences as opposed to Google maps taking you wherever you need to go from golf course to golf course or caravan park to caravan park.

KEN THACKERAY: I think a lot of people too, it’s the dream and a lot of people when they’re going to work on a daily basis just can’t afford to go cruising and then as they get a bit older, they now find themselves a little bit better off and have the time to do it. So a lot of people are not only out there in an isolated environment but there are couples that are probably in their 50’s or 60’s or in some cases in their 70’s out there really doing it and it can be tough from time to time. If you just haven’t had the experience, it’s nice to have the reassurance.

OSP: Yeah absolutely and on a couple of fronts, because no matter how good your boat is, stuff breaks and they can be quite stressful and quite disconcerting depending on what it is so having a network that can give you advice and help with how to fix stuff or point you in the right direction. But also if you are cruising for the first time, you never really know how much is too much wind when you’re anchoring and how much is too much of anything when you’re looking for safe locations, so having that knowledge base and that confidence to just get started because you can go from having known nothing about cruising to cruise for a month or six weeks non-stop and you will learn a lot in a very short period of time and with what you offer in the community that’s behind it, that means people can get out there without that “I’ll wait until I know enough” type of procrastination holding them back until they run out of time.

KEN THACKERAY: Yeah and it’s just got so many aspects to it. There was a boat at Pioneer Bay at Airlie Beach and it was drifting and drifting pretty fast in a 35 knot breeze and there was nobody on it and some other Vice Commodores saw the burgee so they went straight onto the SICYC site, Googled the boats name, got the phone number of the people who owned the boat. The wife got onto 72 and asked if there’s any Vice Commodores in the area. Three SICYC boaties jumped onto the back of the boat, they re-anchored is and were able to tell the people that were ashore that their boat had drifted and been secured and that’s the network in action.

OSP: Yeah, that’s a great example there that never would have been coordinated any other way.

KEN THACKERAY: Somebody was saying, “Oh that boat’s drifting,” but to have that network around you, to know that hey, we’ve got to do something and not only wanting to, but being capable of doing. Being able to go onto the SICYC membership site with their username and password, call up the boat’s name, get their phone number, ring them and say, “Your boat’s drifted.”

OSP: Well that’s a great resource because most people don’t know but if you’re not on your boat and it’s anchored, you’re not actually covered with insurance in many cases if there’s damage. So having people watch out for your boat when you’re not around for that one in a hundred times is a pretty good support base to have. So in 2014, you were awarded an OAM an Order of Australian Merit for your services to charitable organisation and to veterans.

It sounds like you’ve had quite a long history or quite a strong passion and background and supportive of your communities let’s say because not just your local community but your sailing community, which kind of spans all of Australia and more. What is it that’s driven you to contribute like this to these types of organisation?

KEN THACKERAY: This is SICYC thing was something that took us totally by surprise and look, I’m very grateful to receive the Order of Australia but at the same time, it’s just been a journey of great experience, enthusiasm with some wonderful people and it’s not been a burden at all. It’s just something that evolved and is more or less enriched my life and my wife’s life as well.

So it’s something that we have to make sure that we have a transition plan for, but it was good and the work with veterans, I was a Vietnam Veteran and I worked for a long time as an advocate for veterans who were having problems through DVA but in fact, it was The Prostate Cancer Foundation of Australia I think that were the driving force behind the Order of Australia and I think it was a signal too to people that SICYC wasn’t a joke.

That all of a sudden they thought, “Well, maybe there is some essence in this organisation.” So I think it was for the first time where some of the organisation that looked at us as being something trifling that would come and go, all of a sudden realise that, “Hey, it’s here to stay.” So whilst it was an award that I received, I think it was a recognition of what SICYC people were doing across the boating community and I think it’s incredibly important.

OSP: It’s a really, really great example and quite a unique example of people who are passionate about what they do and the things that have evolved naturally and that people enjoy it. It’s almost like it’s not an effort, its happened as a byproduct. You can set up an organisation and set out to do all sorts of things including raising money, but it can be hard work and you can struggle to get support, but you’ve got a great model, you’ve got a great group of people and this is a byproduct of them enjoying what they do.

KEN THACKERAY: You’ve heard the way they communicate, there’s no essence of conservatism in the thing. The people have got a smile on their face and when you look around the people, you look into their eyes, you look at their faces, they’ve got a smile on their face and enjoying themselves and you’ve got to contribute to that and have that cup half full approach to the organisation and to cruising in itself. There’s so many negative things in life anyhow that you can’t avoid and I think that’s the good thing about SICYC. They’re good fun people. They might be exclusively non-exclusive and that makes them even more important to society.

OSP: Well and it’s a great environment. There’s a lot of fun that happens on the water. A lot of your problems get behind when you leave land and so how long have you been sailing? When did you start?

KEN THACKERAY: 1986 I had a trailer sailer and I used to go up to the Whitsundays on an annual basis when I had leave and then I started sailing more regularly in about ’92 and then I had a divorce in the early 90’s and I decided to retire young and I single-handed for about 11 years and Rhonda and I just got together about nine years ago and Rhoda had been interested in the water.

And so it’s been a nice bonding thing for Rhonda and I and our relationship too, because Rhonda always says to me as she would wake up in the morning, “Is today an SICYC free day?” Because as long as we’ve been together we’ve had SICYC as the third partner in our relationship.

OSP: How much time do you put into SICYC?

KEN THACKERAY: It’s seasonal, yeah I’m very easy now. Next week, I go to Airlie Beach and we’re doing a ball and it’s going to take a fair bit of organising but it is going to be probably the most elegant ball that Airlie Beach has ever had and we’ve got huge sponsorship with people providing food, catering services, grog, the facility itself and it’s coming together at the same time as the rendezvous.

But by now, we’re in a situation where if we haven’t got it done, well it is just not going to be done. So it’s this period from about January through to the end of the May I guess that is really bad. So Rhonda and I generally get up to Airlie Beach in late June and we work through until the rendezvous is over and then we sail for two months, and go and hide somewhere.

OSP: That’s nice. Yeah that’s nice. Yeah, that’s really nice. Well what I’m going to do Ken is I’m going to, when I publish this, I’ll publish the show notes on the website as well on OceanSailingPocdast.com and I’ll put all the links in there to your site, the details that link to the site, the blog, the Facebook page and to the skipr.net site as well because I’m sure we’ll get a lot of interest in this.

KEN THACKERAY: It’s good for the people generally because there is an open side to skipr.net and some organisations just have their own page and we have our own page because we are what we are. But I’d recommend it to anybody whether they are associated with SICYC people or not and you don’t have to be a member of SICYC to go onto it.

OSP: Right, I didn’t realise that, okay.

KEN THACKERAY: No, you can just do it and what it will do is introduce you to the association and like all of our aspects of our organisation today, there were people that weren’t members enjoying the thing and saying I’m going home to join and of course, that’s all we’ve got to offer. We don’t really need to have to kid and cajole people if they’re only going to turn up once.

OSP: That’s right.

KEN THACKERAY: That’s not going to break the bank.

OSP: You’re right, I know from the Southport Yacht Club I’ve heard anecdotally about your club for a couple of years now but I have never really understood it until just recently, but I know that there’s a number of disappointed sailors that this year are doing Hamilton Island Race week and of course it clashes for I think the first time that had…

KEN THACKERAY: No, no it’s always been except for last year. It’s always been at the same time and last year, we were successfully able to ask them to push back a week, but they had some sponsorship problem this year and they didn’t. But nevertheless, the biggest flotilla we’ve ever had was 240 yachts and we had that on a weekend that was Audi Hamilton Island Race Week anyhow. So we’re different fish really, we’re a different fish in the pond.

About eight years ago, one of our guys won the Audi Hamilton Island Race Week and he was sailing on a Dufour 38 and he worked out that he could have won his division and then they got frightfully drunk and went off to the Hamilton Island Tavern and the security people said, “You’ve got to come back, you’ve got to come back, you’ve got to come back. They won the Audi.” Still to this day, he can’t remember picking up the keys.

OSP: Wow?

KEN THACKERAY: So when they do the sail past, they wear their blue shirts and salute with closed fists as they go past them. They still carry on but it’s the biggest boating event in the Whitsundays now. It has more boats and admittedly it’s not racing, but they have more boats participate SICYC than at Airlie Beach Race Week or Hamilton Island Race Week. In fact two years ago we have more boats than both of them put together.

OSP: Which is significant when you think about it and it means whether you’re going north to go racing or going north to go cruising, there’s something for everybody right? It’s just a great backdrop.

KEN THACKERAY: Yeah and it’s taken a while for clubs, all sorts of clubs to sort of get used to us because we’re not a club in a normal sense. Like we don’t have a club house, we don’t have any staff, we don’t have marina berths, we don’t have moorings, we don’t have anything else but we’re a fully insured, incorporated body and so even getting public liability insurance was difficult because there wasn’t just the paper cut out policy.

OSP: Of course.

KEN THACKERAY: So they have created a policy for us.

OSP: Yeah, you’re a virtual club, but the reality is you have a larger membership base and you gather more people together and you raise more for charity than probably 95% of clubs worldwide. So it is quite a significant achievement.

KEN THACKERAY: Yeah. Yeah I know it is.

OSP: Okay, well I know that, I’ve had to tear you away from the SICYC’s seven year birthday party and you’ve got a bunch of members here today that are wanting to spend more time with you, so thank you Ken for giving up your time, I really appreciate that and I’m sure that with what we’re going to be sharing with information about what you do, we can send a whole bunch of people your way, so they can enjoy what SICYC has to offer.

KEN THACKERAY: We’re always after people that can help the process for prostate cancer although our main aim isn’t the fund raising. It’s now become significant because so many of our members are being treated and really guys are a bit silly. They don’t get their tests and things like that, so if anybody would like to contribute in that way too, it’s much appreciated.

OSP: And just on a health note, when should you start getting tests? What age if you’re a guy?

KEN THACKERAY: Well, distinguished Professor Judith Clemens is here today and she was saying to me that guys are getting diagnosed now in their 40’s. So she was saying if you’ve got a family history or something like that and you’re early to mid-40’s, you should be getting your PSA test and the way I look at it if you’re smart, you’re get a blood test once a year anyhow and the PSA is just another part of the test. So if you go in, you’re silly if you don’t just add the PSA test to it.

OSP: Yeah and if you get early diagnosis, what’s the chances of success?

KEN THACKERAY: Like any of it, the remedial action might be minimal but in a lot of cases, guys just let it go and when the symptoms start, it might become obvious, it’s often a little bit too late. So yeah but anyhow, that’s all we can do.

OSP: Thanks Ken, all the best. It was great to meet you, and I look forward to seeing you on the water some time.

Interviewer: David Hows

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Episode 6 & 7: Peter Montgomery Show Notes

Peter Montgomery: The Voice of Yachting

If you enjoyed episodes 6 and 7 and want to read more about Peter Montgomery, his book is available with by clicking on the book cover or title below:

Peter Montgomery: The Voice of Yachting

Table of Contents:

Peter Montgomery: The Voice of Yachting

1. A Yachting Bolt from the Blue (Plus PJ's Top Ten Sailors)

2. A True Blue Southerner (Plus PJ's ten favourite sports people)

3. Broadcasting Natural (Plus PJ's Best known Sayings)

4. The Three Worst Days of My Life (Plus PJ's ten most memorable Yachting Events)

5. Into the America's Cup Cauldron (Plus PJ on Chris Dickson)

6. The Olympic Dream (Plus PJ's Ten Best Sporting Events)

7. The America's Cup is Now New Zealand's Cup (Plus PJ on Peter Blake)

8. Mixing with the Stars (Plus PJ's Favourite All Blacks)

9. The America's Cup is still New Zealand's Cup (Plus PJ on Russell Coutts)

10. The Grant Dalton Saga

11. (Plus PJ on Dean Barker)

12. Family Man; List of PJ achievements

Peter Montgomery Show Notes

OSP: Hi Peter, welcome along this morning Peter to the Ocean Sailing Podcast and thanks for joining me today. Peter is the voice and personality that’s touched my life many times over the past 30 years, it’s truly a privilege to have the opportunity to talk with you on the Ocean Sailing podcast and a couple of months back now I read your biography, Peter Montgomery the voice of yachting.

Peter Montgomery with Russell Coutts and Grant Dalton

Literally it was one of those scenarios where I picked up your book and it brought back so many memories from earlier in my life and I think I mentioned to you in the email, I was at a technology conference that I’d paid to be at and I started reading your book on the plane from Brisbane to Sydney and I ended up sitting at the conference reading your book all day and not paying attention to the presenters. So I guess as the voice of New Zealand Yachting for over three decades now and you’ve covered all of the major events including nine American Cups, nine Olympic games, and all nine Volvo and Whitbread races.

So I really want to talk to you today on three different topics. Firstly, your broadcasting career and distinguished background. A few questions on some America’s Cup related stuff but nothing controversial and a couple of questions on Peter Montgomery who is another person who has influenced my life tremendously. Jumping straight into broadcasting, where did your appetite for broadcasting come from?

PETER MONTGOMERY: I’ve been fascinated with broadcasters from a very young age and growing up in a Otago in Dunedin. I used to listen to a lot of sports broadcasters, notably rugby and other sports as in when they arrive, whether it was Olympic sports or cricket and even horse racing. Much to the dismay of my mother, I was fascinated particularly with horse race commentators and how they were able to say so much in so little time.

Meaning, the final straight, often races were exciting and how they were able to pull words out of nowhere to match the action in front of them. I thought that was a challenge and an art, well become quite fascinated to the point that when I got into my teams, I really often listened to many sports and particularly Australia race commentators.

Craig Fry, Bill Collins, Cam Howe, the list goes on and there’s some very good ones now too but they were just so colorful, so descriptive and they had a furlong or X number of seconds to say what they were going to or they had to. You had a word picture in those days, a lot of it was still on radio not on television. So I get it that television is to enhance the picture in front of you as opposed to radio is to give you a word picture.

Peter Montgomery with Bruno Trouble

So from a very young age, I was always fascinated with broadcasters and I enjoyed when I came to Auckland when I was about 20 — 19, 20, I came to Auckland for a year which proved to be the longest year in my mother’s life because I never went back to Dunedin and Otago. Through an old school friend that had gone to King’s in Dunedin, Bill McCarthy, had made a full time career in sport broadcasting. I used to see him regularly.

We were good friends when we were at school and then he went broadcasting in Australia and then came back to New Zealand and was transferred to go to Auckland. So we hooked up and we saw a lot of each other and on Friday nights we would go to the Royal International Hotel with a lot of his broadcasting careers and I just loved it to be able to mix with Bob Irvine, the current rugby commentator nationally across New Zealand or Howard Richards, a very prominent cricket commentator, and so the list goes on. From those beginnings of one being fascinated with broadcasting and two, just mixing with these guys, it was through Bill who opened the door that gave me an opportunity really to live the dream.

Peter Montgomery on television in 1973

OSP: Okay, it’s really interesting because you’re one of the few if not the only person I’ve come across where you’ve really developed this unique ability to articulate sailing and really made an art form of your ability to articulate it. But at two different levels because as a sailor, I learned a lot more about sailing as a result of your educational commentary. But then I know so many people who never understood sailing at all but due to the engaging commentary that you delivered, not only learned a lot about sailing as lay people but really became to love it.

It always struck me that so much preparation must have gone in to the delivery of what you delivered as a commentator, the preparation around, and all the Peter Montgomeryisms that you became famous for, it always struck me a lot of work must have gone in the background into preparing to deliver what you delivered over the years and a lot of people will probably take it for granted the preparation and research that goes into it, they probably assume you just turn up on the day and deliver immaculately and on time and have no appreciation. How much preparation did go, or does go into delivering the type of commentary you did and such a colorful and articulate way?

Bill McCarthy New Zealand Commentator and mentor to Peter Montgomery

PETER MONTGOMERY: On the very first day I started broadcasting, Bill McCarthy said to me, “Never ever forget you’re talking to the little old lady with a blue rinse hairdo and white tennis shoes in Riverton. Now some folk may not know where Riverton is but it’s actually further south than Invercargill. It’s a remote seaside village right in the bottom of New Zealand. I never forgot that and I still haven’t forgotten it and to the broadcasting I even do today, that little old lady is still my number one listener.

Because I figured very early on that if I could translate a lot of the gobbledygook on sailing and take people with me. She was my listener rather than the know it all aficionado on the Auckland Waterfront of West Haven, who often couldn’t be told anything anyway. I think that was a very important point and then came other issues right at the start that if I say someone bowled a googly and took us off stump or he’s hitting to covers or to gulley or he chips out of a bunker. The point is, cricket and golf commentators use their jargon all the time whether people, or not, understand it.

Peter out over the ocean in a plane trying to pick up Steinlager 2's Peter Blake on the radio

To a degree, that happens now if you look at a big rugby league game or rugby game and definitely an AFL game, those key commentators are definitely talking about the ruck ball or whatever the phase might be. To me, I spoke to Bill McCarthy about it, we agreed that it was important to stay to the integrity of the sport, but not to be patronising to the little old lady in Riverton and other people who really were only aware of sailing as a passing interest, to the aficionado know it all sailors who know everything.

