Author: Joe Cooper

Editor’s note: This month’s Coop’s Corner was originally published by Sail1Design, “a grassroots organization, by sailors for sailors, dedicated to the youth, high school, college, and one-design sailing communities,” and is reprinted with permission. You’ll find this superb resource at sail1design.com. With summer not far off, sailing programs around the country are gearing up for their sailing lessons sessions. There will be high school sailors teaching and coaching Opti sailors, college sailors teaching and coaching high school…

Well, The Vendée Globe has placed its podium people. Dear old Roi, Jean Le Cam, could not, sadly, break onto the august triple stair. Pip Hare continued to impress and cheer us all the way to, and inside, the Barn. What an effort, dragging a 20-year-old-boat, sans foils, on the financial equivalent of the smell of an oily rag, spending an afternoon hanging off the side of her boat replacing a rudder, and later dragging a busted…

Editor’s note: A few months ago, Contributing Editor Joe Cooper pitched an article titled “The Girls of Newport” about the outstanding women sailors residing in the City by the Sea. Ben and Zep loved the idea, of course, but soon realized that story would fill this entire magazine. After changing tacks in favor of monthly Q&As (with sailors throughout the WindCheck region), we agreed unanimously on our first interviewee. The founder and owner of Team One Newport…

If someone told you they were born in the shadow of the Mont Tremblant ski resort in Quebec, and in the next breath said they were in Newport, Rhode Island the following year watching the America’s Cup, you might scratch your head a bit. Stephanie McLennan was not properly “watching” the regatta, but she was there with her grandparents. There is a picture taken by her grandfather of Stephanie in a state of infant repose on the…

The hunkered-down factor has likely made following the adventures of the two most demanding sailing races on the planet a welcome break over the holidays and into the New Year. I speak of course of the America’s Cup (preliminary challenger regatta) and the Vendée Globe. In a curious touch of Serendipity, the Vendée Globe’s fleet, with some eighteen foil-equipped, fire-breathing 60-footers was transiting the Southern Ocean, solo, south of New Zealand, just after the AC boats had…

Most of us had childhood goals (visions really, at that young age), often ignited by something we experienced as kids. Griff Spinney’s first vision was from the lower spreaders on the R/P 66 Aurora, the fire-breathing race boat on which his dad, Latimer Spinney, was captain. T’was Block Island Race Week in 2007 and said yacht was competing so the Spinney family were on Block Island. When Aurora arrived back at the dock after racing one day,…

By Joe Cooper Good morning class. This month’s question: Who has seen a sail plan of their boat? OK, there are sail plans of a sort on the brochure on the builder’s website. You can find them elsewhere in the internet. Some of the sporting sailors may well have a trophy incorporating a profile of their boat presented for some successes. But, no, I mean a real live, honest to goodness paper drawing, say a meter square…

I got a call from a mate/customer of mine recently asking if we could do a quick repair on the kite. I said, “Sure, what’s the matter, what are we talking about, a two-inch tear from a naked cotter pin?” “Well, no.” There was a rather sheepish pause, so I asked, “So what you go fishing with it? Ya wanna help me out here? We have a lot on, and I need to give the guys some…