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[SIZE=3]Summary[/SIZE]

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- St. Petersburg Review
- Race Leg One
- Stockholm Review
- Cruise in Company
- Danzig Review
- Race Leg Two
- Aarhus Review
- Honorary Awards
- Final Times

[SIZE=3]St. Petersburg Review[/SIZE]
The participating ships began gathering in mid-May for the St. Petersburg Review, although most vessels did not arrive until the 25th. The participants included longtime regulars such as the Padua, Dar Pomorza and Cuauhtemoc, but also included several new ships, the most impressive of which was the new Australian barque Southern Cross. The slightly smaller Russian sail-training ship Mir, also newly built, served as the host ship for the St. Petersburg Review, although her homeport was Odessa in the Black Sea.

On the 27th, most of the ships were present to participate in the 238th anniversary of the founding of the city of St. Petersburg, where the ships were treated to an impressive fireworks display, and the crews were able to enjoy the festive atmosphere of one of Russia's finest cities. The following day, even a late spring snow and temperatures below -2C failed to keep away visitors from the ships. During the lead-up to the St. Petersburg Review, a Russian-dubbed shorter version of the film Great Sea Race, filmed the previous year aboard the Yugoslavian barique Pelikan, was shown in Russian cinemas as a prelude to other movies, and contributed substantially to drawing thousands of St. Petersburg natives to the harbour to tour the ships. Pelikan, as one of the stars of the show, received only a few hundred less visitors than the historical frigates and the "home favorite", Mir.

The titular flagship for the 1941 Tall Ships Race was the Danish Danmark, the winner of the 1940 race and the host ship for the later Aarhus Review.

[SIZE=3]Race Leg One[/SIZE]

Class A
The race opened on the morning of May 29th. The Class A Division I ships sailed in two groups starting before dawn. Eighteen ships participated, the most vessels in this category since the beginning of the Tall Ships Race. For the first time, however, no Asian ships participated in the Tall Ships Race, with the South China Sea War playing a substantial part in that unfortunate event.

On Race Leg One, the Irish sailing ship High Adventure dominated her category, turning out an astounding average speed of sixteen knots, high enough that some newspapermen following the race wondered if she'd been using engines. However, the ship had been drydocked only a month before, and had promptly gone to the Baltic, so her underwater hull was still sleek, and with her extremely modern steel rigging, she consistently put on more sail than many of the older ships. The German barque Padua trailed the Irish cruise liner at the more sedate but still speedy average pace of fourteen knots, though the Dar Pomorza slipped ahead of her in the night, beating her to Stockholm by forty minutes. A small knot of ships, including Juan Sebastian Elcano, Presidente Sarmiento, and Danmark, fell in just behind the Padua and Dar Pomorza, finishing within an hour of the top three. Nordmark's Statsraad Lehmkuhl turned in a respectable time, although the French Belle Poule edged ahead and beat her to Stockholm by sixteen minutes. Belle Poule's sistership Étoile, however, did not fair quite so well, beating only the Mircea and the Esmeralda to Stockholm.

Class A Division II
The British Steel led Race Leg One from the very beginning, slipping into the lead and maintaining it throughout the voyage to Stockholm. The small Iberian barque Marques, however, clung tightly to second place, and at several times nearly overtook the Britons. The Mir held a slightly more distant third place, while the Atlantean Namu and French barkentine Cote d'Émeraude contended for fourth place. The French ship eventually creeping ahead to win by a half-hour. The Turks in Hürrem Sultan and the Yugoslavians in Pelikan took the final positions in the race.

Class A Division III
Atlantis's frigate Alala won Race Leg One, beating the Canadian Liverpool Packet and the Atlantean snow Edna II. The USS Constitution adopted a more leisurely style, finishing shortly after the Edna II, but still beat the Shannon, Trincomalee, and L'Esperance to Stockholm.

Class B
The Class B race was filled with newcomers, with four of the seven ships (the American schooner Zodiac, the French schooner Alouette, the Polish ketch Frédéric Chopin, and the Monaco-owned Princess) having never participated in the Tall Ships Race before. The Princess failed to qualify to enter the race as she had only three crewmen under the age of twenty-five, but the ship sailed with the racers anyway, albeit not as a contestant. Of the qualifying six ships, the American schooner Atlantic and the Canadian schooner Bluenose had a notable "speed feud", as the result of previous races, although the brand-new French schooner Alouette gave excellent performance as well. This was demonstrated when, to the surprise of many, she dashed ahead in the first race leg and got to Stockholm first. Atlantic barely slipped ahead of Bluenose, and the second American schooner, Zodiac, overtook Bluenose during the night and beat her to Stockholm. The much slower Irish three-master Red Hand placed well after the rest, but with the Polish ketch Frédéric Chopin creeping into harbour last.

