Dick Carter: Yacht Designer: In the Golden Age of Offshore Racing

Dick Carter was an amateur yacht designer who entered his first boat into the Fastnet Race in 1964 and won it. He repeated the feat 4 years later with another of his designs, which also won the Admirals Cup. His radical innovations created fast and comfortable boats that were much in demand in the golden age of offshore racing. He even designed the massive 128-foot Vendredi Treize for Jean-Yves Terlain to sail single-handed in the 1972 OSTAR race. After a decade at the top of his game, he quit the world of sailing and moved on to other challenges. His surprise appearance at the funeral of Ted Hood gave rise to the suggestion that he wrote this book, which is beautifully produced with many fabulous photographs and boat plans.

Format: Hardback
Length: 328 pages
Publication date: 13 April 2021
Publisher: Fernhurst Books Limited

Few amateur yacht designers would dare to enter the first boat they had ever designed into the prestigious offshore Fastnet Race, let alone with the intention of winning it. But that is exactly what Dick Carter did in 1964, beating all 151 other yachts, some sailed by the most notable sailors of the day. He repeated the feat four years later with another of his own designs (which also won the Admiral's Cup that year as the top boat and top team), but by then he could certainly no longer be described as an 'amateur yacht designer.' His radical innovations created fast and comfortable boats that were in great demand in this, the golden age of offshore racing. They were commissioned by the top sailors and succeeded in winning the Admiral's Cup, Southern Cross Series, One Ton Cup, Two Ton Cup, and many of the biggest races. He even went on to design the massive 128-foot Vendredi Treize for Jean-Yves Terlain to sail single-handed in the 1972 OSTAR (trans-Atlantic) race – the longest boat ever to have been raced single-handed. But after just a decade at the top of his game, he quit the world of sailing and moved on to other challenges. He had been out of the limelight for so long that sailors assumed he was dead. His surprise appearance at the funeral of Ted Hood gave rise to the suggestion that he wrote this book. It is beautifully produced with many fabulous photographs and boat plans and was first published in the US by Seapoint Books and is now published in the UK by Fernhurst Books. While his career as a yacht designer may have been brief, the impact of his innovations has lasted the test of time. Who today would think of an offshore yacht without internal halyards in the mast or that the rudder always had to be fixed to the keel? These concepts, and many more, were first introduced by Dick Carter.

Weight: 1356g
Dimension: 212 x 264 x 30 (mm)
ISBN-13: 9781912621316