East Boothbay-built Comanche yacht breaks transatlantic sailing record
Courtesy / Hodgdon Yachts
The 100-foot supermaxi yacht, Comanche, during sea trials.
Courtesy / Hodgdon Yachts
Comanche, the 100-foot supermaxi yacht built at the East Boothbay-based Hodgdon Yachts, is celebrating another victory, shattering the west-to-east transatlantic monohull sailing record by arriving at the finish line at Lizard Point in Cornwall, United Kingdom, Thursday morning.
The record-breaking arrival at 7:45 a.m. EST was roughly three hours ahead of the Comanche's estimated arrival time, but breaking records is just another day at the races for the yacht, which is owned by Netscape co-founder Jim Clark and his Australian supermodel wife, Kristy Hinze-Clark.
Audrey Hodgdon, the marketing manager at Hodgdon Yachts, told Mainebiz on Thursday morning that just last month, the Comanche competed in the 635-mile Newport Bermuda Race and broke that race’s previous record by nearly five hours. In 2015, the vessel broke the 24-hour monohull speed record, sailing farther than any other monohull yacht on the planet in a 24-hour period, and in December 2015 it became the first American vessel since 1998 to win the Rolex Sydney Hobart Yacht Race.
“The Comanche was specifically designed, engineered and built to be a fast racing sailboat,” Hodgdon told Mainebiz of the vessel, which was completed in 2014. “All of the materials were optimized to be as light as possible so that it could sail so fast.”
Hodgdon is referring to an advanced composite material known as pre-impregnated carbon fiber. In order to build the Comanche from this optimized material, the largest marine oven in the United States was built at Hodgdon Yachts, which means the boat was literally built inside.
“That oven was actually specifically built for the boat and to work with those materials so that they can reach a certain temperature,” according to Hodgdon.
As for what’s next for the record-breaking vessel? While Hodgdon said there are no specific plans that she knows of for the Comanche, it will likely continue to compete in the yacht-racing circuit.
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