Peter Montgomery in action at the Auckland Viaduct

So there was a balance to try and blend all that in what we were doing. Then comes the other issue in terms of the expressions. Well yes, I think I was definitely influenced by other broadcasters and would be some from the northern hemisphere, but principally from the people I told you about and the brilliant race horse commentators who were able to say so much and they might have 17 or 18 seconds over the time of furlong. Very close race, it could go to a finish and how do you described all that?

Some of that would be phrases and then comes the question whether or not they were noted, whether or not they had written them down because sometimes when you try and pull those out, then it becomes wooden and heavy. “I’ve got this phrase, ha ha, listen to me.” The question is, when you pull them out and how you do it. So I suppose some of those Peter Montgomeryisms just the way I’ve been speaking with friends for a long time anyway. With hopefully a sense of humour and fun as part of it.

Peter Montgomery has covered the last 12 Americas Cups

OSP: It certainly came across as off the cuff and completely natural in your delivery, it was never wooden so you were right on the money in terms of the way that you delivered it and it really has been incredible. I think a question I have is, when you sit back now and you sit back and you look out over the harbour and you think about the last three to four decades, can you even comprehend the legacy that you’ve actually created personally for both, not just the industry but the country as a whole?

You’ve created legacy that would not be there in the entirety that it is today from the love and following of sailing and I think the way that our sailing industry continues to be held in high regard globally is partly the sailors we have coming through and the people that support those sailors and then the industries that wrap around setting, your contribution’s been significant. So can you comprehend it? Do you think about that at all?

PETER MONTGOMERY: Well I do sit down and think of a legacy or whatever but I am aware of people coming up to me and inevitably they want to tell me something, “I met you somewhere or I heard you somewhere.” Not just with all the key of the entire settings of May 1995 as in the America’s Cup is now the New Zealand’s cup, or other things that we’ve done particularly in the Whitbread races, the Volvo races, and also some Olympic regattas as well.

Chris Bouzaid with Rainbow II in the background

So yes, I am aware that people start talking about that but I was thinking the other day that actually a couple of weeks ago I was cruising in Fiordland that’s as remote as it was when captain Cook first went there and it’s breath taking and beautiful but there’s just nothing, it’s a wilderness. On board the vessel I was cruising was one Chris Bouzaid.

OSP: Right, wow.

PETER MONTGOMERY: Who really changed New Zealand’s sailing a lot. Yes, the New Zealand had had two Olympic gold medals, 1956, Peter Mander and Jack Cropp and then later in 1964, Helmer Pedersen and Earle Wells winning in Tokyo. Mander and Cropp won in Melbourne 1956. In another generation Mander would have been as significant or as impressive as Coutts or Burling or you name whoever you want to name. Mander was special.

But they really never left a legacy, they were small boats in Olympic regattas and while they were significant and well noted, it didn’t have a roll on effect, if you like as opposed to Bouzaid and Rainbow II, that was the first campaign on the other side of the world where one, you had to ship the boat and two, then get all the backup whether getting it was in containers or how it was delivered.

Rainbow II in action on Auckland Harbour

There was much more to sailing than sailing on your bottom from Auckland to Sydney for The Sydney Hobart which they won in 1967 or sailing to Noumea and then back to New Zealand. There had been other New Zealand vessels like the The Davis, Jim Davin taking the line honours in The Sydney Hobart 1966 and so that had been done but not on the other side of the world and Bouzaid had a crack in ’68 and got a very close second and that motivated him and his outstanding crew to go back in ’69 and have a go. They won the One Ton Cup.

In those days, that was the America’s Cup for New Zealand. They defended it in 1971 and although I’d started broadcasting in 1970, you flattered me with only three decades I note. So 1970 October, later weekend, the World OK Dinghy Championships were held. I thought that would be just a one off broadcasting but then I was invited to do the One Ton Cup which included in New Zealand One Ton Cup trials and we were on, we were all on New Zealand Navy Frigates and it was a big deal.

New Zealand printed postage stamps for the One Ton Cup in Auckland in 1971

Because of a few quirks like wet weather across New Zealand and the National Athletics Championship being postponed or canceled because of the awful rain, that meant that there was only almost one event on two radio networks and that was the One Ton Cup, we got an awful lot of more air time than was originally planned. That was the start for me and I, there was a huge reaction from the broadcasting management that about our broadcasting commentaries which was flattering to a point but I think really bluntly, all of a sudden they were getting inquiries from companies that were not in their catchment. Could they start advertising? Like Epiglass marine paint as an example, many marine or maritime activities just weren’t advertising in broadcasting all of a sudden I think it the bosses saw, “Wow, here’s an opening.”

So anyway, things started off for me and then we started broadcasting right through the 70’s and 80’s on events like the One Ton Cup trials, trials for the Southern Cross and then came the Admiral’s Cup leading up to the first Admiral’s Cup Challenge in ‘75. Then came the Dunhill Cup, which was modeled on the Southern Cross Cup or the Kenwood Cups if you like and so we were out over the Hauraki Gulf up to the Bay of Islands down to the Bay of Plenty, weekend after weekend and what I was thinking, this is a very long answer.

OSP: That’s okay.

PETER MONTGOMERY: But what I was thinking was Chris was sitting down and we were chatting and I thought, “God, we’ve done a hell of a lot of stuff,” and much of that didn’t even get a mention or an acknowledgement in the biography Bill Francis wrote and simply because we’ve moved on to quite obviously the prime time events of world sailing, the America’s Cup, the Whitbread, now Volvo and Olympic sailing is the big three things which I’ve been lucky to go to. As you have touched on, what is it? Nine Olympics and 11 America’s Cups and all 12 Whitbread Volvo’s.

Peter Blake's Steinlager 2 in the Whitbread Race, the only boat to ever win every single race leg

Sadly, a lot of the other events where we had a lot of fun, were over looked but I do get the thought probably and people still bring it up that covering all those events I’ve just talked about, One Ton trials, Southern Cross Cup trials and the Dunhill Cup and the Admiral’s Cup trials, they were off shore racing and in those days there was no Twitter or Facebook and it was just radio. Well, there was television of course as well but we were doing regular updates and the broadcasting in those days wasn’t the personality driven radio now where you’ve got to have a host with an opinion to provoke calls and talk back and all of that stuff.

So we were doing regular updates just of broadcasting and commentary and sadly the way things have evolved with technology, social media, and also the way radio is developed now which is modelled on what’s happening in Australia or other parts of the world, there just won’t be another Peter Montgomery. Because the chances I had just don’t exist any longer. That is sad I think but you can’t dwell on it because then you think oh you’re living in the past and it’s not like it used to be and we know all that, and things do change and some things have changed for the better, I love IT and I love technology by the way and I couldn’t live without my apps but it’s amazing in the last 10 years how my life has changed with my iPhone and iPad. But anyway, I am aware but not to the flattering point that you put it.

High tech graphics have dramatically changed yacht racing coverage for spectators

OSP: Okay, it’s interesting. I’m just going to just jump ahead slightly here Peter but you’ve touched on a really neat interesting point which I wanted to raise with you and that is how broadcasting’s changed. We seem to have morphed from technology enhancing broadcasting to almost to the point now where I watch the recent AC 45’s in Oman, almost feels so formulaic now and some of the colour in character’s gone out of the broadcasting because of the scale and window it’s fitting into.

I think we’ve gone backwards. There seems to be a loss of technical expertise in the commentary and there are in the US, I was watching the Oman commentary, three or four occasions, the commentators talked about kilometres per hour and then corrected themselves and jumped back to knots. If you’re a sailor, you never talk in kilometres per hour in terms of both speed and so I kind of feel that we’ve had this crossover point where we see technologies enhanced the experience but now the tradeoff has been the quality and depth of the commentary. Is that a feeling you share at all?

Emirates Team New Zealand in action in Americas Cup foiling catamarans capable of 40+ knots (75 km/h+)

PETER MONTGOMERY: Well with your question, you’re provoking about 10 different issues there. So with America’s Cup racing, now going under 20 minutes, supposedly television driven, which television companies have not been by the product. Just this week I read a note that was on Scuttlebutt, one of the websites, someone saying, “So the America’s Cup doesn’t exist in Spain any longer.” And I was speaking to an Italian journalist a couple of days ago and he was saying that the profile in Italy now is little to nothing.

So this business of sort of having the instant gratification of the McDonalds Society that the people’s attention spans are no longer than 20 minutes is an insult. Yes I agree that racing at Newport, Rhode Island are now at Fremantle, some of the races were three hours or longer and that was too long, far too long. I mean we’re not going to look back at the good old days because some of them were boring processions. I think if you had for about an hour’s duration, whether or not they should be in catamarans or big 90 foot RC44’s on steroids or Volvo inshore boats with swing keels or because you’re still missing so much that when you reflect on the regatta’s from Fremantle and San Diego also in ’95 and then Auckland 2000 to 2003, Valencia ’07, the boats coming in from the starboard or port end of the line and going into the dial up, that was a maritime game of chess.

Team New Zealand in action in the Americas Cup in the monohull era

The mental ability of the after guards, not just the skippers and their crews to outwit each other and then win the start really was something. Then there were often a lot of close races as we evidenced here in Auckland in the America’s Cup of 2000 and 2003. But I think about it now, 50 minutes to an hour would be good, but under 20 minutes, what you’re happening here is the boat’s just high up, wow they’ve started, wang. In the great town of Bermuda, I know Bermuda very well and have commentated there often in the Bermuda’s Gold Cup. It is a wonderful place, there are great people and yes the beaches really salmon pink by the way. But the great sound for these boats after they start, they’ve got to tack about 90 seconds after, at most two minutes.

Well bang, they start, win start, tack, boom, top marks, slam bam thank you ma’am, it’s all over. So you do wonder what they’re saying and one of the things I would note from a man is that the advance in technology has got outstanding audio off the boats but that really has been from about 1995 on and improved every year and it’s brilliant audio and the trick for the broadcasters is to know who is speaking and to expand and enhance. In other words, let the sailors do a lot of the commentary and you need a couple of guys in the commentary booth who are translating and enhancing what they’re saying rather than just for the non-sailors listening to more sailing jargon or so on, you can do that now. I mean the outstanding graphics that have been developed by a group in Dunedin of all places.

Bermuda home of the Americas Cup in 2017

But there’s some really bright, intelligent, nerdy blokes who went to Otago University and they could be working in America for NASA if they wanted to. But they happened to have married girls who want to stay in Otago and do whatever they do in central Otago and their horse riding and so these guys are based in Dunedin and those graphics have also enhanced for the initiated even, let alone the un-initiated because sailing is quite difficult. In the Olympics they’ve had different forms and some Danish system or whatever, there’s a lot of politics in all of that but all I know is these guys who have been involved in the American’s Cup have done an outstanding job and that really has helped a lot.

But yes it comes down to the broadcast and commentary and those commentators now have got a difficult job and it’s got to be different to the cups that I was involved in because you’ve got 20 minutes maximum, probably 18 minutes and you’ve got to talk New York headlines, you’ve got to give a summary try and also get the audio off the boat, what are they talking and translate that as well. So there is not now the opportunity for an expert analyst to start going on and on and on to fill in time as some of the excellent expert analysts that I had over the years with those.

Russell Coutts, the most successful Americas Cup sailor ever: dark horse and genius

Chris Law or Ed Baird and Buddy Melges, I mean we’ve had some brilliant people including Russell Coutts commentated in a couple of races in Valencia in ’07. I had Jimmy Spithill commentating the other races Russell couldn’t do. Both of them are outstanding. Coutts was quite outstanding but those sort of the insight of those excellent sailors now has got to be pruned down and modified a bit because the slam bam thank you nature of the race is under 20 minutes.

OSP: It’s almost like the perfect America’s Cup race used to be like a good movie, you could introduce the characters, you had time to build into the race, you had the challenges and the good versus the bad and then you had the finale and then the ending. That all fitted nicely into 75 minutes or 90 minutes but doesn’t fit into 20, so you just don’t have that kind of space anymore, do you?

PETER MONTGOMERY: Not only that but if I just mentioned Dennis Connor, Tom Blackaller, Buddy Melges and wide eyed young Chris Dickson and Harold Cudmore. I mean in Fremantle we had personalities and then you had the Alan Bonds against Kevin Parry’s and the people in the Bond camp up against the people in the Parry camp with Ian Murray and Peter Gilmore. I mean there was just so much happening with people in personalities that now a lot of that stuff has been knocked out of the mud. I say that because I’ve been in rugby commentary for a very long time as well.

Dennis Conner won the Americas Cup back in 1987 after losing it in 1983

The media prevention officers, some of the great All Black teams 20 years ago or whatever, went around and said you’re over to get coming from top rugby players All Blacks or whoever the visiting teams were, whether it was the Wallabies from Australia or very good teams from South Africa or from the northern hemisphere, and the players would say things.

Now, they’re almost on ropes and to a degree that’s happening in sailing as well. People are just, not scared, but they’re very aware and they don’t say anything. Compared to some of the stuff that Blackaller would drop a bomb and try to fire Dennis Conner up and often he did. I mean they’re all colourful people and I think in the end, if you look at whatever the persuasion might be in terms of if you’re following sport, what persuasion or football whether it’s Rugby League, Rugby Union or AFL or whether it’s football or somewhere else in the world, the key things you follow are people.

In a way, the America’s Cup with now down to six crew all with masks on and you can’t recognise them and some of them dress like the Michelin man and three of them don’t need to be sailors. They could be bodybuilders or rowers or whatever. It’s changed dramatically, really. My preference would be that we had boats that you could still — look, I get it because these boats are dangerous. We saw that in San Francisco 2013 and once the designers and engineers had time to talk about the 62’s proposed, they were going to be far too dangerous. Now we’ve got a boat under 50 feet, between 49 and 50 feet.

Firece Americas Cup rivals Dean Barker and Jimmy Spithill

Even they are going to be dangerous too. But my preference is to have a boat that you could see people’s faces and get people back into the equation. Now of course, you’ve got quite a lot of people who are in the loop. There’s a lot of self-interest as well and as Dennis Connor once said, when you go the races, always backs self interest, it’s always winning. So there are comments that may come out from the defenders or the cup organisers, when so much of it is self-interest as well. It’s just the way it’s gone and that’s what’s going to happen in Bermuda but it is not quite the same.

OSP: No and I guess the holder of the cup to some degree sets the tone and the culture as well if you look at how it’s evolved and particularly last 10 or 15 years.

PETER MONTGOMERY: Well the holder of the cup has always set the culture and I wouldn’t say it’s all been sweetness and light in the past. We haven’t got time now but aficionados would know that the New York Yacht Club definitely were tough people to deal with. They kept it for 132 years. Now part of it was on merit because they had very good sponsors and patrons and then whether it was JP Morgan or Vanderbilt, whoever you want to name and a brilliant designer and in Hereshoff or Olo Steven’s. So there was a lot of good things but also though, some of the people in the New York Yacht Club were very, very difficult and really was couched that the cup stays here and then finally that mould was broken.

The New York Yacht Club held and defended the Americas Cup for 132 years

Probably I think out of Perth, under Dr. Stan Reed, the Aussies were too fair and too nice and too generous and it was a fantastic regatta in Fremantle and transformed Fremantle. It was a grotty running down seaport, which is a beautiful place now. I mean the legacy is great but really Fremantle and Perth deserve one more go at it which Auckland had, and Valencia had although under some controversy.

The whole thing’s changed dramatically and yes there will be change. I mean you go and look at other sports whether it’s motor sport and the vehicles they might have driven in the 50’s or the 60’s to compared to what’s happening now. Of course there is going to be progression but even in formula one, as sterile as that might be, there’s no personalities and you do get the impression that the teammates, Luis Hamilton and his team mate, they don’t get on. I mean it adds to something rather than the sweetness in light you’re getting dished out the America’s Cup.

Peter Montgomery in San Francisco the Americas Cup in 2013 where Oracles comeback shocked everyone

OSP: Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. One of the things Peter I’ve always found with your commentating style is clearly you’re a New Zealander, but you’ve always been balanced in your approach and I’ve always found it interesting that you’ve been able to communicate openly with opposing teams who often shared all sorts of things with you that historically they wouldn’t with most people. You seem to have this ability to find a balance and to build trust and to not be one sided in your views. Is that something you sort of actively or consciously focused on?

