New to sailing a gaffer, Tim Brooke reports on his first outing at the helm of ‘Dirty Girty’ in the East Coast OGA Annual Race, 18 July 2018. The experience may tempt him to give up his Bermudan ways!!
I was sitting at home one Saturday taking advantage of one of the few weekend days that I wasn’t sailing, when I received a Whatsapp from Will Harvey of East Anglian Sea School. The content of the missive was a picture with the message; ‘would you like to helm this boat on 18 July?’ Now, normally, I am someone who sails plastic boats and therefore not overly familiar with the older generations of craft, but the distinctive silhouette and colour scheme of this one was instantly recognisable. There was only one answer!
18 July 2026, Saturday morning, I drove to Mersea via Colchester station to collect the third member of the crew, arriving there to an overcast sky and a brisk breeze. Will Roberts collected Oscar and me from the pontoon outside West Mersea Yacht Club to take us out to the boat. We picked up an unrigged ‘Girty’ on the way; she had been launched the evening before. I hopped on board to steer her while under tow and was pleasantly surprised by her stability, despite her looks! A little bit of background on ‘Dirty Girty’: she is a unique boat designed and built by the late Bob Berk who wanted a small, light cruiser-racer. She has a bottom print of 24’ by 4’ (3 sheets of ply!) with a vertical bow and vertical canoe stern, twin centerboards which are swapped every tack. She has her beam increase to 6’ above the waterline to give the crew somewhere to sit and somewhere to put the cleats!
Will took us alongside Ed & Evie’s smack to get her rigged and ready, with plenty of discussion about which rope went where on this uniquely rigged boat. And what an interesting and educational experience that was! Sleeved sails (like a Topper or Laser) over unstayed wooden masts, with sprits (like an optimist), the main (rearmost sail) has a boom with the whole mast rotating, whereas what Ed and Will have termed the zero (middle sail) is loose footed and sheeted back either side of the main mast to the aft quarters. Moving forwards the jib is fairly standard on a roller furler off the foremast which has running stays to help keep some tension in the jib luff. To front(?) this all off she has an ‘aftermarket’ addition of an asymmetric spinnaker, off a Topper Topaz, flown from the foremast and a fairly wicked looking stainless steel bowsprit.
With the rat’s nest of ropes sorted aided by Will’s brother Ed, Ed’s wife Evie and coffee we were finally ready to head out to the start line. We cast off and enjoyed a gentle run down the river under the jib, putting the rest of the sails up as we went down. Once free of the river’s confines and having identified the committee boat and made ourselves known, we tried a few tacks and gybe to get the feel of her. For a 24 foot long boat with a narrow beam she was surprisingly responsive, nicely balanced on the tiller though not very directionally stable if you let go of it!
We tried some practice runs to the line to get an idea of her pace and I attempted to discuss our starting tactics but was cut short by Will, telling me not to worry as ‘none of them will be anywhere near the line…’ The starting gun went and we were nicely positioned on the committee boat end with speed … and an empty line, Will’s prediction was correct … I was a little concerned that I had got the timing wrong but my crew reassured me that it was correct!
A reaching leg to start with, where ‘Girty’ really excels, so we ‘popped’ the asymmetric and she really stretched her legs (though with it up she gained a noticeable amount of lee helm – quite understandable as it is a Roberts aftermarket special). Happily at the front of the fleet in what, according to the handicap, is scratch boat we were enjoying doing a steady 8-10kts until from below a dark shape was spotted, rapidly rising and gaining on us. This was to form into ‘Crow’, another Bob Berk special, recently purchased and helmed by Will Harvey himself!
They caught us up and we had a little bit of to and fro but managed to pip them around the leeward mark, helped in no small way by ‘Crow’ being unable to hold her asymmetric for the latter part of the leg and maybe even more so after Will’s shouted admission that he had no idea where he was going! After the leeward mark was a beat and ‘Girty’ again surprised me by actually being able to point reasonably, but unfortunately it was nowhere near ‘Crow’ who was a good 10-15 degrees higher! By this time the first of the smacks were starting to catch us up having started 15 minutes later. The beat was completed in four tacks and not the OGA standard of two, mostly as we were unsure where a sandbank was and decided to err on the side of caution.
We managed to hold the first of the smacks off and rounded the windward mark just behind ‘Crow’ setting up for a ‘white sail’ reach to the next. It was on this leg that the first of the smacks caught us up: ‘Martha’, helmed by Phil Plumtree, came thundering along from behind sporting all of the canvas she could possibly fly, kicking up a huge wake and generally looking fairly apocalyptic from the perspective of a small plywood craft! We held up to windward as there was no way I was going to let her sail over and completely smother us, albeit for a brief moment. Watching her come below us I noticed the aforementioned wake and decided to see if a technique I have used in yachts and dinghies would work with ‘Girty’. I was gonna hitch a ride!
With a bit of gentle manoeuvring, hoping that they wouldn’t suddenly bear away, I managed to drop ‘Girty’ into their wake and picked up a tow on the second wave off ‘Martha’s starboard quarter all the way to the next mark, thank you ‘Martha’! Dropping out of ‘Martha’s tow as she bore away, we had a very uneventful run down to the next mark, ‘Girty’ running dead down wind with the zero on the opposite side from the main and jib. Managing to catch up a bit on ‘Crow’, we rounded the second leeward mark and headed back to the finish close-hauled, putting in a small tack to reach a mark just before the line, to finish third on the water.
We took ‘Girty’ to the slip to be derigged, and, after a bit of musical driveways, found the correct one for her to be stored for the night and retired to West Mersea Yacht Club for a well deserved beer, prizegiving and BBQ. The OGA were, as always, amazingly welcoming and friendly and do have me seriously considering giving up my plastic and Bermudan ways! Many thanks to the Roberts family for inviting me along to helm, it was truly an amazing experience and I would happily come again (hint!).
‘Dirty Girty’ was our ‘featured boat’ in March 2024, follow the link for more details.
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