The Frank Albert Cup , presented by Frank Albert to be won three times by the same owner in the same yachL Apparently this was never achieved .
H . S . Harden . Commodore 1891-92 .
Victorians raced their boats-they still Slllrted from fixed moorings .
Dr Milford was made a life member in 1889 after he resigned from the Commodoreship held by rum for seven years . WM . McLardy . owner of the yacht / olantht . was elected Commodore of the club in
I 889 . This year also found the club in financial difficulties but Vice-CommodoreH . S . Hardencame to the rescue with a £ 100 donurion .
The first and second races of the 1883-84 season were won by Waitangi . Slrocco and Australian . The f11 $ t race was fora £ 10prize with a gold medal for the helmsman and a silver medal for each of the crew , presented by Dr Milford . The club added lhe prizes of £ I 0 for second and £ S for third . On the day of the race . 24 November 1883 , seven of the eleven com ·
petitors crossed the line , but owing to heavy weather the large yachts walked away from the smaller ones .
Ia the next race , on 9 February 1884 , an unfortunate incident occurred when 011inivtre collided with Sao .
Both were damaged , so only five boats completed the race , resulting in the same three yachts taking the honours ; Waitangi , Sirocco and Australian .
Such was the racing in the early days of the club . Members did not race frequently during a season . very irregularly in fact . for in the 1884-85 SCllSOn only three races were held fora total prize money of fifty pounds .
On 4 December 1886 the club ' s first ocean race 1001 . pl ..:.: ( il i > the fir ., 1 we can find from the records ). 11 was to Broken Bay and was won by Commodore Milford ' s Sao . Dr Milford was running two yachts , Doris and Sat >. and also owned at various times / sea and Waitangl . In the Broken Bay race
G11inivere was the only other yacht to futlsh .
By 1890 the club ' s Deet wa .~ so varied th . at five instead of three classes " ere used to divide the racing boats into groups :
First class Second class
Third class
Fourth class Fifth class
20 rating and over I 0 ruling and under 20
S mting and under I 0 2 1 / 2 rating and under S under 2 Ill rating
These ratings would have been taken from the length by sail area over 6000 referred to on page 17 .
To give an idea of how often they raced In 1J1c nineteenth century . in 1892 only seven races were held during the season nnd £ 101 5s Od given in
priwi . This seems to be about the average number of races for the season in those days .
About this time the 2 I 12-mters were very popu · lat , amongst them being Jenny Wren , Louelle , loh / o (), Norna , Astroea . Sirona and later 811 / bul , which beat all the others . then later again Bronze · wi1111 which also proved too good for any of them .
Activity , both social and nautical , was not very great during the 1890-91 season . With only 67 members . the club sailed eight races for prizes
40