Her hull is solid glass, chopped strand mat and woven rovings without a core, moulded by Blondecell of Lymington and fitted out first by Mitchells of Poole, then by other yards and by Blondecell itself, and sold all along as hulls and kits for owners to finish. From the late nineteen-nineties Austin Lion built her under licence at Walsoorden in the Netherlands; the yard, Tradewind Yachts, later took over the brand and still builds her to order. About seventy were built by one count, about a hundred and twenty by another.
Her ballast is lead, encapsulated in the long keel, her rudder hangs on the keel’s trailing edge, and most are rigged as cutters, some with a bowsprit. A sailor on the YBW forums who once sailed alongside a new one called her “the sailing equivalent of a Land Rover Defender … slow steady but you will eventually get there”; Good Old Boat’s review of 2019 expected her to be “speedy in anything over 20 knots of wind” and, from her ratio of sail area to displacement, to have “adequate sail power for lighter winds”.
In the Golden Globe she has raced as Puffin, Sagarmatha and Bernard. Puffin was fourth in 2018 under Istvan Kopar, and in 2022, under Ian Herbert-Jones, was rolled, dismasted and scuttled in the South Atlantic after Cape Horn, her skipper rescued from her. Sagarmatha, built at Lymington as the designer’s own yacht, retired at Lanzarote in July 2018; in 2022, under Guy Waites, she stopped at Cape Town and at Hobart and still completed her circuit, crossing the finish line on 19 Jun 2023. Bernard, found abandoned at Cowes and rebuilt in Brest, started the 2026 race under Etienne Messikommer.
Of the four past starts, three passed the Cape of Good Hope, two went round Cape Horn and one finished.
One started: racing now.
Two started: both ended early.
In days of 60-knot gusts on the approach to Cape Horn, 20–22 Mar 2023, the drogue warp wrapped around the Hydrovane rudder and it snapped in half; the electric autopilot steered through that rudder and it was too rough to fit the spare, so Ian Herbert-Jones was moved to Chichester class and anchored at Picton Island, Tierra del Fuego, to repair the vane. On 10 Apr, about 900 miles from the Falklands in 50–55 knots gusting 70–75 with confused seas of 7.7–8 m and no drogue out (it could not be deployed in the conditions), Puffin was rolled and dismasted; the skipper, with a back injury and a head gash, could not cut the rig away, set off the emergency position-indicating radio beacon and the YB distress alert, and was taken off by the fishing vessel Zi Da Wang on 11 Apr, Puffin scuttled.
Barnacle fouling reported from October 2022 slowed Sagarmatha until Guy Waites hauled out at Cape Town, sailing again on 22 Dec in Chichester class with the gate closing on 31 Jan 2023, which the boat could not reach in time. A knockdown in strong winds and big seas south of Australia on 3 Feb took the liferaft, so the skipper put into Hobart on 10 Feb for a replacement, after the gate had closed, and was out of the race; the circumnavigation continued outside it, 287 days in all.
Two started: one finished, one ended early.
Trouble with the windvane self-steering in the first fortnight left Kevin Farebrother hand steering, with very little sleep, unwilling to sleep below decks (“like getting into the back seat of a moving car to sleep when no-one is at the wheel”) and reporting hallucinations to race control. Sagarmatha put into Marina Rubicón, Lanzarote, and the skipper retired on 15 Jul 2018, telling the organisers “I’m not cut out for solo sailing”.
In 8 kt of wind and more, where she and the other designs have twenty legs or more each, she was behind in every such wind and angle: least behind upwind in 8–12 kt, −2%, and most behind reaching in 25 kt and more, −20%.
| Wind | upwind 0–60° | close reach 60–90° | reaching 90–130° | broad reach 130–160° | running 160–180° | Legs |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 680 | ||||||
| 887 | ||||||
| 1,058 | ||||||
| 723 | ||||||
| 550 | ||||||
| – | 260 |
What the record and the figures support, point by point, and what they weigh against her.
Displacement 8,819 kg, 6th of 17 of the designs that have raced; displacement to length 504, 1st of 17.
“When the winds picked up, the boat seemed to sit back and dig in”, wrote Good Old Boat’s reviewer, Fiona McGlynn, after sailing Kevin Farebrother’s Tradewind 35 from Falmouth to Les Sables-d’Olonne before the 2018 start; in a good breeze she is “fantastic”, said Etienne Messikommer of Bernard on 18 Sep 2026.
Yet in 20 kt and more her boats measured −9% against the other designs.
Solid glass without a core, from “a very high class GRP moulder”, Blondecell, in the words of a sailor on the YBW forums in 2012 who used to watch them being built; the lead glassed into the keel, so no keel bolts to corrode. “It’s super strong”, the race’s founder, Don McIntyre, said of Bernard on 22 Sep 2026.
One of her four past starts finished; Puffin was fourth in 2018.
The Tradewind 35 “tracked well”, found Good Old Boat’s reviewer, and “responded quickly” when a spectator came within a couple of feet; of the Tradewind 33 before her, “once up to speed, she’ll carry on day and night with little need for attention”, in Yachting Monthly’s review.
Waterline 7.87 m, 14th of 17.
Slow, “hopelessly so in light conditions”, wrote a sailor on the YBW forums in 2012; “such a heavy boat” that in light wind “it needs so much power to just start gliding”, said Etienne Messikommer of Bernard on 18 Sep 2026. The Tradewind 33, on the same underbody, “needs a bit of breeze before she can be coaxed into life”, says Yachting Monthly’s review.
Under 8 kt of wind her boats measured −17% against the other designs, and in 20 kt and more −9%.
