Congressional Cup : Conner, Kolius Share Lead on Opening Day

What does the Congressional Cup sailing competition at Long Beach have to do with the America’s Cup two years from now?

Nothing, the skippers say.

But the standings after the first day of the match racing series had strong overtones of Perth, Australia, in proportion to the prospects of the various campaigns.

Dennis Conner and John Kolius, who head two of the United States’ stronger America’s Cup syndicates, shared first place with two wins and no losses. Conner heads Sail America, and Kolius heads America II. Meanwhile, Rod Davis of Eagle lost one race, to Conner in a near-miss with a freighter.

Kolius’ victims Wednesday were Dave Perry, the two-time defending champion, and Jack Gobbell, a qualifier from Huntington Harbour YC who flew a dark-horse pennant from his headstay on the way out to the course, where he lost both of his races.

Ted Turner, who won this event in 1977, the same year he defended the America’s Cup, outsailed Italy’s Mauro Pellaschier by 16 seconds in the day’s closest race but tore out his genoa tack and retired less than a minute after his start against Conner.

Perry had blown a hole in his spinnaker in the winds gusting to 18 knots, so at that point chairman Pete Ives’ race committee decided to postpone the scheduled third race and make it up on one of the next three days when only two races are scheduled.

Kolius was disappointed. “We were hoping to get in three races today,” he said.

Kolius will meet Davis in the first race and Conner in the second today. If there’s a third, he’ll face Turner.

This is Kolius’ first Congressional Cup, although he participated as a crew member eight years ago.

Early in the week he said: “I don’t have a real good handle on what the Congressional Cup is all about, but I’m sure I will have by the end of the week.”

He trailed Perry at every mark--eight seconds at the last rounding--but won by 17 seconds after accelerating above Perry past the mark. Back at the dock they laughed and joked about their race.

“We were hanging tough and hoping he’d make a mistake,” Kolius said. “His jib got away from him and we broke up inside of him.”

Perry, who hadn’t sailed in a race since the U.S. Olympic trials last May, had feared that he and his old crew might be rusty.

“We waited a little too late on our spinnaker takedown,” he said. “Today was our practice day.”

In his second race, Perry overcame two serious incidents. Dickson forced him off the port end of the line for a 12-second jump at the start. Then, when Perry regained the lead, a bowline knot come loose off his jib and he lost his lead to New Zealand’s Chris Dickson (1-1) but recovered to win by 1:06.

The best race of the day was supposed to be Conner against Davis, but it was a 36-second romp for Conner. He took windward position at the start and forced Davis all the way to the left, where he deliberately overstood the mark to put Davis in the lee of the A.P. Moller, a freighter anchored offshore.

“That kind of popped up in the last minute,” Tom Whidden, Conner’s tactician, said. “The wind got real light and he just sat there a few seconds while we tacked away.”

Then, after the windward rounding, Davis’ spinnaker wrapped up as Conner sailed away.

Davis said: “The freighter kind of got in our way, but we didn’t get off the starting line very well, either.”