Congressional Cup : Gilmour Wins His Fourth Match-Racing Title

Australia’s status as a sailing nation went from the thrill of victory in 1983 to the agony of defeat in ‘87, and even Peter Gilmour’s success hasn’t squared matters.

“Not until we win the America’s Cup back,” Gilmour said Saturday after winning the 24th Congressional Cup match-racing championship at Long Beach.

Since he steered the backup Kookaburra II boat at Fremantle a year ago, Gilmour, 28, has emerged as the world’s best match-racing sailor by winning the first four of eight World Cup events leading to the championship sail-off at Long Beach in August.

Dennis Conner’s fans might dispute that ranking, but Conner--a Congressional winner in ’73 and ‘75--hasn’t competed on the circuit in recent years.

“I’d love to see Dennis in one of these,” Gilmour said. “It would certainly be an exciting event.”

His victories at least have convinced Gilmour that “it wasn’t the people” that cost Australia the Cup.

“The key factor is we’ve got the same team. They’re all Kooka kids. We arrive at these regattas already knowing how everybody’s thinking, instead of having to do a sailing school exercise.”

Gilmour thinks the Aussie sailors were equally adept at Fremantle, but the difference was that “Dennis’ Stars & Stripes team had a faster yacht than ours.”

The other events are sailed in provided and equalized boats--for the Congressional, Catalina 38s borrowed from local owners. As Gilmour noted, it lacks ideal quickness and agility for match racing, but talent will surface in any kind of craft, as it did in this event.

Gilmour won 7 of 9 races, reeling off 5 straight until America II skipper John Kolius got him by five seconds in the first of two rounds Saturday.

That dogfight defeat, coupled with John Bertrand’s upset loss to Canada’s Greg Tawaststjerna, threw the event into a three-way tie among Gilmour, Bertrand and Bill Lynn going into the final round, each at 6-2.

In winds of 10 to 14 knots, Bertrand then out-sailed defending champion Eddie Owen of Britain by 41 seconds but needed Lynn to beat Gilmour in the final race, because Bertrand had lost to Gilmour on Friday, and Bertrand had beaten Lynn on Wednesday.

However, that race was over the moment it started. Gilmour picked the heavily favored left end of the line while Lynn started at the opposite end.

“We didn’t realize the advantage was so high on port,” Lynn said after losing by 1:03.

A judgment error also crippled Bertrand’s chances earlier. Charging hard on the wind, the Olympic silver medalist from Anaheim Hills was called for being over the line at the gun and had to circle back to restart. From there, all he could do was give futile chase to Tawaststjerna, who won by 22 seconds.

“My bowman (Dennis Gruidl of San Francisco) was convinced that if we were over early, the boat below us was over early,” Bertrand said.

Bertrand requested redress from the judges, but after reviewing videotape said, “I don’t think there was any question we were over.”

The day’s racing was delayed about an hour while the fishing boat “Maria” from San Pedro retrieved the nets it had laid directly across the starting line the night before, as the racing boats circled impatiently.

Once under way, Kolius--who won his last five races to tie Lynn at 6-3--out-tacked Gilmour in a classic match race. Kolius pulled to a 22-second lead at the second windward mark but wrapped his spinnaker in a perfect hourglass shape and had Gilmour hot on his stern the rest of the way.

In the new on-the-water judging system, only one yellow flag was popped to protest Saturday, and that was waved off by the judges. For the series, there were 19 penalties and 7 270-degree turn penalties imposed.

In the wake of Ireland’s Harold Cudmore in ’86 and Owen last year, Gilmour is the third straight foreign skipper to win the event, after an American monopoly of 21 years.