PETER MONTGOMERY: I think it’s just evolved over a period and during the 80’s, thanks to Cameron Lewis and one or two other people, I was invited to commentate on the Ultimate Yacht Race. There were a couple of guys from Fort Worth Texas, the Darden brothers who really had a vision and so the Yacht Race ended up being giant 18 foot skiffs, they were 30 foot boats but for the untrained eye from a distance, they look like 18 foot skiffs on steroids and there were some really, really prominent names there from around world sailing - a lot of the Americans. I was commuting to the US service six weeks to commentate whether it was in Milwaukee or San Francisco or on the East Coast. I got to know a lot of those guys very well and in an event like that, the tribal nationalism was taken out of it really because we’re commentating the over picture and some of those things helped and then from ’91 till about 07 -

’08 I went to Bermuda to commentate the Bermuda Gold Cup, so again I had the opportunity over the years to getting a lot of the competitors as well and then subsequently I commentated the Swedish Match Cup from the mid-90’s for about 10 years and then the Monsoon Cup. So at events like that, you do get to — after the racing, you may end up somewhere whether it’s in a bar or restaurant or something, you just get to know guys. So I think that part of the relationships that you just don’t build up overnight with Peter Pan and Wendy waving wands, quickly, it’s something that it’s slowly built up.

Muhammad Ali with Peter Montgomery after Peter's historic interview with him

Over the years I’ve been — my wife and I become very good friends, a lot of the people like Tom and Betsy Whidden, Tom Whidden sailed in six America’s cups, is the big boss of the north sails organisation but he won three America’s Cups with Dennis Conner. There are many other people as well that we got to know over the years. Then when it comes to commentating at the Olympics and the America’s Cup. Then I’m mindful about where is the broadcast going to? In contrast, I think it was the Olympics in ’04 and ’08 to help fund TV in New Zealand, they would broadcast well over a hundred countries through Asia or through Africa.

Therefore, you couldn’t necessarily be — not biased, and never used the word “we” as it were, but you had to be aware of who your audience were but say take the America’s Cup and many of the America’s Cups, the broadcast was only going to New Zealand. So I was then aware that the audience principally was hometown New Zealand. I still don’t like the idea of we this and so on, you need to be at arm’s length and sometimes you got to even ask the hard questions. I remember Peter Blake once ordered me off Lion New Zealand. He got furious with me talking about the hard bits of Lion that wasn’t up to it.

Lion New Zealand arriving in Hobart after completing Sydney to Hobart Race with Peter Blake, and Peter Montgomery in front from left to right

You’re still going to do that as a broadcast but it’s important to just try and work out where your audience is going to and they could be part of the problem now with the commentary you were talking about in the current AC45, where is it going? Is it generically across the world or who are they trying to talk to and that needs to be defined as well?

OSP: That’s a really good point. Me included, a lot of New Zealanders wouldn’t appreciate how much of our reputation you’ve developed as an international broadcaster and not just a New Zealand broadcaster, so I guess that’s really helped for you to find the balance based on, as you said, the audience you’re delivering to.

Peters early years commentating from an English navy helicopter

PETER MONTGOMERY: No I’ve been lucky. I was sad that the Ultimate Yacht Race failed — the guys who developed it had a brilliant idea but they just overstretched themselves like so many other, regattas around the world where people have got a good idea but where is the money coming because sailing is not a turnstyle sport and not a stadium sport.

I think that is something that also needs to be kept in mind with the evolution of what they’re trying to, these races made for television and whatever, who is doing it? I’m actually old enough to think back that in Fremantle, yes the American had and some really good teams involved. One of them Stars & Stripes, Dennis Conner and Tom Whidden, Billy Krinkle and co, went on to win it.

But there were others with America 2 and so on and Tom Blackhaller, there was quite a lot of interest and do you know at that stage, with some of the races not starting until 11 o’clock or midnight east coast time, it was more civilised on the Californian Pacific Coast starting at either 8 o’clock or 9 o’clock. They had ratings more in the NCA basketball contest at time. SoI think it’s important that you’re not going to compare sailing America’s Cup or Whitbread or whatever with football in that case or American Football, or their other big sports and it’s just nonsense to do that.

Peter Montgomery and Brendan Telfer at their first Olympics Montreal 1976

It’s a niche sport to a smaller market but that market can still be specific for a lot. They’re the sort of people who might be a bit, to use the cliché; “upwardly mobile” and so that’s why you’d see these expensive watches being advertised along side or whatever. In other words they have got the target audience who they have established are sailors, which is not all true because as you and I know, sailing is not all rich, wealthy and elite but in partly the image that can partly help fund those sorts of things.

OSP: That’s exactly right and I was talking to Rob Mundle at the South Yacht Club last week, we both sail out of there and despite the perceptions, 90% of people turn up for relatively little cost at all by sailing on somebody else’s boat and the image there that’s its only for the rich and the elite helps draw attention to it and controversy and everything else.

PETER MONTGOMERY: That’s right, absolutely yeah.

OSP: When you look at your broadcasting career and I guess Keith Quinn and Brendan Telfer, you all had incredible longevity as broadcasters and you’ve all covered close to 10 Olympic Games. Were there common traits amongst the three of you that have helped you achieve this longevity?

At the completion of London 2012, Peter Montgomery, Brendan Telfer and Keith Quinn had covered nine Olympics Games

PETER MONTGOMERY: Well I think probably that our timing was right. That the people knew now that batting's going, things will change in the next 10, 20 years because of technology and other things and media companies merging and becoming digital. Will there be as many print journalists or the traditional broadcasting journalists? So much of the emphasis now to get into broadcasting, the path that I'd follow, it just doesn't exist. You have to go to broadcast school now and in effect, there are young broadcasters that they're news journalists and they just are a factory turning out bulletins hour after hour and if they're lucky an opening might come up in other areas of broadcasting, whether it's hosting a program and/or doing commentary.

But it's not quite as open or, well it's different and so we were lucky. We were there at the right time. Keith and Brendan, and John McBeth. I mean they're all broadcasters of the old fashioned kind, having been brought up with broadcasters of a previous generation. And some of those standards all rubbed off as well. And those standards would apply to well known broadcasters with longevity in Australia or in the UK or America, anywhere. Well in Germany too, it doesn't matter. Whatever the language that those guys - but yeah we've been lucky. We've all been to nine Olympics and I've been lucky also doing other things. I don't know how many Rugby World Cups Keith Quinn's been to and Brendan follows golf closely. I mean they've been to other big events as well.

Peter Montgomery interviews All Black Captain Richie after has final test match

The other prime time events that I've been lucky to be involved with, well I've done every Whitbread and Volvo. I was in Sydney when the fleet arrived from Cape Town in 1973. Then the Whitbread fleet that lost a couple of blokes over board, but they weren't really given a very good welcome in Sydney because I think some of the key traditionalists saw them as a challenge to the beloved Sydney Hobart. So the next race then came to Auckland instead of Sydney, which made sense anyway. And then the Whitbread became the Volvo - so I've been lucky to be around at a lot of these things.

All those America's Cups and, well the first America's Cup I went to was Newport, Rhode Island in 1980 when Australia challenged Freedom and boy it changed dramatically. Well really a bomb went under it when Allan Bond and his team in Australia II won in September '83 and then the Aussies put on an outstanding defence in the Fremantle aided by an incredible place to sail, out on Gauge Roads. I mean it was white caps and wet decks every day. A Fremantle doctor arrived every day at 1 o'clock. I think there was one or two days only when as Buddy Melges put, "Ah the nurse has arrived today, not the doctor."

Peters first Americas Cup: Australia vs Freedom in New York 1980

But it's just a fantastic place to sail and the spectacular coverage of that time. Yes I know they'd be happy, easier now with drones and all technology, but Channel 7 used their race cam that they were starting to use in Bathurst. It's got a lot more sophisticated certainly. Channel 9 had their blimps, but all the Australian broadcasters all merged together to Channel 10 and ABC. They did a fantastic job and then the cup went to San Diego and then coming to Auckland. So it's continued to improve and things have changed but then of course after Oracle came in and took the Cup away and it's gone into multihulls and there really is a bomb under it now.

So we've got the attention span of, assuming the people can't think for longer than 18 minutes or watch something for longer, you know it's got to be instant gratification, slam bam thank you ma'am. I know the sailing community is better than that. 

OSP: The public are too I think too, they would go through further evolution. I spoke to someone who recently attended an event in Auckland where Richie McCaw spoke on the attributes of leadership and how that had underpinned the All Blacks' World Cup Success. Sir Michael Fay was at that event and was invited to speak and Sir Michael commented to the audience that if his team knew some of the leadership attributes that Richie spoke of that they probably would have won the America’s Cup back in 1987 when they first challenged.

KZ7 racing in New Zealand's first ever Americas Cup Challenge in Fremantle, Australia 1987

When I spoke to Rob Mundle last week, he talked of the Aussie’s ability to play the psyche game on Dennis Connor in 1983 and get them off guard over covering up their keel and the hype built around that.

Chris Dickson, New Zealand Americas Cup Skipper in 1987

It seems Australians have this natural ability to get under your skin and if you look at how they sledge heavily in cricket as though that's just a normal part of playing the game. My question for you is, how much of coming up short against Stars & Stripes in 1987 was due to team New Zealand's leadership on or off the boat, versus some of the psyche games that were completely new to us and I recall back then we were called cheats for building a fiberglass boat, we had holes drilled in our hull to prove we had not broken the rules and it seemed that too created a big distraction as well. What are your thoughts around that?

Check out the first New Zealand's 1987 Cup Challenge Song here

PETER MONTGOMERY: Well I don’t think that there's any doubt that the mind games got the better of the New Zealand challenge. It wasn’t called Team New Zealand then. Yes the New Zealanders had two Lloyd’s inspectors, following the construction of those boats and they did everything well. Tom Whidden, who I’ve got to know well, about two years ago told me that one day he was driving Dennis Connor through Fremantle and he said, "I’m really worried about those Kiwi's, they got an excellent boat that’s been very well sailed. We’ve got to rattle their cage somehow."

Michael Fay's failed monohull vs. catamaran Cup Challenge in 1988

Dennis was driving and he said, "Okay, yup." And left it at that and the conversation moved on to another subject. The next night at the press conference, Tom Blackaller had made some provocative comment and then Dennis Connor said, "Well there have been 73 aluminum boats built, why would you want to build one in fiberglass unless you wanted to cheat?" And then Blackaller goes, "I don’t think I ever said that." Now, Tom Whidden had sown a seed with Dennis of his concerns, Dennis clearly had thought about it overnight and really came out of left field with a real lefty and put a bomb under it.

What it did was that Dennis was tongue in cheek and Michael Fay was so indignant that his integrity and the New Zealanders integrity had been challenged, they took their eye off the ball. I know for certain that just recently, Ron Holland was here and Ron was saying that the three designers, Bruce Bar, Laurie Davidson and Ron had seriously urged Michael to get a heavier keel on the boat. The problem was that KZ7 had had 38 wins and one loss, so why change a winning formula?

Team New Zealand and Peter Montgomery help create a sailing obessessed nation

Well, the New Zealanders learned a lot from that America’s Cup and the first and most important thing they learned from Dennis Connor was, the America’s Cup is a game of change. So if you may remember, Stars & Stripes squeaked in, struggled to get into the final four, they were nearly eliminated by White Crusader, the British challenge. Anyway, they got to the final four and then they changed. They had a heavier keel that could cope with the heavier conditions. Yes the day after KZ7 was eliminated the wind dropped and the next week, it was tailor made to the configuration the New Zealanders had but it didn’t suit them at the time.

Really, I think the management of the New Zealand challenge was dysfunctional, really that Michael Fay and his management team on shore weren’t really connecting with Chris Dickson and his team and I think it then comes to the sail issues that I think some of the New Zealanders, I know Simon Daubney proposed something to do with sails and as Brad Butterworth said to me not long ago, "Well if they would have listened to Simon Daubney on the development of sails and not Bruce Farr, that would have won.

Team New Zealand wins the Americas Cup in 1995

So the point is, here's a couple of comments from guys really close to Ron Holland and Brad Butterworth all these years later, yes, they could have and should have but they learned and the lesson, the other key thing that they learned from Dennis Conner was, not only is this the America’s Cup a game of change, Dennis was outstanding in leading. It was a big lesson for the New Zealanders, that they took on board and really applied from 1995 on. "Don’t dream about things you haven’t got," meaning, "Oh god, wouldn’t it be great to have another six weeks when you got six days?" And, don’t dream about "wouldn’t it be great if you had another six million dollars and you’ve only got $600,000." What you’ve got is the time you’ve got, to work to and the money you’ve got in the bank to spend and Dennis Connor was just quite brilliant in his campaigns like that.

Dennis may not like it but his legacy was definitely picked up by the New Zealanders and that was a key factor in terms of the brilliant success that they had in 1995, where really Dennis Connor as a sailor - that had a lot of input as well. Before that, there was so many designers and you could go back to old Steven’s and go back to Herreshoff and so many and Sir Tomas Sopwith and the designers he had, I mean, they should have won that cup in what was it 1932? But the end result is that often the designers would ordain the patron backing each challenge with their design and there was no input from the sailors.

Sir Michael Fay got New Zealand into the game

The truth is, a lot of yachties or sailors have got a lot of clues, a lot of practical experience and they hadn’t been listened to you. Dennis Connor dragged that out and that’s exactly what the New Zealanders learned from those lessons. So yes, they could have and should have, I agree with Rob Mundle and he was there ringside to it all as well and yes I'm mad. I mean I know he’s passed away now and I know Allan Bond gets a lot of credit for it. He went to the fourth challenge but the other guy who’s passed away who masterminded that was Warren Jones. Warren Jones was so quick on his feet, he was quite brilliant. There were a lot of other good people behind the scenes but it was Warren Jones that really upset the New York Yacht Club.

OSP: Fascinating. Really, really fascinating and it's almost seemed an evolution of styles as well, with Michael Fay and Chris Dickson, I think one of the catch phrases in the early days in the 1986/87 was Michael Fay’s golden rule was "I’ve got the gold so I rule" and we saw a different leadership style with Michael Fay and with Chris Dickson to what evolved with Sir Peter Blake. I think in the late 90’s I read the book Team Think, Team New Zealand and it was all about developing responsible leaders within the team that owned their area of the boat.

So the sailors drove feedback to the sail makers, to the people laying out the deck on the boat and where the equipment all went. And it’s interesting because if you look at this style of Sir Graham Henry and Steve Hanson, they built an All Blacks team with multiple leaders. I think they had seven within the team that owned their part of what their part of the team did on the field rather than having one coach and one leader.

Peter Blake - one of New Zealand's favourite sons

It’s almost like if you look where we are today with what happened post San Francisco in 2013, I wonder if Team New Zealand’s gone a lot more back to that original style of one leader, one voice and a more, I don’t know if ‘dictatorial’ is the right word but a less democratic style of leadership in terms of how they manage, today versus that cycle they went through from the late 80’s into the mid 90’s under Sir Peter Blake then what's happened since. Do you have any sort of thoughts or observations around that? I'm not trying to put you on the spot either.

PETER MONTGOMERY: You’ve touched a hornet's nest there with so many different threads and strings. Yes Michael Fay was young at the game and he would have done things differently and I think if Dickson had been another 10 years older, he would approach things differently because as he’s got older, he’s got more experience and mellowed as well but there is no doubt that when Blake set it up, they had a certain budget they could work to.

Sir Michael Fays KZ1 - the 130 foot 1988 Americas Cup Challenger

They had specific people in and I know the beautiful deck layout actually came from three to four of the sailors. So much of the advances, the flat top main sail that came from Warwick Fleury and Simon Daubney. The sailors actually have got a few clues if they are listened to and there can be some input. Now I know in 1995 in a meeting of designers, this is after the 1992 challenge, remember with the tandem keel and the bowsprit and the whole disaster. Coutts, who happened to be an engineer, he was the advocate for the sailors and he was in a meeting with the designers, Laurie Davidson and Doug Peterson and Tom Schnackenberg and quite a few of the other designers and the basically thread Coutts said was, "Give is a boat that’s equal and we’ll win."

Now that could sound arrogant but it was really more confident because over the previous five or six years, New Zealand sailors, notably Coutts and Dickson, had been winning world match racing championships and they were dominating. They also had a handle on the sailing big powerful boats, there were a lot of Whitbread sailors back in there and as it happened, we know that NZL32 was a good really lovely beautiful quick boat and they’re able to win just on sailing merit. So things evolved from there.

Yes, I mean, Grant Dalton has taken it up and his leadership and what he does and how he'd done it, perhaps it's a throwback rather than using a lot of the experience and I think it was disappointing after all that Dean Barker had done and how he was treated but anyway, he’s no longer there now and he’s moved on. Peter Burling and Blair Tuke are really outstanding. I would rate Burling at the very, very top level. In the time I’ve been around, I think that New Zealand's had a couple of really X factor genius sailors meaning Peter Mander and Russell Coutts. I would put Burling in that group who could join them. He is special.

Peter Montgomery talks with rising star Peter Burling

But in the end, in the America’s Cup game, he's still young, and he still doesn’t know what he doesn’t know and when it comes to development, the America’s Cup being sailed in May/June 2017 will actually be won in 2016 on the development of the foils that’s going on now. Burling and Tuke are on target for Rio 2016 in the 49er class. Silver medal at London 2012 and they've been unbeaten since from 24 or 25 regattas. Their odds on favourites to win and if they don’t win a gold medal then perhaps they’re taking their eye off the ball because of America’s Cup because it’s very difficult to dance and play in the orchestra at the same time. So yes the current leadership in terms of what’s happening, they’ll need to be aware of that so we’ll see.