In 2018 Puffin’s wheel gearbox stripped and her emergency tiller broke, and her water tanks fouled and grew mould. In 2022 a drogue warp wrapped and snapped the rudder of Puffin’s wind vane, and a knockdown took Sagarmatha’s liferaft off the deck. In 2026 Bernard’s cockpit drains let a little water in. On the YBW forums in 2012 a sailor wrote of a Tradewind 33 whose rudder fell apart because mild steel fittings were used inside the moulding, and of teak decks on many boats “likely to be giving problems now”.
“Nerve-wracking when reversing, like all long keelers”, and “probably short on ventilation in warm climates”, wrote a sailor on the YBW forums in 2012.
Two listed for sale on Rightboat and Apollo Duck in September 2026, in Britain and the Netherlands: a boat of 1984 at thirty-nine thousand nine hundred and fifty pounds, and a hull of 1987 rebuilt in 2020 at two hundred and thirty-nine thousand euros. A new one was quoted at two hundred and fifty thousand pounds in 2012, a sailor on the YBW forums reported.
- Yachting Monthly, “Tradewind 33 used boat review”, Graham Snook, 25 Oct 2024 (Rock, the changes that made the 35, the sailing, the build to order)
- Good Old Boat, “Tradewind 35”, Fiona McGlynn, Issue 124, January/February 2019, and Good Old Boat’s sailboat data page for the design; sailboat-cruising.com, “The Tradewind 35” (the construction, the ballast, the number built)
- Tradewind Yachts BV and Walsbay (the builders, the licence, the brand, the lead ballast)
- “Tradewind 35 - info please!”, a thread on the YBW forums, April 2012 (sailors on the builders, the moulder, the sailing, the weak points, the number built, the price new)
- The race’s skipper pages for Istvan Kopar, Kevin Farebrother, Ian Herbert-Jones, Guy Waites and Etienne Messikommer; its “Race Start Review: Les Sables-d’Olonne to Lanzarote”, 19 Jul 2018; and its reports of day 263 of 2018 and day 219 of 2022, goldengloberace.com
- Yachting Monthly: “Guy Waites crosses the 2022 Golden Globe Race finish line”, 19 Jun 2023; the 2026 profile of Etienne Messikommer
- The race’s broadcasts on YouTube: Etienne Messikommer’s call from sea of 16 Sep 2026, the Lanzarote sail-past of 18 Sep 2026 and Don McIntyre’s tracker update of 22 Sep 2026
- The listings on Rightboat and Apollo Duck, September 2026
- Notice of Race 2026: J.1.2 (the approved designs) and I.2.4 (seven entries per design)
- The figures: the builder's pages, Tradewind Yachts (10.67 m, 3.2 m, 1.68 m); waterline, displacement and sail area from the race's skipper pages for her three hulls, Puffin, Sagarmatha and Bernard, which agree (7.87 m, 8,819 kg, 67.35 m²), the builder printing neither the first two and its one sail area, 67 m², being a listed hull with a larger rig; the British builders from the race's page for Sagarmatha and the owners' reports; ballast from sailboatdata's sheet, read through Boatsector (8,287 lb, 3,759 kg); the first year and number built from sailboatdata's sheet and sailboat-cruising.com.
Why her races ended:
- Golden Globe Race, “Golden Globe Race 'Code Orange'. Paying the price for a Cape Horn rounding!” (23 Mar 2023)
- Golden Globe Race, “Day 219: Ian Herbert Jones rescued, safe onboard Taiwan-flagged F/V Zi Da Wang”
- Golden Globe Race, “GGR Timeline 2022”
- Yachting Monthly, “Golden Globe Race: Ian Herbert-Jones needing rescue after dismasting in 70 knot storm”
- Yachting Monthly, “Golden Globe Race: Ian Herbert-Jones rescued”
- Scuttlebutt Sailing News, “Golden Globe: Calamity at Cape Horn” (23 Mar 2023)
- Yachting Monthly, “Guy Waites crosses the 2022 Golden Globe Race finish line”
- Golden Globe Race, skipper page Guy Waites
- Wikipedia, “2022 Golden Globe Race”
- Golden Globe Race, “Race Start Review: Les Sables-d’Olonne to Lanzarote” (19 Jul 2018)
- Yachting Monthly, “Golden Globe Race: 13 skippers left heading south” (17 Jul 2018)
- MySailing, “Kevin Fairbrother pulls out of Golden Globe Race” (17 Jul 2018)
- Wikipedia, “2018 Golden Globe Race”
- Golden Globe Race, skipper page Kevin Farebrother
The same hull in two races:
What the figures mean. Waterline: the longer, the faster a heavy hull can go. Hull speed: 1.34 × √waterline in feet, the old rule of thumb. Displacement to length: above 300 is heavy; every design here is but the OE 32. Sail area to displacement: under 16 is under-canvassed by modern lights. The middle line is the median of the designs that have the figure: seventeen, or fewer where a source does not give it. Lengths are printed to the centimetre and areas to a tenth of a square metre, whatever the source’s own precision, and the ratios are worked from the figures as printed here.
How she is measured. Every 4-hour leg with a model wind on which the boat was moving (0.2 kt and more): this race’s since the start, and each boat’s whole race in 2018 and 2022, to her finish or her retirement (what a boat sailed after she retired is not counted). A leg’s wind is the model wind at its two ends, averaged as vectors, so its speed is that of the mean wind (a few legs of 2018 and 2022 carry the wind at one end only). The past races have no ocean current, so all three are measured alike: speed over the ground, and the wind’s angle off the course made good. Like for like sets each leg against the other designs’ legs of the same race in the same 3 kt of wind and 15° of angle; the heat map and the polar set her median in each wind and angle, over all her legs there, against the other designs’ medians in the races she sailed, each race weighted by her legs in it. Every figure is a median, and each measures the boat as she was sailed: the sailor, her sails and the state of her hull are in it, a hull under barnacles too. More on the Method page.