Word: conner
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Associate Editor Tom Callahan, who wrote this week's cover story on Skipper Dennis Conner, faced his own logistical complications. After a 14-hour flight from Los Angeles, Callahan arrived in Sydney and immediately caught a plane to Perth. From there he headed directly to Fremantle harbor for a training session aboard Stars & Stripes. That experience may sound almost as turbulent as a go-around in the washing machine, but it left Callahan feeling exhilarated. "Conner is so at one with his crew, he barely has to give orders. It's really stirring to be on board with the greatest...
Pounding around Gage Roads in 25-ton yachts is more than just physically punishing. It is perilous. The blinding glare of the sun and the continual shower of salt spray are so forceful that both skippers have had serious trouble with their eyes. Conner was forced to consult a Perth specialist. Says ( Murray: "In the early races I was coming in every day with double vision. It's like having a saltwater hose going flat out into your face." Murray and crew now wear sunglasses, which must constantly be cleared of caked salt with squeeze bottles of fresh water. Kookaburra...
Boat design has been critical in Fremantle. Murray and his co-designer, John Swarbrick, relied on hours of tank-testing models with Dutch Wizard Peter van Oossanen, who helped develop Australia II. As for Conner, he and his syndicate president, San Diego Businessman Malin Burnham, put together what Burnham calls a "mini-NASA" of more than 20, including aerospace scientists and hydrodynamics researchers. "Having the wrong fit between boat and local weather would have been fatal," explains Design Manager John Marshall. In search of the ideal hull, the team used a computer analysis of wind and wave conditions...
...been invariably on target. The winds have been particularly tough to gauge. Meteorologists on both teams have been double- checking their computers because the steady high drafts of the antipodal summer begin to fade in February. The big blows alternate with periods of gentle breezes. The day after Conner won the challengers' finals two weeks ago, the wind dropped from 25 knots to 15. That was unfortunate for Stars & Stripes, which Conner has likened to a "fuel dragster" since it was specifically built to excel in winds above 18 knots. The more maneuverable Kookaburra was expected to gain an edge...
...still a game of toy boats played by millionaires. But no single millionaire, no superstar skipper, can dominate alone. "You have to delegate," says Whidden. "This is a team sport and not a single man's quest for victory." He believes Conner's greatest growth since 1983 has been in his ability to get good people and allow himself to rely on them. Will his team win? Or will Parry and Murray's Kookaburra mates refuse to yield the Cup? As the racing began, most experts favored Conner, but Australian Skipper John Bertrand, who won the Cup in 1983, loyally...