OSP: Well it's a wait and see game that's for sure and certainly Peter Burling strikes me as one of a generation and for his youth in terms of what he's achieved to date, he’s got an illustrious career ahead. But that being said, you can be the best sailor but you've got to have a boat that is at least equal, don't you? As we saw in 2013, you can’t make up for boat speed in these cats on foils without at least being equal.

PETER MONTGOMERY: One thing will not change in 2017 in Bermuda, there was the saying, around Cowes of 1851 or whatever happened with Reliance out of 1903 out of New York and all of the races out of Newport, Rhode Island, and subsequently Fremantle, Auckland, San Diego and Valencia. "The fastest boat will win."

Yes, there’s a lot of one design elements now in these multihulls in America’s Cup, coming up in America’s Cup 35 in Bermuda 2017, but there’s still big advances to be made in those foils. Whatever the people are up to, there’s still a lot happening and Oracle’s onto their third boat and none of them can launch their new boats for America’s Cup 2017 until the 1st of January.

The reaching start in the Americas Cup foiling catamarans has replaced the upwind monohull start

Oracle’s allowed two, each challenger is only allowed one and Artemis is doing a lot of development, so are the Brits, I wouldn't underrate them either. So there’s still things going on and whoever does the most development on the foils will win the Cup next year.

OSP: That’s interesting. So in terms of the rules around the foils, I guess they are reasonably tight but there's room for the best developments to drive the outcome in terms of the Cup.

PETER MONTGOMERY: Well with foils, it's quite restricted on what they can develop and how they can go there now. It’s becoming more one design which, you know, we haven’t got time to talk about today and how that can be happening but these surrogate boats they’ve got now, Oracle are onto their third aren’t they. I mean the development they’re doing and what they’re doing, I wouldn’t underestimate.

OSP: Okay, so you’re one of those people that pop up regularly and I know that when we talk about the Americas Cup, my first experience was 1983 on a transistor radio in a classroom in Blenheim at Intermediate school listening to Australia win the Cup for the first time and then '87 came along and '88 and '92 and in '95, I lived in Christchurch, my first daughter has just been born.

Peter Montgomery in the thick of the celebrations after the Americas Cup 1995 final with Russell Coutts (left) and Sir Peter Blake

When you delivered that perfectly timed, now famous finale in the final race where New Zealand crossed the line and you claimed that the “America’s Cup is now New Zealand's Cup”. I’ve often thought over the years that you must have put a lot of preparation into that final 30 seconds in terms of what you were going to say and how you’re going to deliver it, because you delivered it with perfection and literally to the point where your final word came out as the boat crossed the line. Was there a lot of preparation that went to that sort of historical moment?

Russell Coutts and Peter Blake in happier days for Team New Zealand in 1995-2003 when they held the cup

PETER MONTGOMERY: The first thing is in live broadcasting, you can’t really script anything and that means whether you’re the rugby commentator or its rugby league or in my case sailing. On the 13th of May 1995, I woke up quite early and I thought this could be a significant day for New Zealand. I just jotted down a couple of thoughts really on key things that I should try and wrap up that if all went according to plan and the NZL32 was able to win, to then in the final couple of minutes, try and summarise the regatta and also new Zealand’s participation in the America’s Cup.

Russell Coutts steps off the plane onto New Zealand soil, with the Americas Cup in hand in1995

Because I remember the first Cup I went to in 1980 and I thought I’d be supporting Australia forever. One, it was far beyond New Zealand financially. Two, New Zealand did not the expertise sailing these boats and they certainly didn’t have the technology. Then as we know the 80’s were a huge decade of change and so here we were in 1995 and it was all happening. In 1980 I thought New Zealand would get a man on the moon quicker than the challenging for the America’s Cup. It seemed that formidable.

Anyway, I jotted down a couple of notes and as the race went on, it was coming down to the final leg and I started trying to think what was I going to say and note. I was tossing these things around but the problem was, that we were in a 12 and a half metre RIB. And because of the security out on the water, to keep the area clear for the race boats and the US Coast Guard, we had to go further. So my major concern was actually trying to think, "Where is the finish line? Where are we in line with it?" And doing that rather than trying to deliver the words.

In Auckland more than 400,000 turned out for the Team New Zealand Americas Cup Victory Parade in 1995

So it was a whole moving target and what I was trying to do and thinking, "Well this is a one off, you've got one chance here live. There's not chance of a retake to do it later." So to do that I thought, coming down the final leg, I thought if I had the opportunity, again coming back to those race horse commentators and the influence that have had on me and particularly the colourful Australian ones.

Back in the 60’s and so on, the Bert Bryants, Bill Collins and Ken Howard. So that’s when I thought, "Well you've got to try and say something, you haven’t got the story of your life, you haven’t got 12 words or 20 words to do it, what can you do in about a half a dozen words?" So the America’s Cup had to begin and then somehow I was able to pluck out the other words as well.

As much as anything, it was the pausing that, "The America’s Cup... is now... New Zealand’s Cup." Rather than, "The America’s cup is now New Zealand’s cup." If you get my point? If you listen to really good broadcasters and sports broadcasters, it’s their timing and silence sometimes is golden.

Russell giveth and Russell taketh away as he accepts the Cup as Skipper of Alinghi Switzerland 2003

OSP: Okay. So Russell Coutts is clearly one of a kind having sailed for New Zealand for Switzerland and for the US and he’s achieved some remarkable things in his life. What drives Russell Coutts do you think to continue to do what he does at the level that he does? Because it’s a high stress, high pressure, high stakes game but he’s proved to be in a class of his own with what he’s achieved.

PETER MONTGOMERY: Well Russell Coutts is the only sailor in the world who has won an Olympic gold medal and skippered an America’s Cup boat. Now there are some people who would say, "Well Buddy Melges did as well," but actually Bill Koch was skipper and has made it well known that he was the skipper of the America 3 crew in '92. Buddy was the helmsman. So he is close to it as well and an exceptional person as well.

Russell is chillingly determined and focused and his sister tells stories that even when they were going to school, in the school bus there would be a competition amongst the family in their luncheons who has got the most raisins in their pack. I mean Russell is unbelievably competitive. Chillingly competitive to the point, I think it could be a worry. I dunno? That’s just one of those things, but what he has done, and then you think, "Well okay, he moved on from Team New Zealand," I think a different administration, different organisation, where people weren’t talking to each other and we haven’t got time now today, but there was a disconnect in 2000 unfortunately, Russell moved on to Alinghi and then he had his own disconnect with Ernesto Bertarelli.

Team New Zealand comes within 1 degree of capsizing at AC34 in San Francisco 2013

There he is at Oracle and I’ve got no doubt that when Oracle were coming second, a distant second, that it was Coutts who really started working out a lot of the things and basic mathematics that if you widen the angle of the boat and sail quicker. Oracle started with a mast didn’t twist and yet it finished the regatta in the America’s Cup 2013 with a mast that did twist. Yes there were other bright people involved but Coutts was a key factor in a lot of that. Yeah, he’s definitely achieved a lot and it has been significant and he is incredibly, incredibly competitive.

OSP: But not one for the limelight. That’s quite interesting, I think the last time they won the cup he had already exited stage left and headed away elsewhere and he just wants to get the job done. 

PETER MONTGOMERY: When they won the Cup, Coutts, wouldn’t go up on the stage, he didn’t want to do that. He wouldn’t do it either but anyway, that’s Russell, he’s got his own ways and he may not be everyone’s favourite with where the Cup has gone and the direction but the short story is, that’s where the Cup has gone and the direction, so we live with it and move on.

Russell Coutts has skippered or led 6 winning Americas Cup Campaigns for 3 different countries since 1995

OSP: I think when we look back in 10, 20, 30 years from now his contribution certainly will be admired and respected for what it’s done for the Cup despite some of the changes that haven't always been everybody’s cup of tea. Team Japan under Dean Barker's leadership appear to have a crew that’s becoming more and more competitive. They seem to be able to hold their own in the start sequence on that first leg. It just seems to be the polish around the track that’s letting them down and obviously more time in the saddle is going to help that. What do you think is possible for them in 2017 when it comes to the America’s Cup?

PETER MONTGOMERY: Yeah, I think they are. They're getting good people around them and involved with them. Many who were very good people including a very good designer called Nick Holroyd who was with Team New Zealand and has now gone with Dean Barker. I think the key point is that, yes these regatta’s you're talking about and the AC45’s in Oman and coming up to New York, Chicago, there is one going to be in Portsmouth in late July.

Peter talking with Dean Barker

Yeah but really the key question is, what is the Japanese challenge let alone Ben Ainslie, the French, definitely Artemis and Team New Zealand, what are they doing with the development of their foils now? Or their development on these surrogate boats and how are they coping?

Meanwhile as I’ve said already, Oracle’s on to their third and Oracle’s allowed two America’s Cup boats and none of them are allowed to launch until 1 January 2017 and how quickly will they come out and what’s the evolution? So just because you’re doing well in these AC45’s does not necessarily translate that you’ll do well on America’s Cup 2017 when the big show comes out. It could all add up but it won’t necessarily automatically transfer over.

OSP: That’s right, we know it’s about timing your run and even if you time your run and you’re 8:3 up, nothing’s guaranteed, right?

PETER MONTGOMERY: No, no, not at all. Well again to the point that Burling and Tuke are just, well they’re unbeaten in 49er Olympic class skiff regattas since London 2012. That does not necessarily mean they’re going to win the gold medal, they should and whether or not they take their eye off the ball because of America’s Cup involvement or as Peter Burling says, it helps them and refreshes them, getting into something else. We know that in the final six months of the Olympic campaigns, there will be people coming out of the woodwork. I mean history tells you that, the same but different applies in the America’s Cup as well. So yep, watch this space.

OSP: With Bermuda Peter, what can we expect there wind-wise? I know after watching the Oman AC45’s, where we had nine knots of breeze and foiling cats going around marks doing three knots and not foiling, what can we expect in Bermuda in terms of average wind conditions?

The only thing constant about the Americas Cup is change

PETER MONTGOMERY: I’m told 8 to 16 knots at that time of year out on the Great Sound and it will be excellent sailing and not a lot of waves either, it will be really, really good but the trouble is these boats still, even though they’ve been pulled back from the 72 to the 62 to now under 50 feet, they’re still big and powerful for the Great Sound if you get the drift.

Rather than a more wide open expansive less restrictive area, if it was out in the Hauraki Gulf or somewhere else. So you’ve still got to be mindful of where it’s going to be sailed, it will be excellent sailing conditions. I mean Bermuda is really a splendid place to sail, just the logistics though, when you land in Bermuda, you can’t rent a car. The only way you get around the island is on your moped.

So there is going to be logistical problems. I mean there’s been no helicopters in Bermuda. So how are they going to get aerial shots? There’s a whole bunch of other factors there that they're working their way through that you've got to look at as well.

OSP: Okay.

PETER MONTGOMERY: It’s all a new challenge.

OSP: Yeah, literally. Moving on, before we wrap up, I just really wanted to touch on Sir Peter Blake. I guess, I’m conscious of your time this morning, but my earliest memories of the Whitbread were when I read Digby Taylor's book, "Outward Bound" and that really got me riveted I guess on what was the Whitbread race back then.

Peter Montgomery in the thick of the action broadcasting onboard

Then I picked up on Peter Blake’s adventures and one of my fondest memories was Peter Blake coming down the Auckland Harbour, racing Grant Dalton and listening to your commentary on the radio and it was just - I lived in Browns Bay then, on the north shore and it was absolutely riveting and I guess Peter Blake, when I think about Peter Blake and I'm thinking about what he’d achieved and he was such an icon and a kind of an Edmond Hilary like figure in New Zealand.

And then when he died, the impact that had on me and so many people I knew was really - it only really paralleled to the death of Princess Diana in terms of stopping a nation in it's footsteps and it was such a tragic loss and you would know that far more than I do, given you had a really unique and special relationship with Sir Peter, which I picked up from your biography. What are some of your fondest memories of Sir Peter Blake?

Peter Montgomery onboard broadcasting boat Northstar with Sir Edmund Hillary in 2003

PETER MONTGOMERY: Well he was a special person in that he had respect for people and treated them well, whatever walk of life or whatever area they were in, not necessarily just journalists or broadcasters, it was literally all sorts of people and he did a lot, yes, it was a tragic loss. Life sadly has to go on. I mean Peter really, I think a key thing was that he was able to put people around him and give them an opportunity and those people, I'm thinking of not just the crews, of Ceramco, Lion New Zealand, Steinlager 2 and then the Jules Vern and in the America’s Cup.

They were able to do things that probably some people didn’t expect of themselves. I’ve got a recording here with Peter after America’s Cup 92 saying “if that’s the American’s Cup, you can stick it” because he was brought in too late in '92 and Bruce Farr had the established management and this is the bow sprit and tandem keel campaign.

Peter Blake coined the phrase "Liquid Himalayas" describing his southern ocean sailing in the Whitbread Race

So Peter was there but he was too little too late. When Allan Sefton was able to talk him into coming back in 1995, it was Peter really on his terms. I think although he did great things, he was more comfortable in the campaigns of a big family and my vision of a big family is about 30 people, rather than north of a hundred people in those America's Cup campaigns.

At the height of the America's Cup campaigns, even back in 95, you’d have up to 140, 150 people. So you knew everybody, not only the number of people who are on Ceramco, Lion New Zealand and Steinlager but then the onshore people who were the backup as well. Peter was very comfortable with those and they were really his. He took an awful lot of flack saying that he sailed the Whitbread four times and never won it, well it’d actually been as a crew without quite the power and influence back in the first race on the Burton Cutter in 1974, on condor in 1977, so yes he had sailed on a couple of boats, Ceramco was a revelation and they broke their mast, which they did a good job of still sailing over 4,000 nautical miles to Cape Town under jury rig and then they overreacted I think and with Lion New Zealand, that was built to stand anything and it did.

Steinlager 2 the only yacht to ever win every leg of the Whitbread or Volvo round the world race

So many of the other boats broke except UBS who won the race and Lion New Zealand got second. Anyway, they got it all together and with the perfect campaign in Steinlager 2, it was just quite outstanding and I think that was the most significant of Blake’s campaigns because that was the watershed to go on and do the Jules Vern and the America’s Cups.

Peter Blake disagreed with me, he thinks his most significant campaign and the one he enjoyed most was the Jules Vern, the second was successful, remember, they nearly flipped it, sank the damn thing off Cape Town on first attempt but anyway, they went around and got the Jules Vern record which in this day and age seems tiddly compared to where it’s got to now with foiling being introduced.

Peter Blake wins the 1988/89 Whitbread round the world race with Steinlager 2

Peter ran fantastic campaigns with what he achieved, but also he was very strong on the environmental issues way back. I’ve got recordings of him here; "We’re 2,000 miles from Cape Town and we just seen an albatross," or he’s concerned about plastic in the Southern Ocean, or the birds caught in plastic or whatever. He was concerned about that as well so he was a special person and he's still missed to this day.

OSP: He was a sailor above all else, he was a sailor and a family man.

PETER MONTGOMERY: And he was a sailor that came from a different background because when you look at all the top sailors, they came through that dinghy, white hot P Class in this day and age, Optimist too, P Class to a degree, Starling or the equivalent around the world and all of those very good sailors, it doesn’t matter who you think of in America’s Cup and Peter had come through differently, more through more a cruising background and putting campaigns together.

Emirates Team New Zealand does a nosedive in the 2013 Louis Vuitton Series

He was different and he just loved those campaigns and he understood, he was not part of that junior sailing in the top 10, if you’re not in the top 10, you’re burned off and you think of the drop-out factor across the world and the number of kids who go optimist sailing and not many continue on into lasers and Olympic Class codes. So Peter came from a different avenue and I think that helped him a lot too. 

OSP: Okay and in your biography Allan Sefton appears a lot throughout that and he's been involved and made a contribution to yachting in lots of different ways that probably isn't that well known by most New Zealanders at all. How would you describe the role that he's played in your life?

PETER MONTGOMERY: He’s been key, no, there’s no doubt about it, first we were colleagues in media and really, he’s been a scribbler in the written press, hence his name was Scribbles. He’s a very good writer and a brilliant wordsmith and he wrote books on Peter Blake but also on the America’s Cup out of Fremantle.

Sir Michael Fay with David Barnes

Then he was lured to go to the dark side by Michael Fay meaning into media and management and Alan was a very big influence and he did a great job, but Alan can be a bit stubborn over some things at times and a bit inflexible and I think that some of those things still maybe move on a bit but.

