An interview with Jay Leon and Keith Whittemore about the 2024 J/24 World Championship
by David Schmidt 25 Sep 2024 16:00 BST
September 28 to October 5, 2024
J/24 Worlds day 5 at Boltenhagen, Germany © Pepe Hartmann / J/24 worlds
Yacht design Rod Johnstone had no idea what he was unleashing on the sailing world when, in 1975, he first pulled Ragtime, his self-designed and home-built 24-footer out of his garage in Stonington, Connecticut. Johnstone studied yacht design via a correspondence course through the Westlawn Institute of Marine Technology, and spent several years tinkering with a design for a fast, family friendly, and easily trailerable raceboat. Once complete, Johnstone drafted his family and friends to help with the build, and, in the summer of 1976, he handily won every major regatta around the southern New England area.
Not surprisingly, word of his design quickly spread, and while Johnstone is an excellent sailor, there was little doubt that his tidy homebuilt raceboat was a grand slam.
The orders started arriving, and now, almost 50 years and well over than 5,500 hulls later, the J/24 is indisputably the world's most popular keelboat.
Given the design's popularity and relative affordability, it's also not surprising that competition levels in this international One Design class are high. Winning a J/24 Worlds is—and always has been—a big deal, and one that takes serious teambuilding, training, focus, and skill.
Take the 2024 J/24 World Championship (September 28 to October 5, 2024), which is being organized by the Corinthian Yacht Club of Seattle, the International J/24 Class Association, and the U.S. J/24 Class Association, and is being hosted by the Port of Seattle. As of this writing, the entry list includes more than 55 boats from ten countries and includes multiple national- and world champion-winning skippers and teams. Racing is set to unfurl on the waters of Puget Sound, and—in addition to great racing—will hopefully give teams sweeping views of the Olympic Mountains to the west, Mount Rainier to the south, and Mount Baker to the north.
I checked in with Jay Leon, press officer of the 2024 J/24 Worlds, and Keith Whittemore, 2019 and 2023 J/24 world champion skipper and assistant regatta chair, via email, to learn more about this world-class one-design regatta. They are both working closely with Jon Anderson, the regatta chair, to bring this event to Seattle.
Can you give us a quick update on the health and status of the J/24 class in the Pacific Northwest? Also, what about nationally and internationally?
JL: It has been reported that the Tuesday night J/24 fleet in Seattle is the largest weekly gathering of J/24s in the country—regularly attracting over 20 boats.
J/24 Fleet #1 at Wayzata Yacht Club on Lake Minnetonka, MN recently hosted the 2024 J/24 Nationals. The top four teams from that regatta are also sailing in the 56-boat fleet for the Seattle worlds. The J/24 fleet has always attracted many professional sailors, making it equally interesting to follow the leading non-professional teams, AKA Corinthian teams. The top Corinthian team at the J/24 Nationals was Siesta, which was led by skipper Nobuyuki Imai from Japan. We are expecting four boats in all from Japan at the Seattle event.
In 2023, there were 35 boats at the Worlds in Greece; in 2022, there were 38 boats at the Worlds in Texas, and in 2021, the event that was to be held in the UK was cancelled due to Covid.
Where are the bulk of the entrants coming from? Also, is there a geographical sweet spot in the USA? What about internationally?
Argentina: 1, Australia: 1, Canada: 1, Great Britain: 3, Germany: 1, Greece: 1, Ireland: 1, Italy: 3. Japan: 4, Puerto Rico: 1, and the USA: 39.
How competitive of an regatta do you think this year's J/24 Worlds will be compared to the last several editions of this storied event?
KW: The 2024 J/24 Worlds should be as competitive, or a bit more competitive, than the last couple of championships. The Seattle-Puget Sound racing venue is very fair, has a large variety of conditions for the competition to tackle and thus should give the teams a lot of opportunity to show their stuff.
A good share of the top teams are based in the U.S., [and] with the regatta being held in Seattle, it makes it possible for more of those teams to attend. It has been a few years since the J/24 Worlds had sixty competitors fighting on the course.
What's the weather typically like on Puget Sound in late September/early October? What are the best-case and worst-case scenarios?
JL: Late enough in the summer to be windy, early enough in the fall to be warm. Being Seattle, we may have some rainy days, but we will also have some spectacular fall days with the mountains out and the leaves turning.
Puget Sound often sees big tides and interesting winds. Do you have any advice for competing teams?
KW: [Seattle local and multi-time world-champion sailor] Jonathan McKee will be giving a full weather and tide briefing to all of the competitors at the event.
The Sound is a great place to sail because you can mostly see the wind on the water unlike a lot of other places. Also, sailors are presented with the added challenge of a significant tidal range, this tidal range provides serious current to manage and use to your advantage.
On September 29th, the fleet will be practicing in a ten-foot flood, which is very significant, but as the week evolves, the flood will lessen to a five-foot "Hold-Up", where there is not a lot of current, but there will be a current direction change from a northerly flow (ebb) to a southerly flow (flood), during the racing period.
Puget Sound is "not" a corner shooting place to race; very rarely does anyone come out of a deep corner to win.
The J/24 Worlds races will be held north of Meadow Point in the area off Carkeek Park, which is pretty much the fairest area of Puget Sound to race. That said, both the wind and current can squirrely in the vicinity of Meadow Point (especially on a southeasterly), so the PRO will keep the course north enough to take Meadow Point out of the equation.
Do you have any entries that you're eyeing for podium finishes? What about any dark horses who you think could prove to be fast, once the starting guns begin sounding?
KW: With most J/24 World Championships, there are five or six teams that will fight it out to end up in the top spot. The competitors below have all won significant national and international regattas, [and] are well-prepared and ready to go:
Louis Mulloy (Ireland), Nobuyuki Imai (Japan), Ignazio Bonanno (Italy), Paul Abdoullah (USA), Mike Ingham (USA), and Travis Odenbach (USA)
Seattle also has some great teams that will be up there, in the mix, led by Scott Milne, Mark Laura and Harry Dursch.
Can you please tell us about any efforts that you and the other regatta organizers have made to try to lower the regatta's environmental footprint or otherwise green-up the event?
KW: One of regatta chair Jon Anderson's early goals [with this Worlds] was to ensure the planning of this event led with sustainability at the forefront. You will see examples of this throughout the regatta from the skipper's bags, to the parties, trophies and even on the water.
We are proud to have achieved platinum status as a Clean Regatta by Sailors for the Sea; and the lessons learned in planning this event will continue as key environmentally friendly practices for all future CYC regattas.
This Worlds event will utilize five MarkSetBots, which will be the only race marks for the event. Because of this, we are able to reduce our overall on-water footprint and fuel consumption typically seen with setting and retrieving ordinary inflatable marks by gas-driven mark boats. Not only does this lessen the carbon footprint, it also reduces impact to the tidal environment by eliminating anchoring on sensitive sea floors and tribal fishing grounds.
Is there anything else that you'd like to add about the 2024 J/24 Worlds, for the record?
JL: Two-time J/24 world champion Keith Whittemore supported the effort to get the 2024 Worlds to Seattle and instead of sailing, he is working closely with regatta chair, Jon Anderson, to make this a world-class event.
Expect plenty of boats, plenty of great competitors, and top sponsors including Beechers Handmade Cheese (beechershandmadecheese.com), Bank of America (www.bankofamerica.com), and the Port of Seattle (www.washingtonports.org).
The event will be officiated by top race officials including PRO Mark Foster and judge Willi Gohl from Germany.
For more information including spectator boats and live tracking, please watch the event website here: www.j24worldsseattle.org/home