MOSQUITO FIRST RULE 6 (ANKER, 1913): FROM TRIUMPH TO DISASTER AND BACK

She was designed to race hard in 1913, but 101 years later, almost sank after a calamitous collision. Today, Mosquito is back and racing again

- CLARE MCCOMB

“We’re crashing, we’re crashing ...turn, turn...” was the last thing Stig Hvinden heard before the collision. Mosquito’s three metre-long keel and proportionately small rudder meant that an unstoppable momentum was carrying her on towards the finish, some 200 metres away. He had no time to steer her away from danger – it was like trying to swerve in a lorry travelling at full pelt.

Things had been perfect up to that point. Mosquito had only just completed a major overhaul, including replacing ‘everything’ below the waterline, and the decision to compete in this huge and historic regatta had been arrived at with great caution. Stig, her proud owner, was “reluctant” to risk her, but she had been star of the show at Norway’s centennial Europeweek in 1914, and history was there to be repeated, at the bi-centenary.

Mosquito is an iconic 6-Metre yacht with a perfect Johan Anker pedigree. She was famous for having swept the board in her new-fangled bermudan rig in 1914, beating what was described then as a “swarm of sixes”: now, a full century later, she was trialling so sweetly that the decision was made to risk her – but what a shock was to follow.