Four years ago, the yacht racing world was caught aback when Dorade, a yacht designed by Olin Stephens II and delivered in 1930, won the 2013 Transpac Race. Dorade has previously won the Transpac 77 years before. Now the 87-year old Dorade has placed a very respectable second in her division under both IRC and ORCi in the Sydney Hobart Race.
About Dorade from the Rolex Sydney Hobart Race 2017 website: From the Famous American classic wooden boat Dorade is a revolutionary S&S, designed by a then 21 year-old Olin Stephens and built under younger brother Rod’s (20) supervision. Features a deep keel with external ballast, very narrow beam and a generous sail plan. The yawl took the yachting world by storm and made headlines around the world after scoring an upset victory in the 1931 Transatlantic Race from Newport, Rhode Island to Plymouth, competing against much larger boats. In the next 10 years, Dorade scored overall victories in the 1931 and 1933 Fastnet races and the 1936 TransPac Race. Adrienne Cahalan, the first woman to sail 25 Hobarts, is navigating.
Matt Brooks and his partner Pam Rorke Levy purchased Dorade in 2010 and spent a year restoring her with the aim of competing in all the major races she had won. Since, she has beaten her Transatlantic, Newport-Bermuda, Fastnet and TransPac times of the 1930’s and made the podium of all, winning the 2013 TransPac overall into the bargain. Arriving in Australia this year, she placed third overall in the Brisbane Keppel race and 14th in the recent Newcastle Bass Island Race. The oldest boat in the fleet at 87, this is her and Brooks’ first Hobart.
DORADE is, and always will be, an amazing boat. Eminently sea worthy (if not necessarily super comfortable offshore due to her propensity to roll), she is fast and amazing to sail or at least that is what we’ve all heard over the years. Best of all, aside from her performance and speed, she is a gorgeous boat. She’s one of those that you look at and dream about. Read the book YOU ARE FIRST for a wonderful “biography” of her first Trans-Atlantic Race. Good for all on board and may she continue as she has for many years to come. In the hands of Mr. Brooks and Ms. Levy — who obviously love the boat as so many others do — she’s in good hands. And as we all know, if you take care of the boat, she’ll take care of you. DORADE has an exemplary history of doing just that.