Alan had a very big influence but more importantly when I brought up the name Chris Bouzaid before and all that stuff and hundreds of hours of broadcasting through the seventies on Southern Cross. Alan Sefton was there writing for the Auckland Star in those days and the stuff that he would write and inevitably, the power would be on the back page of the Star and even leading some rugby, football, soccer or cricket pieces and Allan had a very big influence in the rise and rise of New Zealand sailing, no doubt about it.

OSP: Okay, that's fascinating. So just in terms of wrapping up, I've just got some final questions for you Peter. In 1990 you were awarded the New Zealand Yachtsman of the Year, the New Zealand Yachting Federation's highest honour. And yet for many New Zealanders it was really 94-95 onwards that you became more of a household name, largely through America's Cup broadcasting. How much did that award mean to you then and how much does it still mean to you today?

Peter Montgomery with the 1990 New Zealand Yachtsman of the Year Trophy

PETER MONTGOMERY:  I was surprised at the time really. That comes back to, yes as you say; the awareness. Certainly through television and the America’s Cups but during the 70’s and 80’s, we had done a hell of a lot and particularly with the Whitbread and we probably haven't got time now, but I went to the start of the second Whitbread and Blake looked after me and introduced me to Claire Francis who was the skipper of ABC Accutrac and she was explaining, she was going to speak to Capital Radio.

Now, in those days, private radio was fledgling in the UK and nowhere near the powerful force it is now. The BBC still ruled in those days. Anyway, we took it on board and when we got back on Condor, Blake explained to the skipper Robin Knox Johnson, now Sir Robin, what Claire had told us and it was Sir Robin Knox Johnson who said, "Why don't a couple of Kiwis speak to each other?”, meaning that if we spoke to Condor, Robin Knox Johnson didn’t think he or his co-skipper Lesley Williams needed to be involved. It was a Blake who was a watch captain and so from those early fitful days in 1977, we developed it a lot more and Peter and I had a lot of input in terms of the broadcasting and how you did it through Ceramco and it became more refined and sophisticated through Lion New Zealand and Steinlager 2.

Bernard Fergusson, New Zealand Governor-General and instigator of the New Zelanad Yachtsman of the Year Award

So a lot of those things in the input that we did really, with Alan Sefton involved as well, They’re just forgotten now. It was all part of the building blocks, if you like, in the rise and rise of New Zealand sailing and there’s no doubt about it.

OSP: Okay, on a personal note I spoke to Rob Mundle last week and he spoke warmly of his friendship with you and the many times your paths have crossed over the years and with the glint in his eye, he did suggest I ask you about the story behind the nickname ‘Splash’ that you ended up with at some point along the way.

The spectacular Organ Pipes all yachts sail past in the Sydney to Hobart Race

PETER MONTGOMERY: You can thank Mundle for nothing. Actually it was Sefton. Well, there we were, we were invited to go to this stud about 60 miles north of Fremantle and the America’s Cup media had been taken up in coaches or buses to this incredible place where they had these beautiful white horses from Spain and did all these fantastic tricks.

Anyway, we were in this place and there was an indoor pool and alongside the pool was the Jacuzzi and we got to the stage of the night where people from various countries were invited up to do something, whether we were going to do the Haka or Pokarekare Ana or whatever, the New Zealand’s were invited up.

I got distracted as I was walking up and I managed to walk straight into the Jacuzzi. Hence Sefton called me Splash and unfortunately Mundle still remembers it. Our family are great fans of Mundle and what he’s done and what he’s written lately, he’s done an outstanding job and he’s being a very good journalist too during his time.

When I think of what Mundle was doing back during the 70’s and 80’s on the Sydney to Hobart, offshore racing and the America’s Cup writing for the Australian and all he did, there's just not those opportunities now and that is disappointing.

The Montgomerys - Johnny, Peter, Claudia and Kate find plenty to smile about

OSP: Yeah, some interesting parallels between the both of you with your contributions to respective countries from a broadcasting view around sailing. So finally Peter, I guess what music do you still have left inside you and what’s next for you?

PETER MONTGOMERY: Well I mean, I’m still involved in broadcasting, they’re talking to me about whether or not I’ll be in Bermuda next year and I may do some commentary even on Olympic sailing this year off tube, but now its the cost of the Olympics that are becoming extortionate and so prohibitive, that so many broadcasters in various countries, they’ll do it off tube from their own country.

Peter Montgomery awarded an MBE by New Zealand Governor General Dame Cath Tizard in 1995

I may do that and or the America’s Cup. I’m very mindful that it gets to the stage in life when it becomes someone else’s turn. I want to do other things while I can or dare I say it, before it’s too late. And spend time with my wife and family and other things and travelling, I’m still involved a hell of a lot doing stuff for various yacht clubs, I'm Patron of a couple of yacht clubs.

One a junior sailing club and another an indigenous, “The Mullet Boats” in Auckland. I’m heavily involved as a life member, the Royal New Zealand Yacht Squadron, doing a lot of functions for them. I’m still doing a lot behind the scenes and trying to give back; one, if various people I think I can and then two, while I can as well.

The Montgomery's, with Peter's mother, Anne, left, Claudia's mother Bonnie Brinsden, second from right and Dame Cath Tizard, centre at Government House with the Americas Cup in 1995

It’s been a very special experience for a long time and I’m mindful the opportunities I had for some, don’t exist today as we discussed because technology or the change in formats and it has been special.

OSP: Okay, it’s interesting hearing you talk about giving back, given you’ve been a great servant that’s given so much, it really does describe your character well I think. Before we wrap up, is there anything else, any other thoughts you want to share with me at all? Anything I haven’t asked you about, you want to comment on before we wrap up today Peter?

Peter in action supporting youth sailing

PETER MONTGOMERY: David, I’m looking here at Skype and we’ve gone for one hour 31 minutes. I think anybody who would want to listen to 1 hour 31 minutes with David Hows talking to Peter Montgomery needs a medal. If there’s anything else, cor-blimey their eyes would have glazed over by now.

OSP: I think you’re being a bit hard on yourself. This is such a good interview, we’ll break it into two episodes and without trying to sound too ‘made for TV’, so we’ll have a couple of 45-50 minute episodes, which will be great. I think you’ll find this is the extremely popular amongst our reasonably new, but growing audience. So Peter, I just want to wrap up by saying, thank you for putting aside your time generously. I emailed you out of the blue and you didn’t hesitate to say you’d make some time available when you could.

Peter Montgomery - sailor and broadcaster for more than 4 decades

It has really been an honour and a privilege to talk to you this morning and in my lifetime, I’m only 45, your impact on New Zealand is unparalleled and certainly you’ve carried us through so many highs and lows over four decades of yachting broadcasting and one thing that stands out for me is I guess is the pride and patriotism you’ve inspired in almost every household across the country during those Cup campaigns. I think when it comes to sailing, its probably a level that’s unlikely to be seen again. So I just want to say, thank you for your contribution and thank you for appearing on the podcast with me today.

PETER MONTGOMERY: Yeah, it’s been a pleasure, good luck and good sailing

Interviewer: David Hows

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Episode 5: John Lucas Show Notes

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OSP: This week we’re with John Lucas. So welcome along John and thanks for joining us on the Ocean Sailing Podcast and we’ve got a unique opportunity this week, we’re going to talk to John about his story from more than four decades ago now about an amazing trip that he made. John, tell us a little bit about what was this trip, where did this start, where did it end and where did the idea come from to start with?

John Lucas: Sure and good morning David. We call this particular expedition The Daydream Expedition where upon we sailed a flat bottom houseboat from Geelong, all the way to Thursday Island taking approximately three months. The whole issue started when a group of missionaries got together in Geelong and bought this houseboat.

After they had finished the houseboat they found that they couldn’t get it up to New Guinea in any way shape or form. They’d run out of money by that time, things weren’t going too well. On a particular day I came across the guys that put it together and I said, “Why don’t you sail it up?” And they said, “Well, we’re not too sure if that could be possible because we can’t even get it out past Point Henry,” which is a local signal station in Geelong.

One conversation led to another a month or so later I was approached and asked if it could really be done. I said, “Well, let’s give it a try.” So myself, Len Day who is one of the owners of the boat and two other people and the three of them had never been to sea in their life before. The were novices going to sea however Len had flown in the London to Sydney air race, so he was a pilot, not a seaman. So we rigged the boat up, we had advised Canberra of what we had in mind and they sent down something like 26 different departments to try and stop us from doing it. 

We had to meet all the regulations and in the end there was no reason why we couldn’t do it. However, I would say today, it would be impossible and you would not get the permission because of safety at sea rules. So we set the boat up, it was a flat-bottomed houseboat with a draft of 18 inches, two big rudders on the stern, quite a comfortable boat being a houseboat inside. We also rigged a mast, which carried a cat gaff-rigged sail and that was for the sake of an auxiliary if we had any problems with the motor. 

The motor in particular was a water jet motor that traversed 360 degrees, it was the invention of a local in Geelong who wanted us to give this particular engine a try so that was installed and it was a 310 horse power Perkins diesel, converted to over eight with the sea and cooling and we put the crew together and set off. Our first trip was down to Swan Bay for the night where we pulled in and Swan Bay is a very small bay down near Queens Cliff which is The Heads. The next morning we setup to go out of The Heads. 

Now, The Heads are known as one of the, if not the roughest, the second roughest stretch of water in the world, second only to the Cape. We were very cautious about how we go and tackle that, the first episode of course getting out of Swan Bay is we what? We ran aground. Surprise, surprise. This was a good start to the trip. However when we sorted that out, we got in touch with the Point Lonsdale light, which organises the traffic coming in and out through The Heads.

We were given the okay to make our way out so we put the big engine on, sails up. At the same time, there was the start of the Melbourne to Devonport, the up rise. The weather was pretty bad and they actually canceled the start of that but we being a little better at sailing decided that we’d take the risk and go out. Not a very smart idea if we found out halfway through.

But having done that, we made it through The Rip and not too long after making it through The Rip, our sail tore. So that was the first bit of damage on the boat. We knew that there was a sail maker close in at Flinders. We stripped the sails off, took the sails in, got them repaired, we ported in at Flinders of course, prepared the sail and prepared to go around Wilson’s Prom which again is pretty tricky if you catch it on the wrong day. That’s why they call it the second roughest stretch of water in the world. 

Well we ended up going around that in a four seven which was not very comfortable but the lucky part for us was actually on the stern. So halfway around and a number of quick prayers, we thought we’d be in trouble but we then found a refuge bay which is a safe little haven around the point there, so we pulled in there for the night, sat in there comfortably and the next morning things had quietened down a lot, so we took up along the coast.

We then got to our next stop and we wanted to go in and pick up some stores which was relatively easy to do on a flat bottom houseboat because you don’t have much of a draft. I lined up the leads to go in and I advised the crew that they were the leads, that’s how we got in and there’s quite an active discussion onboard with the guys that hadn’t sailed before who thought that there was an easier and softer and more gentler way to get through the quite big waves that were coming in.

Big argument pursued and my comment was, “Well, your boat, your problem, we will do it your way but don’t call me if you get into trouble.” Well halfway through, we’re in trouble, we were starting to broach and those sorts of things and after a time we finally made it in to a place called Inverloch, at which stage I said, “Well, thanks for the invitation to join you on this cruise but I think under the circumstances, I’m out of here.”

OSP: That’s quite an interesting place to be, given that you’re part way into a pretty long trip, to come to that conclusion quickly.

John Lucas: Yes, well the conclusion was drawn because I had lost the authority to run the boat. As we say in the classics, one ship, one captain. Again, I had the experience. I’ve been sailing since I was about eight year’s old. However, we worked through that issue and Len then said to me, “Well John, from this day on, you are now 100% in charge, what you say goes.” That’s a good idea that put all the pressure back on me. 

We then stayed in Inverloch for about two or three days until the weather had changed a little and then we continued our trip up along the coast. The local newspapers and TV stations were covering the trip and so we had a chat to them about our experiences getting through The Rip on a flat bottom houseboat which weren’t very comfortable. They were quite surprised that we had made it through.

The local sailors in the area complained and said how crazy we were and that we would have no hope whatsoever of taking this houseboat up to New Guinea. However as the day pursued, knowing that we’d taken every step for our safety, one of the crew members decided after the rough trip that the first few days that he’d quit, he had enough. I think it was either too slow or he was too concerned as to what might happen with this trip.

OSP: What sort of speeds were you doing do you think?

John Lucas: We were probably doing speeds, conservatively, around three to five knots. We had picked that particular time of year because it’s the start of the south east trades. So we pretty much had the wind on our stern most of the way. If we picked up some northerly weather we really had to pull off and park somewhere until the northerlies are gone. Because the houseboat had a chisel nose on it, which obviously didn’t take too kindly to northerly winds.

OSP: So what sort of angle could you sail to within. Beyond a reach how much further beyond could you go?

John Lucas: More than likely just on a reach. Yeah you certainly wouldn’t go into a beat of any sort. Again, because of the southwest prevailing, it was mostly up our tail or on a fair short of a reach, shy reach, which would carry on to a broad reach if we got a little bit more easterly into it.

OSP: So we’re looking at some of the newspaper cuttings from the time of the trip and this is before mobile phones existed and this was before internet existed. How did you communicate your story and your updates and your progress to the people that were following you and then on the media side?

John Lucas: Okay, well the government said that we would have to get a radio that was strong enough that we must radio in every evening to let them know where we were. We were doing that but we weren’t getting any response from them, they just weren’t there or weren’t listening and weren’t available. So whilst we tried every night, we pretty much didn’t get anywhere near them.

Philips had heard of our trip and they decided to sponsor us with a big radio, so they gave us the radio, which helped us immensely through the trip and we could keep in touch with people back home. We made it up to Ballina, we made it around the cape and up to Ballina, which is — I’ll just go back on that. We’re actually back in Sydney, I’m reading ahead on myself here. Ballina’s a little bit further on. 

Well we made it in to Sydney and we pulled into the Cruising Yacht Club of Australia (CYCA) who welcomed us and gave us a free berth for as long as we wanted to stay there, at that particular stage of course all the TV stations and the newspapers was starting to catch up with us and finding out where we were, what we’d been through and how we were handling the whole situation.

So we stayed in Sydney probably for about four or five days and when the weather cleared a little bit, we again took off through Sydney Heads and headed up towards Port Macquarie. That part of the trip was reasonably comfortable and it wasn’t until we get near Coffs Harbour that the wind picked up somewhat considerably and we were fighting 25 to 30 knot breezes. There were big ships that were passing us by that were bearing their bow and the spray was probably reaching 30, 40 foot up in the air, which made us look very small in comparison. Of course made us think twice about what we were doing.

OSP: How long was this vessel and how wide was it?

John Lucas: It was 40 foot long, if we go back to foot and inches and had an 18 inch draft. One of the problems we had with the water jet unit, which traversed 360 degrees, was okay but we found that we couldn’t get a lot of steerage out of the boat. So we had to put two big rudders on one on each of the stern quarters, which helped us immensely to turn the boat or to control the boat. That made it a lot easier. 

We got up to Coffs Harbour and the weather had certainly turned nasty but we were doing reasonably well, we didn’t have a lot of problems and we’d put quite a few miles behind us. After leaving Coffs, the next stop would have been Ballina and we were fighting some pretty big seas by that stage but we were running a bit short on fuel and running short on food and what have you. So we decided we should put into Ballina. We had to pull the sail down, kick the big motor over, lined up the bar and boy did we shoot in that bar.

We got in on port up at Ballina and this old fella came down, big beard, smoking a pipe, dirty old jacket on, said, “Who is in charge of this craft?” Not being in the best frame of mind at that that particular time, I said to him, “Who wants to know?” He said, “I do. I’m the harbour master.” I said, “That’s great.” He said, “Well I’ve never seen anything like that in my life.” He said, “I saw you coming up the coast,” he said, “Our bar has been closed for five days. I was out doing the garden and I saw you and thought you’re going to run for cover down around the point. 

Next thing I looked up and you were lining up the bar. I thought, “Well, I better get to the garage and grab the port’s closed signs and run them up the masthead,” which I did. The only problem was when I got them to the masthead, I had no cleats on them. He said, “By this stage, you had started coming over the bar and I just stood back in sheer amazement and couldn’t believe what I was seeing as you came through, well done.” My comment to him was, “Quite frankly, if you got those signs up, we wouldn’t have known what they meant anyway and we were coming in.” That was quite a bit of a challenge.

OSP: Well and quite a compliment in a way from a harbour master who sees all sorts of things happen and then to put in context, the east coast of Australia, the sand bars most of the way up and down the coast are pretty treacherous and they change and move around a lot and lots of them aren’t suitable most of the time in the conditions that we have.

John Lucas: Sure. Well going back in the early days, of course they’ve got a long way lately to making a lot of the bars a lot safer than they used to be.

OSP: To put this in context, what year are we talking about here? What year was this?

John Lucas: We’re talking about 1972.

OSP: So 44 years ago, just to put some context.

John Lucas: So 44 years ago, most of the only boats that generally used the bars were the fishing boats that knew the waters very well and spoke with the harbour master before they came in and out.

