Jim Brown has notified friends and colleagues that his friend, legendary multihull sailor-designer Dick Newick, passed away this past week. In tribute to Dick, Jim posts the following, which is excerpted from Volume One of his memoir, “Among the Multihulls.”

ABOUT DICK NEWICK
From “Among The Multihulls” by Jim Brown

Like most pioneering multihull designers, Dick Newick began his work using flat-sheet plywood and strip planking in his strongly performance-oriented designs. He broke with the “plywood box” norm in 1971 when his trimaran THREE CHEERS was launched. This vessel utilized the cold molded construction method in her hulls, and in a one-piece, totally integrated crosswise bridge or “wing aka” to connect the three hulls. THREE CHEERS had not only the sleekest, most sea kindly hulls imaginable but the wing aka, which resembled the apex of a big boomerang, comprised the superstructure of the cabin and contained the bunks, galley and stowage areas. It was sculpted beneath to either deflect or decapitate onrushing wave crests, and was integrated with the hulls to achieve a strikingly organic anatomy that seemed evolved by nature over eons.

This boat was almost shocking to behold. Looking both avian and pelagic, she also had a vaguely reptilian purposefulness about her. Whether roosting at the dock or streaking through the waves she just looked right for the job of showing the world how a small sailing craft could sustain very high speed in extremely rough water and awfully hard wind. She had demonstrated her ability in some races, but while competing in the 1976 Observer Single-handed TransAtlantic Race (OSTAR), skipper Mike McMullen set her on the risky northern route to America and may have encountered ice. Fragments of the boat were found years later in a fishing trawl but Mike McMullen was never seen again. Newick, visibly distraught from the incident, said, “If you’re going to play these rough games, somebody is going to get hurt.” As with many revolutionaries Three Cheers led a checkered life and met a tragic demise, but her ongoing influence was pivotal.

Sailboat racing had by now become a major sport in France. The 1976 OSTAR was won by the venerated French superstar Eric Tabarly sailing his 73-foot monohull PEN DUICK VI (as distinct from the trimaran PEN DUICK IV). Tabarly was followed closely by the huge French monohull CLUB MED, a 236-foot juggernaut sailed – yes, single-handed – by Alain Colas. Colas was penalized into 5th place for receiving outside assistance, but both vessels had taken about twenty four days to cross from France. There was a large contingent of French journalists at the finish in Newport, Rhode Island, and this generated a lot of tricolor hoopla in the quiet harbor town. To everyone’s great surprise, only one day after celebrating the French achievements another boat appeared at the finish. It was a tiny Newick trimaran. Called the THIRD TURTLE, she was in some ways the baby sister of THREE CHEERS. At only 31feet-long this VAL class production boat, essentially a daysailer, was sailed by the modest Canadian Mike Birch. At less than half the length of the official winner and about one-eighth the size of the juggernaut, she literally stole the show in the milestone event. Birch’s tiny trimaran was described by at least one French journalist as, “Zee reeal winnaire.” In a sense, the real winner was Dick Newick.

The French now began to stage their own transoceanic racing events. The first Route Du Rum race was run in 1978 from Saint Malo, France to the island of Guadeoupe in the Caribbean. Another French superstar sailor Michael Malinofski was sailing his KRITER V (sponsored by the French champagne producer), a 68-foot monohull. As Malanofski approached the finish line, apparently far ahead of the fleet, again the redoubtable Mike Birch was seen also approaching in a very Newick-like 38-foot trimaran designed by Walter Greene named for this race OLYMPUS PHOTO. KRITER, at almost twice the length of Olympus, was holding a substantial lead but Birch surveyed his position and realized that the local conditions favored his trimaran. He also, recalled that the race sponsors had put up a generous cash prize for the winner and he resolved to give it a go. Sailing in breezy headwinds he overhauled the big monohull and – after twenty three days at sea – finished first by ninety eight seconds! The event demonstrated that in order to win in such competition one must be sailing in something other than a monohull.

Then, a Boston-based newspaper publisher named Phil Weld won the 1980 OSTAR. He sailed the 50’ Newick-designed, cold molded trimaran MOXIE, and at age 65 defeated twenty five younger competitors. This achievement together with his persistent, articulate advocacy of multihulls was to make Phil Weld perhaps the most venerated American multihull sailor of our time, but after his OSTAR win France went multihull crazy.

In trying to identify the root cause of the French enthusiasm, nautical historian Richard Boehmer has drawn attention back to Dick Newick and his THREE CHEERS. In Boehmer’s words, “I think it was not just the speed but also the beauty of Newick’s boats that so strongly stimulated the aesthetic sensibilities of the French. After THREE CHEERS and MOXIE they jumped into multihulls with an investment of talent and commercial sponsorship that has led to their three-decade dominance in both ocean racing and production multihulls.”

While this may be stretching the point, I believe that the influence of Dick Newick’s wooden boats, THREE CHEERS in particular, was so far-reaching that nothing in the sailing world will ever be the same again. Even the Americas Cup contests are now sailed in multihulls! By breaking the barriers of both performance and acceptance, Dick Newick can be called the Chuck Yeager of multihulls….