Yacht Racing - Types Of Small Racing Yachts In America

( Originally Published 1911 )

USUALLY the type of the small racing yacht is directly dependent on the locality in which she is to be used. For instance, deep water allows either the keel or centerboard ; shoals, bays, rivers, and lakes, especially of the smaller size, usually mean a shoal centerboard. In the eastern part of the country to-day the so-called knock-about, either keel or centerboard, but with many hundred pounds of lead placed outside for ballast, is the type most used. There are many restricted classes of this type — of from ten to forty boats, scattered along the coast. In the western part of the country, especially on large lakes, where for the last few years small racing fleets have grown with great rapidity, the low-sided, flat scow is used almost entirely. When the restrictions are special, the class built under these is named for them, but usually the class name is the type and water-line length. They are as follows :

15' knockabouts
18'
21'
21' raceabouts (600 sq. ft. sail)
22' cabin class (Massachusetts Bay)
25' knockabouts
25' cabin class (Massachusetts Bay)
21' " (Great Lakes)
21' Quincy Cup boats (unrestricted, except water-line length)
Seawanhaka Cup Class (International, about 27' water-line)
18' class scows (Western Lakes)
20' (Western Lakes)
Special International Sonder Class
"Q" Class under universal rule, used only on the Atlantic seaboard, between New York and Boston.

There are, beside the above-named classes, many local classes not so well known, such as several one-design 30-foot classes of keel boats, etc.