OSP: Okay. In terms of the trip John, what is the total distance from Geelong to Thursday Island?

John Lucas: Over 3,000 miles.

OSP: When you think about that, and you put that into context, that’s more than crossing the Tasman Sea twice and it will get you a fair way to South America if you were to sail across the ocean towards South America.

John Lucas: It most certainly would.

OSP: How old were you at the time?

John Lucas: I was 27 at the time, that might give you an indication as to how old I am now but how many sea miles I’ve done.

OSP: With the trip, how many people did you do the trip with?

John Lucas: Well it started off four of us and as I said, one of them got off but when we pulled in at Inverloch, we went to the local hotel to have a bar meal and a quick drink. We had little to drink on board but went to the bar to have a quick drink, we were talking to one of the young farmers there and he said, “Well where are you guys from and what are you doing?” We said, “We have this flat bottom houseboat and we’re trying to take it all the way to New Guinea.” He said, “Do you need help?” We said, “Yeah, actually we’re one short in the crew.” Well within the next half an hour he’d been home, packed his bags and he was on the boat.

OSP: Quickly.

John Lucas: He had had a bit of experience, so he had worked on trawlers and what have you, over the years, in between his farming, when he was cropping and what have you. But he was very keen, jumped on board and was a great help of course.

OSP: You made it out successfully over the bar again and you left Ballina and what happened next?

John Lucas: Okay, our next big bar to across was of course the bar at Surfer’s Paradise, which was notorious in those days. Most of the fishing boats that came out through there, used to have to run up the coast, find the channel and run back down. We had different things in mind because we knew we had a shallow draft and we heaved the boat straight through. 

Now, it was a pretty rough day and those that were at the local hotel, all came roaring out and thought that we’re going to see the greatest demise of a boat that had ever come through or crossed that bar. When we got in, of course there were great cheers and many of them came down the boat, brought a lot of alcohol with them, congratulated us and sat down on how to chat all day, all night about what we’d been doing, how we got to that stage, and what our next big trip was to be.

OSP: Great, a classic Gold Coast welcome. So then you stopped in the Gold Coast, and how long were you here for?

John Lucas: So after the Gold Coast and we were in the Gold Coast for about five days, again, waiting for a bit of a break in the weather. However we knew that there was an inside passage so we used the inside passage to go up to Morton Bay and out through Morton Bay to continue our journey.

Our next big problem was getting around Double Island Point. Once again, the weather was very heavy, the bar had been closed for a week or so. So we were stuck out there, we couldn’t go in, so we had to find somewhere to hide, which we did just around the corner of Double Island Point, there’s a little lagoon.

We carefully placed it out to make sure we could get in, we popped in there and had to sit in there for about four or five days before they reopened the bar. Now, we were in constant contact with them and the first prawn trawler that came out when they reopened the bar, hit the sand bar and disappeared completely.

OSP: Gosh. So it just sank?

John Lucas: It sank and there were no signs of it or any of the gear and as you would know, most fishing boats carry a lot of floatation gear, none of that was ever found. So what we assume happened was they were coming out sitting on the top of the wave, it dried out underneath them, the bow dropped off the wave, hit the bottom, the sand completely encompassed the boat and nothing was ever seen of them again.

We were called in to help to see if we could find them because the way they had settled quite a bit by then. So we traveled up and down the coast whilst the coast guard also went out looking for them, but they were never seen and no parts of the boat were ever found again.

OSP: Wow, puts the challenges and dangers of crossing bars into context when you hear a story like that.

John Lucas: Yes, most certainly. I think we all learn when we go sailing that the first thing to do when you’re crossing a bar is to try and get some local knowledge form somewhere because the bars do shift, there’s quite a bit of shifting sand. They can be in one place one day and different place the next. So local knowledge is certainly very, very important.

OSP: Okay, so what happened next?

John Lucas: From there of course was inland passage, which was lovely of course, going inside Fraser iIsland, coming out of the top, by that stage of course, you’re basically inside the Great Barrier Reef, you’ve gotten rid of a lot of the big swells that come up from down south and traveling was a lot more comfortable by that stage. We’d made a couple of stops to pickup fuel and then made our way up to Hamilton Island where we were warmly welcomed and then up to the group of islands there. 

Now, a lot of the people on the island had heard that we were coming up. They met us when we got in, we had some very wealthy business men approach us and asked us if we needed anything. We really didn’t but they said, “Well, what we’re going to do is we’re going to let you order as much steak and as much food as you can carry and as much fuel as you can carry and we’re even going to organise some paint for you if you want to paint the boat when you get up there.”

So we loaded up with all those things, thanking them very much that they were quite interested in the trip that we had taken and talking about it and what sort of problems we’d had and where we were going to go from here. So that was very helpful.

OSP: That’s a generous offer and crew will never turn down a good feed or a good meal after a long trip, so it was great to be able to stock up there.

John Lucas: Well by that time, the idea of having a steak was very good. But we had good cooking facilities on board. Surprisingly enough, many would ask us how the boat was traveling and when it rode a wave, it was very much like a surfboard so it went up basically level and then sunk down basically level. So you could take on a big sea a two metre sea or a three metre sea and ride the wave out quite nicely with the salt and pepper still on the table.

OSP: Wow. And it’s 40 foot long, what was the beam of the boat?

John Lucas: I can’t quite recall the beam.

OSP: Looking at pictures, it’s pretty big, right? Probably at least 15 feet maybe wide?

John Lucas: Yes. 16, 18 foot wide.

OSP: Okay. So what happened next?

John Lucas: So we then left there, which was absolutely lovely of course, going up to Rockhampton Mackay. As I say, once again, we were in calm seas by that stage. The motor was running pretty much all the time, not a lot of breeze, the breeze had dropped out, so we were looking forward to doing the last laps as we went up past Rockhampton, Mackay following the passage up through there, Townsville, Cairns. Had an engine problem in Cairns and had to call back home for new parts to replace, to keep the engine going.

We did find that the sail we’d set up came in very handy quite often through the trip but in this particular stage, it was all we had. So it did help us a fair bit of the way. So we’re pretty well up at Cairns by now and heading inside the Great Barrier Reef, which was quite pleasant, a lot of whales. We made it up to the very tip of Australia and right at the very tip of Australia, there’s a little channel that you got through and there’s a Japanese Pearling company.

Now that pearling company had been there for 50 odd years or so, which was quite interesting because we’d had a war with Japan, but the Japanese were up there pearling, we were invited into the pearl farms, fed up very well, drank some nice Japanese wine and they presented us with some of the pearls in particular some black pearls, which are quite expensive. They were very happy to see someone come in and have a chat to them, pull in, what have you. We stayed there for a couple of days before we started to make our way over to Thursday Island.

OSP: Pretty unique opportunity that you probably never would have imagined possible, especially if the cultural differences maybe even then, given that it wasn’t that long after the war really, 25, 30 years.

John Lucas: Yes, not long after which was quite surprising. When we got up there, we were met by the US Navy who then advised us, unbeknownst to us that they had basically been covering us on our trip all the way up with their technical gear, which would have been happy to know of course. But they had us on board, gave us a lovely meal, presented us with a United States Navy officer’s ring and made the comment that our trip sounded more exciting than the RA and Kontiki expeditions put together. Cause one thing you don’t normally do is put to sea in a flat bottom houseboat.

OSP: That’s a really nice touch. What a nice way to recognise the trip you’re undertaking given by this stage you’re probably on your way to your trip and in the final stages.

John Lucas: Yes, the final stages, the trip from Australia across to the islands was very rewarding, very comfortable, big seas had gone, we were glad to get in and looking forward to booking our flight to get back home, having been away for two days shy of three months.

OSP: Okay and then to the arrival at Thursday Island, describe how that unfolded?

John Lucas: Well we arrived at Thursday Island, which is regarded as a first port of call into New Guinea. So they have all the customs there, they have a customs hall. We had the customs officers come down and meet us, we had to fill out the official customs forms for getting in there but we were made quite welcome.

There were not a lot of Anglo Saxons actually made it up that way, so they were quite happy to see us. We did our official bit and our official paperwork, we booked our flight and spoke with the missionaries over in New Guinea who were to come over and pick the boat up and take it up to the Fly River.

OSP: Did you ever follow the boat after that? In terms of where it ended up?

John Lucas: I have no idea where it ended up, after having spent three months on it, which probably two days short of what we should have spent. It was constantly used, the Fly River is one of the largest navigable water ways in the world. We certainly had very little to do with the boat once it got there but the missionaries did use it to travel up and down the river and because of the 360 degree traversing water jet, it was quite comfortable on the river runs.

OSP: So when you’re think back now about the construction of the boat and the condition of it when you stepped on board was it fit for purpose or did you have challenges along the way with things breaking and wearing out and coming apart?

John Lucas: No, the boat held up extremely well, the only damage we really sustained apart from a few problems with the motors and the sails, we actually took a big brass - huge brass bell that we were going to give to the missionaries, we had that parked on the bow and when we came over the Ballina Bar, with a fair bit of water smashing across there, we lost the bell. So I have no doubt the bell is still down the bottom of the Ballina Bar. But the boat was in good condition when we handed it over.

OSP: What was it constructed out of?

John Lucas: It had a steel hull on it, built very much like a barge. So it had a chisel nose on it and of course the upper deck was in ply. We put two ex-aircraft seats on the back so that we’d be comfortable sitting on the wheel, we ran shifts of course as we went up there, it was sort of four on and eight off as we swung to people looking after the craft while the others were asleep. But it was much appreciated when I got up there.

OSP: Okay, what were the bunks like in terms of sleep, did you get a good night’s sleep?

John Lucas: Yes, always a good night’s sleep because it had four cabins and each cabin had two bunks in it and they were very comfortable bunks and all in all from the point of view of those that do sail and sail mono-hulls where you’re on a slant most of the time. We’re on a flat surface and could get actually get a good night’s sleep.

The Houseboat - Daydream

OSP: When you think about that, that changes things a lot doesn’t it when you are flat almost all of the time. What about managing provisions, cooking and refrigeration, did you have refrigeration?

John Lucas: Yes we had refrigeration but once again because of the shallow draft, we could get in wherever we needed to get into pick up fuel and to pick up fresh goods, bread and milk, the lunch was normally two slices of bread with some sliced cheese in it and a raw tomato. The idea of losing a lot of weight on the trip certainly came true, I think I dropped about two stone.

OSP: Okay, and did you have much success with fishing along the way?

John Lucas: We did, we’ve had a line in from time to time, never caught much. However when we got up near Cairns and Townsville, there were a lot of Spanish Mackerel around. Spanish Mackerel are a very good fighting fish and you really don’t have to use bait, you can actually put a colored ribbon on your hook and throw it in and they’ll snap at anything.

The aircraft seat installed for helming comfortably

So we had a lot of Spanish Mackerel to eat, plus from time to time we would run into prawn trawlers and we would offer to buy some prawns off them but being the good fellas they are and being boaties, all boaties are good friends, they would give us bags and bags of prawns, which everyone would enjoy of course and did not want to charge us anything.

OSP: Okay. So if you think about the people in the three-month trip, it’s a long trip. After that initial incident coming over the bar, where you had almost had a bit of a mutiny going on, how did people get along? Did you have people all got along well? Did you have personality clashes at times? Did you have things that became large thorns in your heel by the end of the trip?

John Lucas: Yes, there were those times and that’s because you’re living in closed quarters of course. So there was a small breakdown between the crew and the skipper and the skipper and the owner were sort of 50% of the road and the crew were the other 50%.

So there were times when we had to call everyone into a meeting and say, “Look, if you’re going to let anyone down, you’re going to let the team down if you don’t participate and do what we expect of you. They all came around, there were no big blues or arguments, there was just some grumpy little incidents that came up over the trip.

OSP: Which is pretty natural, three months together in a space like that. You talked about the multitude of government agencies involved and getting approvals to do the trip, what did you have to do back then in terms of safety equipment and what was the plan if it all turned to custard?

John Lucas: Well, as I said, at that particular time, just prior to that, all the States used to look after their own coastline and three or six months before we did the trip, what the government did was they put them all into Canberra so that it then became the centre to say you have to go to Canberra. So I think Canberra were all interested in coming down and having a look at checking safety. So we had to rig the boat with a lot of safety gear up to date; jackets, right arrows, flares, charts and anything else you can think of that might be in our safety. As I say, today, you would not be allowed to do something like this. You just would not be able to meet the safety standards.

Quite the pin-up poster boy

OSP: Okay, when we think about the trip, did you have any really hairy moments or times when you actually wondered if you’re going to get through?

John Lucas: Yes, hairy moments, probably three months. No, not quite. Going out through The Rip is always a testing time. There were 19 commandos back then who had to paddle across the front of The Rip and they were all lost. They all drowned and they were commandos. There was a pilot boat and pilot boats are a very, very safe boat. They lock up all the hatches if they roll over, they pretty much come back up the other way, however two boats had been lost at sea going out through The Rip. 

It’s pretty treacherous passage of water. It’s one that the Sydney Habour sailors don’t look forward to when they’re coming across there because you’ve got all that big water coming across from the west, you got all that run down the southeast coast, you’ve got that big winds and seas coming up from the south and it all meets there and it can be flat calm at one instance and really bubbling at the next.

Hoisting sails required tw0 crew in stronger breeze

Wilson’s Prom was obviously a, more than a challenge. At one stage, I certainly believed that we’re in trouble until we come upon Refuge Cove but a lot of the yachties know where Refuge Cove is and a lot of them do use that as a safety mooring overnight. The bars up along the coast were obviously very challenging. Back in those days, once again, you didn’t have the advice that you have today. 

We did, it was one of the first books that Allan Lucas — no relation to him by the way — actually wrote and we were using that one as the bible as we went up. I found that very, very informative and very, very helpful but certainly many of the bars created a lot of problems but once again, once we got inside Fraser Island and up past the Whitsundays, it was just magic. It was probably some of the best sailing I’ve done in the world.

OSP: Okay, it’s interesting that the trip is more than 40 years ago but you’ve got really vivid memories of quite a lot of the detail of the trip. It must have had quite a big impact on your life obviously at that point. But what have you done since or what did you do next? Following something like that, it must have almost been a challenge to go back to a day job and a regular sort of nine to five life.
 
John Lucas: Well fortunately for me, I was in show business back then and we would probably only bring one or two shows. I was Elton John’s Australian tour manager, did shows like the Bee Gees, Suzi Quatro and what have you. So I would probably only do two big shows a year, so I did have a lot of time to do so many things like this. 

The Daydream motor sailing in fair weather

But I started at the Royal Geelong Yacht Club at the age of eight, in Yachting World Cadet dinghies and I was the youngest member of Royal Geelong to have a Quick Cat Catamaran which was designed by Charlie Cunningham, was a single handed boat. I was certainly too small and too young to handle it, so that was quite a challenge and I’ve had several boats since then.

OSP: Okay, and have you done much in the way of offshore passages or have you been mostly coastal cruising or done a bit of racing? What’s your sailing been year round?

John Lucas: Done a bit of everything. I spent a bit of time over in the Isle of White. Lived in the Greek Islands for about three months, did a lot of sailing around the Greek islands, lived in the south of France for about six months, done a lot of sailing through the South of France. So I spent a lot of time on the water doing racing and cruising.

OSP: Okay. That’s great, and what else would you like to tell me about the trip or your experience that I haven’t asked you about?

The Daydream under motor in spectacular conditions

John Lucas: Well, as I say, the newspapers and the TV stations covered the trip pretty extensively and so I have a good record of the trip and my son was looking over the records only a few years back and he said to me, “Dad, if I wanted to do something like that, would you let me?” And I said, “No bloody way son.”

OSP: What did your parents think of it at the time?

John Lucas: My parents and my girlfriend who I finally married and have been married to for over 42 years, all had a trying time waiting because it wasn’t all that often that they heard from us and they picked up most of their information from the newspapers. So they didn’t know where we were or what was going on. The family were very apprehensive.

OSP: Which is pretty natural because that’s not a common voyage that someone does, let alone in a houseboat. It’s not really made for that kind of thing I guess, but shows you what’s possible if it’s well constructed and you’ve got capable people on board. 

John Lucas: Yeah, we do think all things are possible and I think sailing comes down to riding a bike and driving a car and as much you’re on the side of caution and you just take everything as it comes and you work through the issues. But homework again is probably one of the most important things. Understanding the crew is certainly another one and the crew’s requirements. So it’s all a fair sort of a challenge, but something — this was a once in a lifetime opportunity, something that no one else has ever done, and no one else is probably silly enough to ever do it again.

OSP: They won’t be allowed to.

John Lucas: Let alone be allowed to, yeah. But it was an exciting voyage.

OSP: It’s a great story and I really appreciate you taking the time to share it with us today so that people can listen and understand and learn about a story that they would probably not be aware of. Particularly given this predates when even media content was online. Certainly what I’d like to do is scan or photograph some of the material you’ve got here and post it online because it will allow anybody listening to this to then go online to the show notes.

