New-York tribune., 1920-07-22
American Yacht Captures
Exciting Race in Only
Sailing Weather That
Has Marked Contests
Challenger Sent to
Dock;No RaceToday
Resolute Leads ON Wind.
ward Leg, but Sham.
rock Then Begins Gain
By w. O. Mcclellan

reeled across a lively sea with the
sun flashes lighting the high spots,
Shamrock " lost the third race in
the series for the Americas Cup yes.
terday by virtue of the time allow.
arce awarded the defender Resolute.
Actually, the race was a dead heat
on elapsed time, one of the weird
est ironies ever conceived by winds
and tides since the days when men
first began to go down to the sea in
ships.
The challenger crossed the start
ing line just nineteen seconds before
the defender. Shamrock pushed her
blunt nose over the finish line ex-
actly nineteen seconds to the beat
before the trim prov of Resolute
passed the red and white Ambrose
Lightship.
In the motion pictures it would
have made picture to make tie
heart of even those who usually are
deaf to the call of the offshore wind
beat tumultuously. 1t was salt water
melodrama pure and simple
But to those who followed the
course of the boats it meant nothing.
1t was merely picture The mathe-
matical calculations in the physics
laboratory at Columbia University and
the rules of the Yachting game took
the thrills right out OF it. Mathems-
ticians arc constantly taking the thrills
from things.
Shamrock Gains Gradually
The course called fer beat to the
windward ard wing -and-wing reach
20 the starting place. Working 10 the
windward. Shamrock dropped behind
half d mile by the time the mark vas
turned Then. with all her enormous
81 read of canvas raised, Shamrock be-
gan to come up in a ten~knot breeze.
The gain was gradual. but certain.
The dainty Resolute seemed to be fly
ing home, but the bunt-nosed green
scow, with the full drape Of white cam
vas bellying out before her. continued
TO bore down steadily 1t was certain
tha, Shamrock would pass Resolute
somewhere before they crossed the fin
ish line. But it was just as inevitable
that the challenger would lose on the
time allowance.
Within two miles OF the finish Inns,
when the sunlight had pushed aside
the iilrn OF mist and revealed the squat
outlines of the Ambrose relief light
ship, the halt mile had been shorte ned
TO few hundred yards of green water.
On came Shamrock to the starboard OF
the defender, creeping up inch by inch.
"A, >,1 H.
boWsprit Of the challenger, that thing
that looked like a sawed-of railroad
tic, passed behind the graceful out
lines Of the white Resolute cleaning
in the sun like yacht of FURNISHED
silver. The ugly blunt nose passed be-
hind that screen. The eclipse was un-
der way
Twin Masts Side by Side
OFF TO the starboard. the tall mast
and the bcllying sails of Shamrock
were diminished in size. They moved
behind the graceful silhouette of the
silver defender For an instant the
like composite 1icture of the two
racing s.chts. The challenger Was
completely hiude.- though she had
gone into the sea on the ghost; trail
OF the tiying Dutchman. Only Reso-
lutte cleaner upon the sunlit ocean.
An ugly BIT o. timber protrudod ahead
of the chiseled bow and the tapered
bowsprit Of Resolute, then green fat
nose Shamrock was beginning TO
come INTO the lead. 1t emerged slow
ly and cumbersomely from behind that
dainty screen furnished by Resolute
and stood off for the mark blunsly and
rudely
The experts turned to where the red
and white lightship was rolling at her
moorings and gauged the distance 1t
was barely mile away. Unless a sud-
den gale seized Resolute and carried
aw~y all of that graceful spread of can
vas there was no chance for Shamrock
to finish anywhere near winner with
that handicap of seven minutes and
one second. 1t was all over but the
picture, q beautiful picture, but one
that meant nothing real in the history
o. the Americas Cup.
They were barely fifty yards apart
when that eclipse came. The rival
captains could have talked across ths
! rushing waters in that brief instant
when they held side by side. 1t looked
as though it had been staged for tho
camera,
Actually Dead Heat
The Whistles and the sirens at thu
[ finishing mark sounded for the racing
yachts simultaneously, for while the
blunt nose Of Shamrock pushed past
hrsf the chiseled prov OF Resolutc
pointed in just nineteen seconds later
By the rule of boat for boat il was
dead heat after thirty miles of the
only real sailing weather that has
favored the races to date, By the rula
of time allowance the challenper was
! beaten by just the amount that had