USA 18ft Skiff Challenge - a brief history
by Frank Quealey 10 Apr 21:02 UTC
AFS, Howie Hamlin, in 1997 © Bob Ross
The participation of Mikey Radziejowski, David Liebenberg and Daniel Roberts at the 2026 Giltinan world 18 footer championship last month marked the return of a USA 18ft skiff competitor at the championship for the first time since Katie Love skippered Panasonic Lumix in 2019.
With little time and opportunity to prepare for their challenge, the US trio were provided with the competitive 2022 and 2023 champion Andoo by the Australian 18 Footers League, and repaid the gesture by performing well throughout the regatta.
The Andoo USA team finished 18th overall in the 27-strong fleet and included race placings of 11th, 12th and 13th.
Hopefully, it may lead to an even stronger challenge in 2027 and resurrect the US competition which began on Sydney Harbour in 1970.
Legendary League official Alf Beashel was the driving force behind the club's efforts to introduce the USA into the championship when he organised a team of three Australian crews to contest the 1969 Long Beach Sea Festival against four US crews in 18s which were previously purchased from Sydney and shipped to California (see a photo).
Bob Holmes' reigning world champion Travelodge won the five-race regatta and was left in America for Californian skipper Roger Welsh.
Welsh brought the skiff back to Australia the following year and became the first USA entry when his team contested the 1970 world championship as Travelodge International on Sydney Harbour (see a photo).
The team performed very well and finished 4th overall after recording 2nd and 3rd in two of the last three races of the regatta, however the team's greatest achievement came at the 1971 worlds on Waitemata Harbour, Auckland when it set another record by winning Race 4 in treacherous conditions.
With winds gusting to 30-knots and a strong ebb tide which whipped up big seas in the harbour, Travelodge International finished 6m52s ahead of Rod Zemanek's Willie B, the only other boat to complete the 12-mile course.
The crew on that record-making day was Roger Welsh, Andrew Gram, John Slattebo and Bob Rollins.
Welsh was so impressed with the Farr design that he elected not to contest the 1972 championship and instead commissioned Farr to design, and build, a new hull and a complete set of sails in New Zealand, for a new skiff. On completion, the boat was shipped to the US, gained sponsorship from the Travelodge Hotel organization, and taken to Sydney where Welsh skippered her in the 1973 Worlds (see a photo).
Travelodge International finished 4th overall behind Bob Holmes (Travelodge NSW), KB (Dave Porter) and defending champion Don Lidgard (Smirnoff), but the result could have been much better had the skiff suffered fewer gear problems.
The skiff recorded one race win and two second-placings in the five race regatta but failed to complete the course in each of the other two races and suffered by having to carry a non-finish in her final total.
It was apparent that Welsh and his team were on a strong upward curve and would be a consistent challenger during the 1970s but tragedy was about to strike. Roger Welsh took ill and Andrew Gram was forced to skipper Travelodge International at the 1974 Worlds when word was received from the US that Roger had passed away.
It was a tremendous blow to the USA challenge, and would take another twenty years to recover back to the same level.
Pakhtun Shah skippered Travelodge International at Brisbane in 1978, Kentucky Fried Chicken at Sydney in 1979 and Lysaght Colorbond at Auckland in 1981, and was by far the most successful US challenger before Howie Hamlin came on the scene at Sydney in 1996, when he skippered a chartered skiff, named Konica.
Howie was a champion 5o5 sailor who took to the 18s immediately and returned each year for the next three years in chartered skiffs from the League - AFS in 1997, Lexmark in 1998 and Emery Worldwide in 1999 (see a photo).
After winning the 1999 world 5o5 championship, Hamlin skippered a new Australian-built 18ft skiff, which raced as US Challenge, at the 2000 Giltinan World championship.
He won the European Championship later that year then it was in GE-US Challenge that Howie Hamlin broke through to become the 2002 and 2003 world 18 footer champion after two excitingly close victories on Sydney Harbour.
He remains the only US world 18 footer champion and the only winner from the northern hemisphere to win the championship on more than one occasion.
Along with his great sailing partner Mike Martin, Howie won the 2002 San Francisco International in General Electrics, but it was in Pegasus between 2005 and 2007 that they recorded most of their 18 footer victories together.
Along with Australia's Trent Barnabas, Hamlin and Martin won three consecutive European championships (2005-07) as well as the 2005 and 2006 San Francisco International. With Paul Allen they also won the 2007 San Francisco International.
Howie later won two more San Francisco International contests (2009 and 2011) in Harken and CST, with Matt Noble and Paul Allen, then teamed with Australians Scott Babbage and Peter Harris to win the 2013 European Championship in CST and the 2015 Mark Foy Trophy in Harken.
Hamlin completed his Giltinan World Championship challenges when he skippered Harken in the 2017 and 2018 regattas.
California's Katie Love, who previously skippered an all-American Female team on Sydney Harbour in the 2013 Giltinan world championship, returned to Australia to complete a full 18 footer season with the League in 2018-19 and contest the 2019 Giltinan World Championship in Panasonic Lumix.
Don't forget, if you want to watch coverage of all the racing at the 2026 Giltinan 18ft skiff World Championship, as well as all previous racing and interviews throughout the season, go to www.youtube.com/@18footersTV/streams