John Lucas: Yes I’m sure they’d appreciate seeing what the boat looked like.

Built like an ocean going tank

OSP: Yeah that’s right, visually, it brings it to life and when you look at it, it puts it into context. It’s quite staggering and the mast relative to the size of the boat, it’s not a big mast, so clearly it’s not going to be moving at a great pace. With that, how much of the time where you motoring and how did you manage fuel requirements and carrying enough fuel?

John Lucas: Look, we were probably motoring most of the time but once again because it had a shallow draft, we could get in and out when we needed to fuel.

OSP: Well that’s excellent John, I really appreciate you putting the time aside and we’ll capture this and post it online and be ready to share it, it’s really a fascinating story. I was amazed when you told me about the story, maybe about a year ago now, you mentioned it to me. What a fascinating story.

John Lucas: I do mention it from time to time and the local papers back home have a history of it of course and they’re always asking about it. But other than that I basically haven’t done much with it. I’ve been asked on a number of occasions to do a book on it. I’m not a bookie person so I wonder whether that will ever get done.

OSP: Well it’s a lot easier to talk than to write. Well that’s great. Well thank you for appearing on the Ocean Sailing Podcast this week and look forward to being able to share your story with everybody.

John Lucas: You’re welcome Dave

Interviewer: David Hows

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Episode 4: Ray McMahon Show Notes

OSP: Hi Ray, thanks for joining us on the Ocean Sailing Podcast today. It’s great to be able to chat to you about the history of the Southport Yacht Club. Its 70 years old this year and interestingly when we chatted a little while back you explained how it’s not always been a sailing focused yacht club, even though it always had the name Southport Yacht Club. So, tell me about the birth of the yacht club initially and what really drove the development of the sailing club well we were largely a power boater’s domain back then. 

Ray McMahon: As you said David the yacht club is 70 years old and in fact in just three short weeks from now, on April 19th we celebrate the 70th anniversary from when the club was first incorporated back in 1946. Over the years the club has gone through many changes, power boaters, sailors alike have frequented the club and used the club and both have used it with great excitement. And there’s been several attempts over the years to create a racing club here as well, as another arm of the Southport Yacht Club but I think over the last 10 years it’s been the most successful. We now have a serious racing division at the club and we have got over 500 races this year at the Southport Yacht Club.

Ray McMahon as MC at Sail Paradise 2016

OSP: Well, that’s more than on a day, it’s a pretty good batting average.

Ray McMahon: It’s a big ask, isn’t it? And the people behind it do a damn good job and having to keep up with the pace as well, yes more than one a day.

OSP: Okay, when racing started off at Southport, did it start at Southport Yacht Club first? Were
there other sailing clubs in the early days on the Broadwater? 

Ray McMahon: Look, clubs have come and gone and there are still other a few clubs around here on the Broadwater but the Southport Yacht Club seems to be the one that’s survived the test of time and obviously in surviving the test of time has grown and grown into what it is today.

OSP: Okay. And what I find unique about the facility here is its got a big food and beverage business and It’s in a unique location and my experience has been that most yacht clubs struggle to operate food and beverage other than Friday, Saturday and maybe a Sunday and they don’t have the patronage that we have at the club. How much of that contributes to the ability of the club to invest and grow, outside of revenue from Marina berths and sailing fees and all that kind of stuff?

Ray McMahon: Yes, massive contribution. The food and beverage brings new people into the club and they discover the sport and want to be involved. Part of the reason why this is busy 7 days of the week is again the 70 years it’s been here. It’s been here a long time if you’ve opened a restaurant up, we all know the first few years are the toughest ones but it’s been here for 70 years, its 7 days a week. 

We are also a bit unique on the Gold Coast as well in that we have got this fantastic weather pattern, where even our winters don’t really hurt us too much so we can be out on the deck four seasons of the year and enjoying it. We are also very blessed to have the view that we have got here. Those people 70 years ago that setup the club put it in probably one of the best spots you could on Broadwater.

OSP: It’s pretty unique and enviable. Surely there is plenty of cases where yacht clubs don’t have
waterfront views or water frontage in terms of what they look out at so that makes it a unique facility.

Southport Yacht Club offshore racing is friendly but extremely competitive

Ray McMahon: Absolutely and if you travel up the down the east coast yacht clubs, many of them have pleasant views of fishing trawlers etc and that is unfortunate for them because I am sure they would like to have our view, but yes we are lucky. We are blessed to have the fantastic location, fantastic view and all this helps the club to go forward. 

OSP: So, tell me about when yacht racing actually got started here at Southport, how did it get started? Was it inshore, was it offshore? Tell me about those early days.

Ray McMahon: Yes I will take you back to almost 10 years ago, which I would term the modern era of yacht racing here at the club. There were a few attempts that have come and gone, but for many years the club has owned our sailing squadron up at Hollywell as well which is a brilliant venue, its great and kids learn to sail up there and there are some amazing sailors such as Matthew Belcher that have come out of Southport Yacht Club.

Kids start learning how to sail on opti’s and sabers and then into teenage years on slightly larger boats. And we have had a fairly strong inshore fleet and for what I would say trailer size sailing boats. But we have never really had a big boat keelboat series that’s been successful for a number of years. 

I moved here from Sydney just over 10 years ago around the same time as another guy famous with yacht racing in this country; Rob Mundle who had moved here about a year before me, also from Sydney and a few locals around here Matthew Percy a former Olympic sailor, John Hall who was known up here as a broker, and Lee Dorrington another ship broker. These guys all got together some 10 years ago and realised there was nothing really happening out of the Main Beach clubhouse for big boats. I think our complete racing calendar for the year for big boats was about 5 races.

Formative years at the Southport Yacht Club

OSP: Wow!

Ray McMahon: Yes. It’s nothing when you consider going to other clubs that would have 70, 80 or 100 races for the year for big boats. So, the guys got together and formed a twilight races series because twilight racing is the big thing around the world. Its social, yes it is racing, but the bottom line it is social. Not too scared to have a drink in hand while sailing around in a twilight race. Every club these days that is successful has got a strong twilight race series and most clubs do them throughout the summer. 

So about 10 years ago these guys got together and formed the group called the KBG as opposed to the Russian Secret Service, which is the KGB. We were the KBG which stands for the Keel Boat Group and we organised a race series for 8 Thursday afternoons on 8 consecutive Thursdays in the summer and thought we would see how this goes. We had no real idea what was going to happen after that. So in first race when we had 5 boats which was quite exciting and when the eight weeks were up and I think that every boat owner and every crew person was like ”oh, what do we do now, its been a great 8 weeks and it had ended in mid March. 

So we started again in spring later that year with a much longer twilight series of 13 weeks, which was 6 weeks pre-Christmas and 7 weeks post-Christmas and then at the end of that we found ourselves saying, “what do we do now?”. It was about our 3rd year we decided that why don’t we run our twilights through the winter as well.  Just because other clubs don’t do it doesn’t mean we can’t when we have got the weather here. So we decided to have a spring summer and winter series. Cut a long story short now we have 42 twilight races each year, we have three series throughout the year. 

So we do a 14-week series and then have a 3-week break and a 14-week series and a 3-week break. So throughout the year we are doing 14 weeks on and 3 weeks off and over Christmas we have the 4 weeks off. So twilight racing really was the start of what is now building into a fantastic keelboat fleet and offshore racing. Probably about 5 years ago we then also realised perhaps offshore racing could start to lift as well and not to preempt any criticism about offshore racing, but this year now the club now has 76 races for the year for keelboats with a combination of twilight and offshore racing. It’s a long way from the 5 races 10 years ago.

OSP: It’s a substantial change. What about the fleet sizes for twilights and offshore what sort of
numbers are you seeing with this kind of frequency? Is there fatigue with the increase in race
numbers, is there fall off or is the opposite happening in terms of growth in race numbers?

The Broadwater before it was dredged and before the Seaway Entrance was established

Ray McMahon: Interesting question. I think to a degree our fleets are fairly typical Gold Coast and what I mean by that is Gold Coast is a rather transient area. People come, stay for their 5 or 6 years and eventually move on. Others like myself love it here will stay forever but it’s quite transient. So, I have been finding that our fleets are literarily the same with the people who come and sail with us for 4 or 5 years and potentially move on. 

So our numbers are good. In a twilight race we have around 20 and have had as many as 30 out there which is great and our offshore fleet is undergoing unprecedented increase in fleet numbers as well. But at first I was a little concerned how we were getting to 20 and weren’t climbing above that and I have noticed we have lost some boats. 

But looking at where we lost them we only lost them because the boat had been sold when the owner had moved on or the owner had moved and taken the boat with him to another part of Australia. So we weren’t losing them for reasons of not enjoying the club or not doing the right thing, we only lost the boats because they were changing their post code. So I have had to come to terms with that. As much as I am builder I like building things. I don’t mean a builder as in houses I just like building businesses or whatever. Now we get the growth in numbers and we get to lose a few I have got to accept that. I don’t like it but that’s Gold Coast. People will transit to the other capital cities of Australia.

OSP: Ok. So, if we go back to those early years and again how the KBG were operating. So they were operating outside of the Southport Yacht Club initially and then the yacht club approached you I think for and talked to you about using their facility. How did you go from operating outside of The Southport Yacht Club on probably minimal resources to then suddenly morphing into it and working inside the Southport Yacht Club? How did that all come about? 

Ray McMahon: Yes. You are absolutely right David. Initially in the early days and I will give you a bit of a background to how tough it was, John Hall one of the guys I mentioned earlier, he is a solicitor. We wanted to have John involved because John was able to draft up documents to ensure that in the event of an accident, I hope it never happens obviously, but that we are indemnified against that risk and obviously we had to get aquatic permits and so on and to get aquatic permits you have to make sure you have structures in place etcetera. 

Southport Yacht Club is an world class facility in 2016

So having a solicitor onboard was very handy for him to actually draw up a lot of this gear and make sure we were doing the right thing and make sure we were going the right way. So, we did a lot of work behind the scenes ourselves. Every week we were on the phone talking to other boat owners trying to get them involved. 

Lee Dorrington who was a boat broker and involved in the early days, used to walk up around the marina literary knocking on the boats doors when he saw an owner onboard saying, “Hey, you want to come and join us for a sail?” And we were doing all the work. That’s fun. We were happy to do that. We wanted to go racing ourselves so no problem. But you are correct I think the club saw it was going well, after attempts in previous times where it hadn’t been successful, so the club thought it was going on well and were approached to bring the Keel boat group under the banner of the Southport Yacht Club. 

I must admit to a rousing round of applause to the guys that did all the hard work, because we all had businesses to run or jobs etcetera and that was kind of a bit of a light at the end of the tunnel, after the work that we had done. For the club to take over and run it through their already structured administrative system was great. 

So that happened which was great and we basically handed the reigns over to the club. There was teething issues at the time and I think at one stage we found we had almost lost a few boats, but I think the owners felt perhaps we had actually (the KBG guys involved) had stepped back too much and we knew what the owners wanted because we started the structure. 

So a few of us are still very much involved now and again to make sure what started, maintains its progress etcetera. So the club now runs it, which is great, a few of us are still involved to help with the running of it, but the KBG is long gone. A lot of fun but a lot of hard work at the time.

Early Gold Coast days before the Southport Yacht Club was established

OSP: It’s interesting. And who were some of the colourful personalities behind this in those in the early days and are they still around today?

Ray McMahon: There are two of us still around today very much so. Colourful, absolutely. Lee Dorrington a broker as I mentioned earlier, Lee is one of the most colourful guys you will ever meet and those that know Lee, I am sure we will be going “yes he is colourful”. He is ok, he has got the beard and the long hair and when he is on the dock is not afraid to call a spade a spade. 

Great guy real good bloke, happy to call him my mate and actually he just recently attended last years presentation night and we actually got him to present a few prizes because he was one of the guys that actually started his whole big ball rolling. He is a great colourful character and he is in Sydney these days. Matthew Percy longest member here at the club, Vice Commodore of Sail at one stage, former Olympic sailor as I said earlier and Matt again colourful character. Matt is about 6ft 7 and probably about 130 kilos, so when Matt’s in a room you know it. And Matt being a character he is, uses his very bold stature and when he is in the room and he will put his hand on your shoulder you know Matt is the only person it could be. 
        
So Matt is a very colourful character and a guy that has been part of the sailing of this club for many years and I am sure he will be for many more years. John Hall who was our solicitor at the time John now lives in Melbourne and John is a lovely bloke, great guy, fairly quiet and I guess to a degree he just went about his business and made no fuss. And then we all know in the yachting world Rob Mundle. Rob is still very much involved at the club. Rob is a past Commodore of the club went on to become Commodore of the club shortly after the KBG days and Rob has written many hundreds of articles regarding sailing and yachting around the word and now he is getting more notable as an author of maritime books and doing a great job and still very much involved here at the yacht club.

OSP: Its quite fascinating when you think Rob is pretty understated guy, comes out and sails, nice guy but then you go to the bookshop and there is a whole lot of books there and then you listen to the commentary on the Hamilton Race week on TV, there is Rob’s voice and you wouldn’t know it is the same guy.

Ray McMahon: Yes. Its true and every now and then Rob asks me if there are any spare crew if he is short of crew for his boat, so I will put someone onboard and I will say to the person you are in Rob Mundle’s boat today and often I get back “The Rob Mundle” “Yes, the Rob Mundle”. He is ok, he is cool, he doesn’t bark he doesn’t bite, so he is just a good old bloke that gets out there and I don’t mean “old” Rob, but he is just a good bloke that gets out about there and has a sail. Yes very much understated as you said.

Southport Yacht Club early years

OSP: Ok. So when you look at the last 10 years have there been any moments at the club where the sailing just kept going because of a core group of passionate people or has it’ just gone from strength to strength over the last 10 years?

Ray McMahon: I guess if you have to really answer that in a short phrase, it has gone from strength to strength to strength. Obviously there have been patches where there has been lulls and the odd J curve and the GFC hurt boating and yachting around the world. So, it hurt us to be sure and many of us including myself a few times questioned was it going to survive and keep going, but fortunately those questions where 1% of our thinking and 99% were how do we go forward? How do we progress and so on. So, on a whole I would say it has kept going forward from strength to strength, with the odd speed bump rather than mountain to overcome. 

The Broadwater before the Southport Yacht Club was established

OSP: It was just too expected. Okay, so, when you look at some of the prestigious clubs, well established clubs around Australia CYCA, Royal Prince Alfred, Royal Victoria, Royal Perth and Middle Harbour, how would you say the Southport Yacht Club compares and where are the areas that we could still be better at or build strength, competency and reputation with?

Ray McMahon: As a club we compare very well with the ones you mentioned and other clubs around the country. Obviously I can’t speak for them but speaking for ourselves, we are a strong club financially and with growth and we are quite a strong club that’s had good management here over the years and I think we compete and compare with the best around the country. 

On the water it’s certainly a different story. Certainly our juniors have been very much competing and comparing with the best around the country and we have got a fantastic credibility at junior regattas where the Southport sailors will come home with all the cookies. In bigger boats, in keelboats it hasn’t quite been that way. There has been periods throughout the club’s lifetime, but in my time here (and I came from Sydney and was a member of the CYCA) and I felt our fleet was a little naïve at the time, and again five races breeds naivety and probably everybody knows everybody. 

But it was a little naïve at the time and so therefore in building a race series, we have also had to ensure that we built the skills of our skippers and crews to go along with that. We knew we would get to a stage where we had 20, 30, 40 even 100 boats out racing and potentially with 100 Muppet’s at the helm, you don’t want that, that’s dangerous. So, we had to make sure we kept increasing our skills for our crews and our skippers along the way. Where are we today compared to other clubs? Well, we are building and we have got a great yacht club here but we are building a racing keel boat division and where we have come in 10 years is amazing and I know that David, I’ll have this conversation again with you in 10 years time and we will be going even better. 

The last couple of years we have been able to bring home a few decent trophies back here to the club. A local boat won the Beneteau Cup, which was great, another local boat won its division in the 2015 Sydney to Gold Coast race and another in Airlie Beach Race Week. Things like that 10 years ago was just not going to happen. Now our keel boats are starting to compete with the bigger clubs on the water. We always competed with them as a club venue and I am convinced 10 years from now we will just be as strong at competition level with the ones you mentioned.

The Southport Yacht Club at the head of the Broadwater today

OSP: So somebody who is listening to this may have read about sailing, they may have always dreamed about getting to the sailing. You look at a yacht club and you look at these expensive boats sitting there. How easy is it to actually get into sailing and become a sailor and step onboard with no experience and just doing some sailing? How do you go about that and how easy is it?

Ray McMahon: One of the great anomalies about this sport I am sure people sit on the shoreline and see a beautiful yacht go past and think God I wish I could do that, how do I get onboard? Well it’s actually easy, you just walk in the front door of the yacht and we will happily do our best to find you a ride on a boat that suits you and your personality. And again adding to that, it’s also quite bit funny that often we struggle to find crew and you get people who say, what are you kidding me? And yes its true boats will go out sometimes needing 10 crew and they will have 8 or 7 because we often struggle to find crew. 

