Word: lexcen
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Dates: during 1983-1983
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...campaign has had an unlikely Nelson: Allan Bond, 45, a chunky, feisty Perth entrepreneur and onetime sign painter, who has spent $16 million in ten years pursuing what many of his countrymen dismissed as a manic obsession. This is his fourth bid, Australia II his third boat. In Ben Lexcen, 47, Bond found a naval architect who could radically change the design of a 12-meter boat, a field that has seen little technological innovation in years. In secret tank tests in The Netherlands, Lexcen developed a keel like nothing ever used before: with two delta-type wings weighing more...
...matter the outcome, the world is in Australia's debt for transforming what had become a boring parody of competition into a tingling cliffhanger of sport. The brilliant designer Ben Lexcen was wrong in one respect. Before the first race of the finals, he declared, "If we can't win this time, no one can win the bloody thing." His boat has proved, once and for all, that the bloody thing is bloody winnable. - By Michael Demarest. Reported by Richard Hornik and John F. Stacks/Newport
Bond's chief designer is Ben Lexcen, 47, who as a youngster in the small town of Boggabri in eastern Australia built such superior model racing sailboats that he had to give some away to keep his friends interested in competing. He gives nothing away now. Lexcen spent months in The Netherlands tank-testing eight different 25-ft. model hulls in secrecy to prevent the Americans from learning about his new keel. Indeed, reports surfaced last week that the Americans tried unsuccessfully to get the Dutch to reveal details of the design. Lexcen snaps: "They would flash...
...first controversy involved the radical keel of the leading foreign challenger, Australia II. The brainchild of ebullient Australian Designer Ben Lexcen, the keel has provided Newport with gossip, speculation and creative chicanery all summer. Swathed in blue-green skirts whenever Australia II is out of the water, the supersecret keel has been the target of camera-wielding scuba divers from rival camps. One local cartoon lampooned the mysterious keel by depicting it in the shape of a bottle of Swan Lager, a major corporate backer of the Australia II effort...