New York Yacht Club Invitational Cup attracts sailing finest

by Barby MacGowan on 6 May 2009 Though she will be impressed by some prominent names entered in the New York Yacht Club’s inaugural Invitational Cup, you can be sure Marie Klok Crump can hold her own in a room full of sailing standouts.

From Århus, Denmark and now living in Newport, R.I., the tall blonde Scandinavian has been a top-ranked women's match racer since the mid-nineties, ranking as high as number two in the ISAF Women's World Match Race circuit and crowned twice as the Danish Match Race Champion (’94, ’96). As a member of the Danish national team, she also pursued an Olympic campaign in the Yngling women's keelboat for the 2004 games in Athens. This September 15-19, however, she will lead the Royal Danish Yacht Club’s co-ed entry in the NYYC’s Invitational Cup, which is set to host 18 yacht club teams from 14 nations in Newport, R.I., where Crump currently resides and where the club’s on-the-water clubhouse, Harbour Court, is located.

'This will be a very special event,' said Crump, who is a partner in a management consulting company and will no doubt utilize her sailing skills as well as her business acumen to lead the 10 plus crew that the Royal Danish Yacht Club fields for the event. 'Not only will I have my husband, Will Crump, and brother, Thomas Klok--who are both accomplished sailors--on my team but also the event will resurrect the true spirit of amateur racing, which big-boat sailing seems to have been lacking for a long time.'

Similar to the America’s Cup of yesteryear, the Invitational Cup will be a friendly competition among nations. On each team, all but two of the crew must hold a passport of the country of the invited yacht club’s or sailing organization’s primary location. The event will be sailed in Club Swan 42s, one-design boats developed by the New York Yacht Club and designed by German and Mani Frers for the purpose of providing a high-performance race boat, available globally, for inshore as well as offshore competition.

That these ingredients--expertly combined in the making of the Invitational Cup--will refuel the passion for Corinthian competition among sailing nations is a certainty in the mind of NYYC Commodore David Elwell, who crewed on America’s Cup defender Intrepid in 1967. An avid Club Swan 42 sailor who will participate in an elimination series that will determine his club’s team, Elwell says, 'I think I can speak for all the club Commodores in saying that we look forward to getting back to the basics: where how well a team does in competition is determined by how well it sails, not by how much money it spends or go-fast technology it develops.'

In addition to NYYC, the Royal Cork Yacht Club (IRL) is known to be holding eliminations to determine its team.

Meanwhile, already named to helm Finland’s Nyländska Jaktklubben (NJK) challenge is Leonardo Ferragamo, the president of Nautors’ Swan, builder of the Club Swan 42 and one of Finland’s most iconic companies. Ferragamo, who is also inextricably connected to the luxury goods industry by virtue of a career spent in his family’s fashion business, recently won first overall and second in IRC class at Semaine Nautique Internationale de Mediterranee, the first event on the 2009 Club Swan 42 Mediterranean Circuit. Though Ferragamo’s crew was primarily Italian at that event, he will happily sail with the required majority of Finnish crew at the Invitational Cup, including NJK Commodore (Ms.) Gunilla Antas, Vice Commodore Erik Wallin, former Finnish Finn Champion Christian Andersson, experienced offshore sailors Johan Ahlström and Patrick Andersson, and noted skiff sailor Miikka Pennanen, who teaches junior sailing at the club.

NJK, in the province of Nyland, is the best known and most successful yacht club in Finland. With over 2,500 members and more than 700 registered boats it is also the largest sailing club in the country, established in 1861. The club also operates the NJK sailing centre at Björkholmen, in the western part of Helsinki.

Crump’s Royal Danish Yacht Club (originally named the Danish Association for Pleasure Sailing) was founded in 1866 with its first clubhouse built in 1884 in Copenhagen. In connection with the 25-year jubilee in 1891, King Christian IX granted the Club his permission to use the name Kongelig Dansk Yachtklub (Royal Danish Yacht Club). It was then, too, that the royal crown was introduced as part of the club’s burgee design. The club, today with its main facility in Hellerup (the Copenhagen structure was blown up by the Nazis in 1944 in response to sabotage attacks by the Danish Resistance), has about 2,200 members.

The complete list of yacht clubs and sailing organizations competing in the NYYC Invitational Cup is as follows: Japan Sailing Federation; New York Yacht Club (USA); Norddeutscher Regatta Verein (Germany); Nyländska Jaktklubben (Finland); Real Club Nautico Barcelona (Spain); Royal Bermuda and Royal Canadian Yacht Clubs; Royal Cork and Royal St. George Yacht Clubs (Ireland); Royal Danish and Royal Hong Kong Yacht Clubs; Royal New Zealand Yacht Squadron; Royal Ocean Racing Club, Royal Thames Yacht Club and Royal Yacht Squadron (UK); St.Francis Yacht Club (USA); Yacht Club Costa Smeralda (Italy); and Yacht Club de France.

Sperry Top-Sider is the exclusive footwear sponsor for the NYYC Invitational Cup. The company will debut its latest in performance sailing footwear, the Ventus, the Latin term for 'wind', and will provide this footwear to all competitors.

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