In early January 1980, working for the Shobokshi Group, I acquired Fairways Marine from the receivers, Rank’s boat building and repair and maintenance business at Port Hamble near Southampton and signed the agreement with Gary Hoyt to build the Freedom range exclusively outside the US, all within a week. Fairways cost £34,000 (the receivers had expected £1m), Rank’s incompetent leisure division management paid me to take over the largest boat repair business in the UK (I needed their facilities) and the Freedom range I saw as the future of sailing boats because of the unstayed rig with wrap around sails controlled by wishbone booms.
My first sail on a Freedom 40 was an eye opener. The speed was simply amazing compared to all conventional Bermudan rigged boats, We overtook every boat on the water . The ease of sailing with the self tacking rig (no headsails), the simplicity of reefing (let the halyard down to a marker and pull the reefing line took 30 seconds) and the ability to share the sail with the outhaul line to tweak the performance, I likened it to driving a high performance Porsche amongst a group of sedate saloons. Later, I got into the science of the rig’s efficiency with tests at Southampton University that showed the wraparound sail was 96-97% efficient compared to 60% for a mainsail on a track up a mast. Freedoms are cruising boats not racing boats but their performance was astounding. But, there is always a but, they looked unconventional so how to sell this to the conservative yachting world. I decided to get the best known sailors of the time to race Freedoms. For around the buoys racing, I struck a deal with John Oakley, the skipper chosen for Lionheart, the 12m challenger for the America’s Cup and owner of sail maker Miller & Whitworth. I gave his company the contract to make sails for Freedoms, the Fairways Fisher motor sailers and the Seastream range inherited from Rank, I gave him a Freedom 35 (the 33 in the US) to race in the Solent Series and the Round the Island race (Isle of Wight). The Solent series was England’s premier series (the Solent is the largest centre for sailing in the UK and the Round the Island Race is the largest participant race of the year with some 2,000 boats. John went on to win every race in the Solent series (except one when he retired with a stone jamming the centre plate) and won the Round the Island Race starting in the main fleet and catching and overtaking every OOD34, regarded as the latest and most desirable 34ft ft from Jeremy Rogers, builder of the legendary Contessa 32, that started half an hour before.
To catch global attention though, I decided to follow the example of Nature, builders of the Swan range, who had put their name and brand in the public eye by winning the Whitbread Round the World Race with a Swan 65. I persuaded Rob James, the most prominent British ocean racer, and wife Naomi (who had been made a Dame for sailing solo around the World while Rob was winning the previous Whitbread) to race a yet to be built, three masted Freedom 70. Naomi was much more famous than Rob in the UK but Rob was hugely respected by people who knew ocean racing. He has won the two-handed transatlantic race and the Round Britain & Ireland Race with Chay Blyth. I let the Freedom 40 do the persuading of Rob. Naomi accompanied by Rob had been opening a new enormous supermarket in Southampton on a sunny Saturday and they came to chat with me and see the 40 afterwards. Naomi was so put off by the look of the 40 that she was reluctant to come for a sail but Rob was intrigued. A few days later, we went for a sail. We motored along the Hamble river to the entrance. The Hamble had 7 marinas and Port Hamble was one before the entrance from Southampton Water. The marina at the entrance was Hamble Point and on cue out came the latest Swan 42 designed by Ron Holland, the New Zealander and top designer. Rob and Naomi (also from New Zealand) were close friends with Ron and his American wife, Laurel. In fact, Naomi and Laurel were entered to sail together in the next two handed transatlantic race. Rob rubbed his hands with glee that he could measure the Freedom 40 against the Swan 42. The Swan started to raise their sails. We had 15-20 knots of wind on a glorious sunny day. Rob suggested that we raise the Freedom’s sails so I told him that we should give the Swan a helpful start. Rob was sceptical. He old me that the 42 was a fast boat. Trust me, I told him. Let’s allow the mouse to run first. We have the Swan (on a demo sail) a mile start and then I told Rob to raise the Freedom’s two identical mainsails, pull by hand and only use the winch to raise the booms. The Swan was doing around 8 knots on a reach. I watched Rob and Naomi’s faces as the Freedom accelerated to 10 to 12 knots and rapidly caught up the Swan. We overtook the Swan, sailed around it and then overtook it again. The manager of Nautor was trying to distract his clients from looking at the Freedom 40, we all knew each other.
Rob and Naomi were sold on the Freedom rig so Rob said that that the 40 was too small for the Whitbread. I explained he Freedom 70 with three masts and suggested that Naomi and Laurel could race her in the Two Star and Rob and Naomi in the Whitbread. We sailed back to Port Hamble and went to see the drawings of the 70. The Nautor manager called and said that his demo sail clients wanted to see the 40 and he would send them along as long as we warned him if we were taking the 40 for a sail so he could avoid a repeat encounter. We sold them one.
The Freedom 70 did go in the two star but Naomi had a burst cyst on the ovary two days before the race and John Oakley replaced her. Rob had his Whitbread crew come to Rhode Island to sail the Freedom 70 back and had a private race with Flyer, the conventional favourite for the Whitbread, from Nantucket lighthouse to Lands End. The 70 beat Flyer by 4 days crossing in the second fastest time for a monohull, beaten only by America, over twice the length of the 70. I had used the ultimate sanction of resigning because the Shobokshi Group had failed to send the agreed £1m extra capital for the expansion of Fairways and that led to the collapse of Fairways and the 70 not going in the Whitbread. Rob and his crew and I had no doubt that the 70 would have won the Whitbread easily, I had arranged live broadcasts daily from on board.
My plan was to create a second generation of Freedoms after the initial 40, 35 and 30 that Gary had created. I had commissioned Ron Holland with considerable input from all our experience including Rob James, John Oakley, Anton Emmerton and myself. The first model was the Freedom 39 pilothouse with a schooner rig, wishbone booms and wraparound sails. It was built in England and the US.
I own a Freedom 35 today built by Fairways in 1981 which I refurbished in 2022. I would have bought the 39 had I found one. The 35 was the best of the first generation with one exception - the Freedom 70. If you find a Freedom with unstayed masts but a conventional boom and the sail on a track up the mast, you can definitely change to the wishbone boom and wrap around sails. Unstayed masts must be stepped to the bottom of the boat. The area around the mast is strengthened. If you think back to before stayed masts stepped to the deck, unstayed was the norm on sailing vessels. I called the Freedoms the monoplane of sailing boats compared to the biplanes of stayed masts. If you consider an older stayed mast sailing boat, check the chain plates carefully because the stress invariably causes issues.
Email sent Chris…