Class C
Canada's Maple Leaf dashed to a quick early victory, racing into Stockholm with thirty-six hours on the clock. The British sloop Jolie Brise led a pack of three ships, including the Peruvian pilot schooner Conquistador and the ketch Andrea Elwin, into Stockholm. Topaz, Lâle Devri, and Flamme followed approximately two hours later, while the Adventuress and Belisarius finished at the tail end.

[SIZE=3]Stockholm Review[/SIZE]
The Stockholm Review drew approximately 65,000 visitors from all over Nordmark, and saw several of the now-traditional mid-race events. Some of the Class A Division III ships, led by Alala and Trincomalee, staged a mock battle for the amusement of watching Nordish crowds, although the relatively constricted harbour and merchant ship traffic made the duel a more straightforward affair than previous years. A number of ships also conducted crew exchanges, allowing young sailors the chance to sail on a different ship for the Cruise in Company section of the race.

On the afternoon of June 5th, the ships held the small boat regatta, with the various rowing-powered craft of the vessels competing against the others in their category. The Prince of Wales triumphed in the Class A Division I category, while the Yugoslavians from Pelikan won the Division II category. Four of the Liverpool Packet's crew, all Nova Scotia men, powered their small launch to victory in the Division III race, while the Atlantean crewmen of Flamme, and the crew of the Zodiac, triumphed in the Class C and B races.

[SIZE=3]Cruise in Company[/SIZE]
The ships left Stockholm early on the morning of June 6th, getting underway under a gray sky. The weather fortunately was warm, although irregular rain often chilled the crews and reduced visibility. Midway through the cruise, the German Deutschland signalled a medical emergency, as a sailor had begun showing symptoms of acute appendicitis, which the ship's onboard doctor did not feel qualified to treat himself. The Deutschland diverted to Kalmar, where the sailor was treated by doctors. The Deutschland rejoined the other tall ships at Danzig several days later. The barkentine Cote d'Émeraude also had an incident where a sailor slipped in the rigging; as he did so, he tangled his leg in the ratlines, preventing him from suffering a potentially dangerous fall, but dislocated both his knee and his ankle. Aside from those incidents, the Cruise in Company proceeded remarkably smoothly.

[SIZE=3]Danzig Review[/SIZE]
The Danzig Review drew over ninety thousand visitors, some of whom came by train from Germany or beyond to see the ships. The older frigates consistently drew the largest crowd, and there was some dismay among the visitors that the Japanese reenactors and their longship Yabanjin, a traditional crowd favorite, were not attending. The Constitution's marines, in replica War of 1812 uniforms, conducted an impressive rifle drill along the pier.

[SIZE=3]Race Leg Two[/SIZE]

Class A
Leaving Danzig, the ships were treated to a welcome easterly wind that sped them along the sourthernmost stretches of the Baltic. Padua and her crew, closely familiar with these waters and the area around Denmark, quickly opened up a commanding lead that even the High Adventure's speed could not erode, although the Juan Sebastian de Elcano made an outstanding effort to keep up. The Iberian and German four-masters were close together, although the ships separated when Juan Sebastian de Elcano sheered away to take the Storebælt, while the Padua sailed through the Øresund, followed only by the Danmark and Esmeralda. All the other ships preferred to use the Storebælt. Esmeralda's attempt to use the Øresund, however, proved unfortunate, as she cut too close to shore and briefly grounded, fortunately without serious damage. The Esmeralda's crew warped their ship off in a half hour without resorting to the engines, but a cursory inspection showed that she'd lost her false keel and had a few leaks in her bilges. Although this ruined her speed it did not threaten the ship, and the Chileans returned to the race, even though they finished second to last, barely beating the Atlantes. The most exciting finish of the race was the duel between the President Sarmiento and the brand-new Australian barque Southern Cross. The Australians fell behind the older Argentine ship in the early stages of the race leg, but as the ships entered the Storebælt, the Australian crew found a good point of sailing and began catching up. Only a few miles out from the buoys marking the finish line at Aarhus, the Sarmiento maintained a ship-length's lead, but the Southern Cross expertly cut astern of the other barque and slipped across the line with only six seconds margin.

Class A Division II
The Russian crew of the Mir got off to a quick start from the harbour of Danzig, and led a pack of three ships, including the Yugoslavian Pelikan and the Hürrem Sultan, through the Storebælt to Aarhus. The Namu finished fourth, followed shortly by the British Steel and Marques.