We obviously struggle to find very good crew, but sometimes we just struggle to find any crew just to fill spots. So it’s quite easy to get into, it’s a great sport, its very healthy sport, you don’t
have the drug issues that some other sports have unfortunately for them. We are a very clean sport which is great and we spend our entire time out there on the water in the fresh air and it’s just great. The camaraderie is just great as well we will go out there and have a race and then back in the club will be the stories how I let you beat me etcetera and its great camaraderie and we have a good club house that makes it even easier to do that, but yes get down here, come for a sail and I promise you the only drug that we have in sailing is your own personal drug of “you want to come back again and again and again”. It’s great fun.

OSP: It’s very addictive. It’s one of the few sports where you can enter at any age. You can be 50, 
overweight, out of shape and be a great sailor, right? You don’t have to be an athlete and you still don’t need to have steroids to help you with that, because clearly it’s not that demanding.

Ray McMahon: Absolutely right.

Southport Yacht Club foiling catamarans racing on the Gold Coast

OSP: …quite extreme although with dingy sailing and some of those high performance sail boats, you need to be very fit and athletic, but keel boats are pretty easy to enter at any age really, age 16 or age 66.

Ray McMahon: Absolutely right. You can come here for a sail. We start taking kids from age 7 here at the club, we will start teaching them from 7 years of age and again if you go to the other extreme, there are guys like Syd Fisher who are out there so you don’t need to be young.

OSP: Syd Fisher recently retired.

Ray McMahon: I don’t think he ever retired but Syd has been doing Sydney to Hobart at nearly 90 years of age and that is just outrageous. So, it’s a sport you can do your entire life and you talk fitness levels, you are right. You choose the level of the sport that suits you. If you are a gung ho, super fit person and you want to get into that style go for it. But if you a person you are just of average fitness and you just want to go out there and enjoy your sailing well, there are areas for that as well. I know people that have done the Hobart that probably couldn’t run 100 meters but they were good at what they had to do on the boat. 

OSP: And there’s boats and cultures for everyone in the sense you have high performance crews on one level and then you have the cruising boats that do social sailing they are not that serious about racing but more serious about having a good time and so you can pick your boat, pick your crew, find your spot and you will see  how seriously or not you want to take it.

Ray McMahon: And that is exactly right I couldn’t have put it better myself, its exactly right.

OSP: Two years ago I was at my neighbourhood barbecue and one of my neighbours said “I have always wanted to do the Sydney Hobart” and I said “that’s fantastic, how much sailing have you done?” He said “none”. I just like watching it in TV and he is now racing with me as a brand new sailor that started only two years ago. He is a great sailor already and started from nothing, so it’s a sport you can learn as quickly as you want in terms of the people around you and resources and courses and books that are available and it’s a sport no matter how much you learn you never stop learning.

Ray McMahon: It’s great. Will he get to do that Sydney to Hobart?

OSP: This year.

Ray McMahon: So he is good enough, he has learned enough.

OSP: Yes.

Lasers racing out of Southport Yacht Club Hollywell on the Gold Coast

Ray McMahon: Fantastic and that is great. And that is the sort of the story I would love to hear as well.

OSP: It’s a great outcome.

Ray McMahon: 3 years is a great outcome. It’s a good story and I would love to hear that sort of thing and really how simple it is. It’s one of those sports where you get started you enjoy it, hook into it because the sky is the limit. There are so many interesting things and we have mentioned Hobart a few different times. The Hobart race is great but these days there are so many things around the world that you can be involved in with the America’s Cup etcetera. There is all this fantastic racing all over the world these days that you can be involved in.

OSP: And you can make a living out of it too, right?

Ray McMahon: Indeed so.

OSP: I remember 30 years ago, Brad Butterworth sailing in the Citizen Match Racing Cup on Auckland Harbour with Russell Coutts in as amateurs and didn’t earn a bean from that you think about 30 years later, how the world has changed. So it’s a career path as well.

Ray McMahon: You are absolutely right. I think take Matthew Belcher, hasn’t worked for several years now, he just sails.

OSP: An interesting stat from the 2007 Americas cup. The average age of the winning team was 53 years.

Ray McMahon: And what is it today?

OSP: Its probably 33 I would say you look at those high speed soiling cats and it shows there is plenty of brain power required not just out and out braun.

Ray McMahon: Absolutely right but the good part us old guys (and I am over that 53 mark) but us old guys are still useful because it’s a kind of sport where experience does count for so much as well. You need a good mixture of youth and enthusiasm and experience.

OSP: Yes. absolutely. It’s a good analogy for lots of part of life I think. So our premier event at the
Southport Yacht Club is Sail Paradise and it attracts  40-50 entries and if you look around the country events like Hamilton Island, Airlie Beach and Geelong Race weeks, they attract some really big fleets. So when you look at the location here at the famous Gold Coast, where there is 50,000 to 100,000 tourists every week and it’s got this beautiful year round climate. What do you think we need to do differently or more of to grow Sail Paradise into a more significant event on the national calendar from a keel point of view? 

The Gold Coast, Queensland makes a great backdrop for Southport Yacht Club offshore racing

Ray McMahon: Good question. One of the great things like the one you mentioned earlier is that events like Hammo have been running for a number of years. So they have obviously got that time factor on their side and they are great with regattas and they run very well and I enjoy going to them all. The Sail Paradise regatta is only new and its been running now for about 5 years and I think and we really used the first 4 years as a bit of trial and error.
    
We learnt a lot in the first 4 years and this year in the most recent event we have just held, in January a few months ago, I really believe we got it right. And I hope I viewed that correctly as an organiser in watching it. The previous year I was one of the organisers as well and we got it wrong in so many areas. So we learnt from that and we had the same organising team working on it for a bit over 12 months, which makes it handy to get a second crack at it and we got it right this year. So, from this we will build. I am convinced our 40 to 50 this year would turn in 60 to 70 next year and again not wishing to be complacent, I will do my darnedest to make sure we get it right next year, so that 60 to 70 turns in 80 to 90 the year after.

So, that’s what I believe we have to do to improve Sail Paradise. Its one thing to get it up and running and build it, but you have to make sure that every year we are not complacent. If we have a good year let’s not sit back and pat ourselves in the back, lets have 10 second pat on the back and then go right back out and ask what can we do better next year? So that is the big one I think and lack of complacency is very important and I know we don’t have the complacency problem. 

So we will just spend time and keep building and listening to what they want, listen to the skippers. Skippers and crews always have different requirements, crew are a little bit easier, but skippers are the ones footing the bill and they have to get the boat there, get the boat home and so on, so listening to the skippers and the crews requirements and catering to them in the best possible way is super important, but again we are looking into the future I really believe that  one day we will be talking about Sail Paradise in the same sentence as the Hamilton Island, Airlie and Geelong Race weeks, because we would have had time and hopefully we will have the same organisers in that period of time as well, to make sure we keep building it and I look forward to where it’s going.

OSP: Well that’s exciting and when you look at the fact that there is a couple of thousand yachts spread across a number of marinas up on Moreton Bay, just 5 to 6 hours motoring from here if you can make it down here through the Broadwater or probably twice as long if you come down the outside, but there is a reasonably large pool of boats that have the potential to compete so it’s not like we need them to come from Sydney, they are not that far away.

Sail Paradise the premier regatta that the Southport Yacht hosts every January

Ray McMahon: Its true and we were lucky to have boats from many clubs competing this year, so it wasn’t the case of just one club supporting the event. This year we had a good spread across many clubs and I was quite excited to hear that they were all going home to tell their club mates what a great event it was and how we will access those couple of thousands of boats that are within a few hours north and south of us, is by someone from their club coming here, experiencing our regatta, experiencing the hospitality of Southport Yacht Club and then going back to their club and saying to their other members “hey guys we are good for next year, you want to go there too”. 
    
What we don’t want is people going back to their clubs and saying, “don’t waste your time, it was terrible.” That is what we don’t want and we hope we never ever have that and if we do well, we have got to fix it. But this year we were fortunate to get it right and some people have gone back to their clubs and actually said exactly that and I reckon several other club members will be here next year and if we can convert those additional next year in going back as well, that is exactly how we get all those boats up the road on Moreton Bay to come down for it.

OSP: That is exciting. There is nothing more exciting, whether you are a keelboat crew who do a little bit of racing or a serious sort of keel boat racer in having 20 or 30 or 50 or 70 boats on the start line. It’s a real buzz as opposed to 5 or 10. So as if those things start to build more too, it builds that buzz and that kind of atmosphere. 

Ray McMahon: With the thousand of races I have done, I still love it when I am on the start line and there is 100 plus boats and it doesn’t matter if its literally a twilight afternoon race which is potentially low key in the racing ladder. But when there is 100 boats on the start line the adrenaline the excitement level for that is off the planet and that is where your competitive side kicks in as well. If there are 100 boats beside you, you don’t want to be boat 100, you are getting up there as far as you can. If there is three boats beside you, you can always say you ran in third but when there is 100 boats around you, you want to make sure you are up in single figures.

OSP: You have got you eyes in the back of your sails when there is 100 boats beside you.

Ray McMahon: Oh yes absolutely.

A great atmosphere at the Sail Paradise prize giving in 2016

OSP: So at Southport Yacht Club the birth of yacht racing happened almost 10 years ago and you are basically the face (whether you want to be or not) of our twilight keel boat racing and a resident MC when it comes to sailing presentations and bits and pieces and awards nights and now a director on the board at Southport Yacht Club. What is your vision for the club if you fast forward 10 years from now, when you look at the amount of change from small beginnings on the sailing side over the last 10 years, what do you see in 10 years time when you look back? What does it look like?

Ray McMahon: Well on the face of the club I too agree I have a great face for podcasting, but I don’t see myself as a face of the club. We are a club, we have got a bunch of great people here and we all do a great job. Potentially I am the guy with the mic, I am often the MC so yes I appreciate I am often the face because I am the guy with the mic so people come to me with questions and that’s fine. Where do I see the club in 10 years time? I will wear a couple of different hats. First of all I will wear my board hat. As a board member the club will continue to grow, will continue to be a premier yacht club in Australia and will also continue to be a premier venue on the Gold Coast. We have plans at the moment on how we are going to expand the business and the building where possible and again we are not being
complacent. 

In our board meetings every month we make sure we look at what’s happened, how we can improve on it and where we want to go forward. So, the club itself will keep going forward in a wonderful way. On the sailing side, I also believe the next 10 years could be the most exciting. We are now at a point where we have gone from very little to having quite a good series for both twilights and offshore, so therefore great for being both social and competitive. So, the social racing is competitive, and so is your offshore. We have got a good race series; we have got 76 races this year as I said earlier and I will do everything I can in my power to keep being positive and motivated to ensure that arm of the club builds and builds. So, when we go to regattas around the country we can really gauge how we are going and we want out boats to be competitive at every regatta. We are not going to win every regatta, nice goal but it’s not
going to happen, but if we go there and we can be competitive and if we have got 10 or 15 boats at a regatta, if they are all competitive in their divisions then I think that’s a success, that’s a win and that’s where I want to be in 10 years time.

OSP: Ok. That’s great. And when you look at the location here at the southern end of the Broadwater, Main Beach, Gold Coast, Queensland, Australia, its a magic  destination but what comes with that is this area called the split, which if you read some of the history was largely fishing trawler based and then out of that in the 1960s came the sea world theme park and now there is talk of hotels, a casino and a cruise ship terminal, so what do you think that could mean for Southport Yacht Club if even half of those things start to materialise in the next 10 years and the pressure it will place on infrastructure, water, traffic, marine permits and all of those little things that suddenly become bigger challenges?

Crews preparing for tough racing as they head out for day 1 of Sail Paradise 2016

Ray McMahon: Is that a landmine question I am about to hit or not?

OSP: Given the re-election of the popular very development focused mayor recently…

Ray McMahon: Mayor Tom Tate does a good job. He does a good job so I don’t have a problem with Tom. Look, from a yacht club perspective we would be affected in a number of ways. Obviously if all of these big plans go ahead financially it can only help us bring more people to this part of the Gold Coast and in particular here to the Broadwater and we have an absolutely sensational fine building that is great for coming and having dinner and having a quite drink. 

So we would obviously get a significant benefit out of that financially which is wonderful. On the water it would be varied, there would be a bit of a mixture with  benefits and losses as well. So the jury is still out on that part and I say that because there are so many different proposals in place and every proposal has its own features and benefits and possibly its own negative points as well. So it’s a hard question to answer because it depends on which of the proposals we really are referring to.

I have see one that suggests that we will bring these big ocean liners right into the middle of
Broadwater. Now let’s not be silly; if there is a big ocean liner coming in here, there is not going to be a racing course in its way. so that would affect the racing side of the club. Obviously that wouldn’t impress me too much, but there are other proposals that don’t bring the ocean liners into the middle of the Broadwater which wouldn’t affect our on the water activities, so I don’t have a problem with those. But I have got to say though that those are just my own personal opinions, and as a board member here at the club the board’s policy has been similar to what I have just said; that we really can’t focus one way or the other until there is a definite proposal in place. 

Once the definite proposal are in place then we can look at it and decide what could be the best for the majority of the members of the Southport Yacht Club and that is always what we have to do. There is always going to be one person that wouldn’t be happy but we are going to look at what the benefit is for the yacht club and the majority of yacht club members and we would go from there.

OSP: Yes and if you go back 50 or 60 years and you look at where it is today, you would say that by and large the development of infrastructure and everything around here has enhanced the opportunity for the club not taken it backwards. I am probably sure 50 years ago there were people that were pro-development and people that had all sorts of concerns about the evolution and growth of the Gold Coast.

Ray McMahon: I am sure 70 years ago, there were people who were saying they don’t want a yacht club here and if you look now 70 years later at what it has done for the area of the yacht club, so of course that is always going to happen with development. So again it’s just going to come down to which proposal is the one that would appear to get a green light and if there is a green light we can formulate an opinion of what is best for the members.

Cyclone the carbon hull, Frers 50 competing in Sail Paradise 2016

OSP: Ok. And as an aside, we have recently had one of our members; Andy Lamont talking about his plans to sail single handedly round the world later this year on a non-stop voyage on a S&S 34 yacht. Would do you think about that a club member doing that, is that something you would have pictured 10 or 20 years ago?

Ray McMahon: I think he is nuts. I have got to give him 10 out of 10 for bravery, crikey around the
world solo nonstop. And Sailing 22,00s nautical miles in 9-10 months at sea on your own, I promise you he will get one or two storms in amongst that. So he is a brave man. It’s not really something I plan on doing. I think it’s absolutely fantastic for the club and that he is a member here at the club and a member that participates in all of our events here. 

I think it’s fantastic for the Gold Coast that somebody wants to leave on an around the world journey from the Gold Coast and return from their around the world journey to the Gold Coast. I was talking to Andy a little bit earlier and I said “I think you are crazy” but give me one liner so we can work out how unique this is and he said “Ray, more people have gone to space than have sailed around the world solo” and that put it into perspective for me. Very few of us get to go into space. So its amazing this guy is going to do this, I wish him all the best but I think it’s fantastic for the club and fantastic for the region, for the Gold Coast. The Gold Coast can literary say hey, he is ours and more importantly I will look up and say he is actually more ours. So it’s good.

OSP: Well, Ray thanks for catching up today. It’s been really interesting to talk to you and find out more about the background of the Southport Yacht Club. I am sure our members will learn a lot out of that and anybody thinking about sailing in any club around the country might think about stepping inside their local yacht club and asking how they can go up for a sail and dip their toe in the water, so to say and check out sailing for the first time and who knows where that might lead?

Ray McMahon: Well, it’s been a pleasure David. Thanks for asking me. I have enjoyed every second of it and you are 100% correct if you are listening to this and you have got a friend that’s ever said I would like to sail, then just tell him how easy it is. Just walk into your local yacht club and tell them your level of fitness and what you really want to do and even if you don’t know, just say “I don’t know what I am going to do” you’ll get the experience, so get on a boat, it’s not that hard and it’s a hell a lot of fun for the rest of your life.

OSP: And on that subject we have got to wrap this up because in about 10 minutes we are actually going to do exactly that. You are about 10 minutes away from a whole lot of people walking in the front door saying “I want to go sailing today” as you are coordinating which of the 20 boats they are going to end up on.

Ray McMahon on the water with John Ashton, one of Southport Yacht Clubs boat owners

Ray McMahon: That’s exactly right and again I love every second of that. I love seeing the new faces that walk in, because you never know who is going to walk in and it’s always interesting having people walk in saying they want to go for a sail. So looking forward to it. It’s going to be a great afternoon, the suns shining out there, its about 15 knots, we are going to have a blast.

OSP: Excellent. Thanks Ray.

Ray McMahon: Cheers mate.

Interviewer: David Hows

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