1948 London

Paul Elvstrom came to south-west England and the Games regatta in Torquay and began an unequalled record in Olympic sailing: four consecutive gold medals. And to think the Danish Olympic Committee had misgivings about sending him because the 18 years-old Elvstrom could speak no English then and he retired from the first race, shy and sensitive, after a haranguing from the Finnish competitor in a port and starboard incident.

Elvstrom was competing in the Firefly, a two-sail, two-person boat designed by Uffa Fox and pioneer of hot –moulded plywood construction (for ‘mass production’) and an aluminium mast. After his shaky start, Elvstrom got stronger scoring 6-3-1-2-5-1-1 to clinch his maiden gold, dropping the jib and sailing with a reefed main to suit the blustery conditions which saw many capsizes. Indicative of Elvstrom’s later inventiveness in gear and sails, he modified the Firefly’s mainsheet, leading it from the transom, along the boom and down to a swivel jam cleat on centreplate case.

The Sixes were the only International Rule class maintained and joining the Firefly as debutantes were the Swallow and Dragon, two and three person keelboats. Another innovation was orientating the course to the wind direction to give perpendicular starts and upwind legs. A circle of buoys was laid, with three selected to form a triangular course, marked by smoke signals.

Swede Tore Holm won a third medal, a bronze in the Sixes whilst Adriaan Maas of the Netherlands won a bronze in the Star having previously won silver in the Snowbirds in 1932. The Stars were won by the son and father crew of Hilary and Paul Smart of the USA. If Britain had had its way, the Star would probably have not been included in 1948 as the new Tom Thorneycroft-designed Swallow was its baby. But with little international interest, other countries lobbied for the Star’s inclusion with 17 competing compared to 14 Swallows.

Elvstrom’s was not the only notable career to have started. Bahamian Durwood Knowles sailed for Britain, as Bahamas did not have separate representation. He sailed for Bahamas four years later and through to 1988. But what a debut. To reach the UK, Knowles shipped his boat from Nassau to Miami, trailed it to New York and would have missed his crossing on the Queen Mary but for a delay due to a bomb scare. Then in Torquay he was dismasted in one and disqualified in another.

Germany and Japan were not invited but a record 59 nations attended the Games though Anglo-Irish tensions run high. Independent since 1921 and named Ireland in its constitution, the Irish found themselves in Opening Ceremony running order as Eire which had British-rule connotations. J F Chisholm, Hon Secretary of the Irish Olympic Council threatened to withdraw his country but the storm passed.

1952

Again there were five events when the Games returned to Scandinavia and Finland, one of the great Olympic nations in Track and Field. The Games were now truly international. Among the 69 nations were Ghana and Guatemala and, for the time, the USSR appeared as Soviet era superpower. The sailing took place at Harmaja, not far from Helsinki. Auspiciously, the Finn singlehander made its debut.

With the Olympic-Jolle and Firefly clearly unsatisfactory and with no real one-person dinghy established in Scandinavia, the Finnish Yachting Association held a competition and Rikard Sarby’s creation won. A canoe designer, Sarby zipped off a couple of fingertips with an electric saw whilst building his prototype. The Swedish Pricken design was front-runner in the first trials but the Fint, as it was originally called, came through strongly in the second, windy, trials in Sarby’s hands.

The Fint became the Finn and Sarby took the bronze in Helsinki behind Briton Charles Currey and Elvstrom. The Dane had built a hiking bench in his Hellerup home, and trained extensively on the water. Though the points method was different then, his score of 8209 to Currey’s 5449 and Sarby’s 5051 demonstrates the Dane’s dominance.

The 6-Metre hung on for one last hurrah whilst the International Yacht Racing Union brought in the 5.5-Metre as the formula class. Its first winner was American designer Britton Chance.

1956

When the Games moved away from Europe or the USA for the first time, they headed south to Melbourne, Australia. Again five classes were sailed at various locations on Port Philip Bay. The Finns were at Sandringham; Dragons and 5.5-Metres at Brighton whilst the Stars and newcomers, 12-Square Metre Sharpies, making their one and only Olympic appearance, were St Kilda. Sailing fared better than the equestrian events for which the Australians refused to relax quarantine laws. For the only time an Olympic event was separated, held in Stockholm instead.

The post World War was no less political. British and French action in Suez, the Soviet invasion of Hungary, Egyptian/Israeli and China/Taiwan tensions saw a handful of countries stay away.

The breezy sailing events suited Elvstrom. gold No 3 was his, the 20 Finns and their English sails were drawn by ballot. Canada’s Bruce Kirby was 8th overall in the Finns. His Olympic triumph came later when, in 1996, his creation – the Laser – was introduced to the Games.

The Australians used a clock face of eight buoys with the committee boat in the middle to set their course.

When the winds were light, the Scandinavian crews were untouchable in the Dragon with Swede Folke Bohlin, the silver medallist from 1948, and Dane Ole Berntsen taking gold and silver ahead of Lt Commander Graham Mann sailing the royal Dragon, Bluebottle, owned by the HRH Duke Edinburgh who had formally opened the Games at the Melbourne Cricket Ground.

The Star contest was spicy with Italian world champion Commander Augustino Straulino becoming involved in an early clash with Dr de Cardenas of Cuba in which the Italian forced the Cuban down on the American Star, which holed her. Both Italy and Cuba went out from that race, the difference for Straulino between winning a second successive gold and getting silver instead.

The Sharpie competition had a real trans-Tasman feel with Kiwi Peter Mander and West Australian Rolly Tasker racing home-built boats. The German world champion was the only other person in the 13-strong fleet to win a heat. The Tasker v Mander battle for gold continued into the last race with Tasker thinking he’d secured the title until a tangle at the final windward mark with the French boat. Tasker didn’t protest but the Frenchman did and Tasker lost the gold despite ending up tied as Mander had three wins to the Australian’s two.

1960 Naples

A return to Europe saw the greatest distribution of medals among the sailing nations. For the first time since 1900, not country won more than one gold with 15 medals shared by 11 nations. Denmark finished with three, a gold and two silver; the USSR a gold and silver; the USA a gold and bronze. Belgian Andre Nelis won bronze in the Finn to add to the silver he’d won four years before.

Timir Pinegin’s gold in the Star was the USSR’s first in sailing, his boat built by Skip Etchells in Old Greenwich Connecticut, USA. Elvstrom won his third gold in the Finn and fourth successive gold; an achievement still without compare.

Greece issued a stamp to commemorate Crown Prince Constantine’s victory in the Dragons, settled with a fourth in the seventh and final race. It was his country’s first-ever yachting medal and, remarkably the 20-year old prince had sailed the class only since February. His mother, Queen Fredericka, embraced her son at the close of the competition and then playfully pushed him into the water in front of King Paul. Constantine’s grandfather had been one of those who worked tirelessly with de Coubertin to bring the modern Olympics to life.

Though Rome was host city, the sailing event took place in the south in the Bay of Naples. The 5.5-Metres were won by American George O’Day, a former Harvard football player, and later a famous boat maker. O’Day had won the US trials in an Einar Ohlson-designed boat but when she was destroyed by a runaway truck, her purchased Minotaur, designed by Ray Hunt, who was the father of his bowman. O’Day scored five 1sts and two 2nds.

Peder Lunde Jr, scion of Norway’s most famous family, won gold in the newly introduced Flying Dutchman two-man dinghy with Hans Fogh, then sailing for Denmark before his move to Canada, taking the silver.