Class A Division III
The weather for the second race leg favored the Canadian schooner Liverpool Packet, which slipped into an easy lead by taking the Øresund to save time and distance. The Alala and the Shannon were closely matched throughout the length of the Baltic, but the Alala managed to finish in a slightly better time. The Constitution ambled into Aarhus shortly after the Trincomalee, although she beat the Edna II. The L'Esperance finished last.

Class B
The speedy Alouette turned in a more lackadaisical performance in the second race leg, with both Atlantic and Bluenose outrunning her by a fairly significant margin. The Zodiac beat out the Red Hand to Aarhus by a comfortable hour's margin, and the Frédéric Chopin finished last, with an aggregate time of just over forty-eight hours.

Class C
The observers waiting at Aarhus were thrilled by the close finish of the Class C race, with the underdog Peruvian pilot schooner Conquistador narrowly outsailing the Jolie Brise, beating her to the buoys by a mere five minutes. The Flamme and Maple Leaf sailed in a few hours later, trailed by Topaz, Adventuress, Lâle Devri, and Andrea Elwin.

[SIZE=3]Aarhus Review[/SIZE]
Although only 58,000 attended the Aarhus Review, the smallest of the port reviews of the race, the Danes proved particularly welcoming to the windjammers, and many of the crewmen felt it was the warmest welcome they had received on the year's port calls.

The award ceremony was held on the Danmark on the afternoon of June 21st, attended by most of the ship captains and race organizers. The Padua won the TSR White Banner, the Mir received the TSR Green Banner, the Alala received the TSR Green-and-White Banner, Atlantic won the TSR Red Banner, and Jolie Brise received her second TSR Blue Banner. All winners additionally received a gold cup as a trophy. The winners of the Small Boat Regatta (Prince of Wales, Pelikan, Liverpool Packet, Zodiac, and Flamme) all received a white pennant and a silver medal.

The Sail Training International leadership board Committee met June 23rd for their annual meeting, selecting a new general director for the 1941-1942 term.

In other business, the committee voted to seek the appropriate permissions for the following race ports of call in 1942 and 1943:

Quoted

1942
- Cobh (Ireland) to La Rochelle (France): 465nm
- La Rochelle (France) to Plymouth (UK): 350nm
- Plymouth (UK) to A Coruna (Iberia): 455nm

1943
- Karlskrona (Nordmark) to Helsinki (Nordmark): 405nm
- Helsinki (Nordmark) to Riga (Latvia): 275nm
- Riga to Travemunde (Germany): 520nm

[SIZE=3]Honorary awards:[/SIZE]
- Youngest overall crew: Atlantean schooner Flamme (average age of 24 sailors is 20.125 years)
- Most popular ship: United States frigate Constitution (received largest number of visitors in port calls)
- Oldest ship: Latvia's L'Esperance (laid down 1759) (runner up is Constitution, laid down 1794)
- Newest ship: Australian Southern Cross, completed December 29th, 1940. (Runner up is Mir, completed December 15th, 1940.)
- Biggest ship: Atlantean barque Atlantes, five masts, displ 13,800 tons full load (largest sailing ship in the world)
- Smallest ship: British sloop Jolie Brise, displ 44 tons full load.

[SIZE=3]Final Times[/SIZE]

Total wins in the Tall Ships Races
This is the total number of wins by country for a TSR Banner.

Canada: 3
United States: 3
Britain: 3
Atlantis: 2
Argentina: 1
Byzantium: 1
Poland: 1
Turkey: 1
Denmark: 1
Yugoslavia: 1
Germany: 1
Russia: 1

An excellent read Brock. Exciting action all the way and some respectable finishes for Britain and Argentina to boot!

The proposed 1942 course gets my approval for the British sections.

Thanks. I'm glad you enjoyed it. The Argentines always seem to do rather well, even though they have about the same chance as others in their category. The dice must like them or something.

I figured Plymouth wouldn't be a problem, but it never hurts to confirm it.

This is always a fun event to set up, though the write-up itself tends to drag out; it's hard switching things up from year to year so everything stays relatively fresh.

Interesting read, well done Brock!

Thanks!

Bluenose beaten not only by the Yanks, but the upstart French? Canada suspects foul play is afoot...

To the labs!

Quoted

Originally posted by ShinRa_Inc
Bluenose beaten not only by the Yanks, but the upstart French? Canada suspects foul play is afoot...

To the labs!

The result of a high dice return for Alouette in Race Leg One. Bluenose's roll in leg two was insufficiently high to erase the edge - but Atlantic's roll was just high enough to do so. *Shrugs* It happens.