From the start line to Bandar-e Bushehr was roughly a hundred miles. In this boat, Hawke could cover that much water in four hours. That would put him off the point where Saffari’s compound stood at dusk. The SEAL commander, Stollenwork, had requested 1800 hours for the insertion of the assault team. Hawke would make sure his request was granted.
The two megayachts approached the half-mile-long starting line surging directly toward each other. Hawke drew starboard and had the opportunity to control the king’s yacht. Kingdom quickly bore down and moved away from the starting line. Hawke, at the helm, recognized the classical tactic instantly. Kingdom ’s skipper wanted to be at full speed when he hit the line, but timing was everything in this game. Should his opponent arrive even a fraction too early, he’d be forced to restart.
Hawke remained patient; he wanted to hit the line on a starboard reach, Blackhawke ’s best point of sail. He kept one eye on Kingdom and the other on the compass.
“You’re dead on it, skipper,” the tactician said. “Maintain your course.”
Hawke’s hired gun, Steve Hall, who would be calling tactics, had an impressive sailing resume. In addition to his Olympic Gold in sailing, Hall had a pair of Ph. D. degrees from MIT, hydrodynamics and electronic engineering. He’d spent years in a quest to discover why boats go fast and how to predict performance before the starting gun fires.
When Hawke offered Hall the chance to join his crew in the “race,” he’d jumped at it. Although the massive clipper ship had never been designed for racing, she’d certainly been designed to go fast, and Hall was fascinated to see firsthand what she could do against a traditionally sloop-rigged boat. So far, he was impressed.
The starting flag was hoisted and the gun fired.
Kingdom was surging forward at twenty knots. Her destroyer bow knifed through the water, sending a foaming bow wave down her topsides. Her white hull shined and reflected the water as though it were made of glass. Hawke was on a reach at twenty-three knots. All he had to do was swing the helm to starboard and he’d be off on a perfectly timed start. Kingdom was already trailing by ten seconds, blanketed in the dirty air created by Blackhawke ’s towering sails. The tactic had worked.
“She’s slowing!” Hall shouted. “ Kingdom ’s slowing!”
Hawke glanced back at her and saw he had the lead, for the moment at any rate.
Laddie Carstairs smiled broadly and clipped Hawke’s shoulder. “Good start, skipper.”
“I rather liked it myself,” Hawke replied, grinning as he eased the helm over two degrees. “Now we find out if we can hold them off in a tacking duel. Any second now she’ll-”
“She’s tacking now!” Laddie shouted suddenly, and Hawke whipped his head around to see Kingdom go on to port tack.
Hall, in a deathly calm voice, called, “Ready about!” alerting the crew that they, too, would be tacking momentarily. His stopwatch ticking off the seconds, he waited precisely forty-five seconds from the moment the opponent had tacked and then shouted to the crew, “Tacking!”
The helm went over slowly as Hawke timed the turn and the sails. He and his architect had designed the sails to retract into the masts at the moment they might have the effect of slowing the yacht and then extend as soon as the tack was completed. This remarkable feat of engineering allowed the sails to remain full of air throughout most of the turn. Hawke and Laddie were all smiles as Blackhawke slowed only slightly during the tack and then suddenly accelerated, the huge bow wave coursing back along her gleaming jet-black hull. It was clear to both men that her radical hull design gave her the ability to go to weather (into the wind) despite her enormous beam.
“Good God, Alex,” Hall said. “She’s ferociously quick, isn’t she?”
“This is the moment I’ve been waiting five long years for, Steve. I’m glad I’m sharing it with you.”
The hired sailing crew on deck cheered loudly, astonished by the boat’s performance as well. All battle-tested veterans of maxi yacht races around the world, they had wrongly assumed this big beast would come to a dead stop in a tack like that, dead in the water, unable to regain momentum. Shouts of surprise and enthusiasm also could be heard from many of the spectator boats that were lining this first leg of the race.
Hawke eased the helm gently to port and spoke softly to the sail trimmers.
“Okay, lads, let’s see just how high we can go. Trim in slowly as I bring her bow up into the wind.”
The closer to the teeth of the wind a yacht sails, the faster she goes.
He moved the wheel a fraction to the right as the hydraulic winches pulled the sails toward the centerline of the massive yacht. The compass remained centered at 120 degrees, just 30 degrees off the wind. In a true race boat that figure would have been closer to 18 degrees, but Blackhawke had not been designed to race. Tons of electronics, furniture, not to mention radar systems, weaponry, and ammunition, lay beneath her deck.
All was quiet in the cockpit for a few minutes. And then Hawke noticed the compass move to the left half a degree.
He now whispered, as though afraid to break the fragile bond between yacht, wind, and water: “Lads, another small trim, please.”
The giant masts turned a fraction to the left. The sails moved closer to the wind. Blackhawke had gained another half a degree to windward. All three men held their breath as the yacht gained still another degree to windward. And they stood in awe as they watched Blackhawke parallel Kingdom ’s heading. She could sail just as close to the wind as the sloop-rigged boat!
Suddenly, Kingdom tacked back to starboard. Now, a crossing situation between these two colossal yachts was about to unfold. The slightest misjudgment by anyone on board either boat, or even a wind shift, would result in a catastrophic collision. Hawke, like every competitive sailor, loved those times when two yachts, sailing at maximum speed, crossed each other’s paths with mere inches to spare.
Kingdom now had the privileged position as she was on starboard tack. But Blackhawke was ahead by three boat lengths. Hawke had a decision to make. He had to cross his opponent’s line now. If he didn’t, and Kingdom had to alter her course to avoid a collision, an infraction would be assigned to his boat, a 360-degree penalty turn that would cost him significant time and distance.
As the boats closed it was clear that Blackhawke was ahead and the proper tactic would be to cross and then almost immediately tack onto starboard and have the dirty air in the wake of his sails slow down Kingdom. Precision was the key. Tacking too early could cause a penalty for interfering with Kingdom ’s heading. Tacking too late would allow Kingdom to have clear air.
Sadly enough, it didn’t matter anymore.
“Boys, we’ll have to fall off and go below the king,” he shouted. “We must be in a lull. At any rate, we can’t cross now. Too late.”
Kingdom slid by, looking magnificent in the afternoon sunlight.
The sails were eased and Hawke put the helm hard over to port. Blackhawke crossed, well behind Kingdom. Three minutes later he tacked onto starboard, leaving the race course to Kingdom, and headed directly for the Iranian coastline. His blood was up-he wanted like hell to win, to beat this damn boat to the finish line-but he was at least content to know that he could beat her.
He picked up the VHF radio transmitter’s microphone.
“ Kingdom, Kingdom, Kingdom, this is the yacht Blackhawke. We have suffered a catastrophic hydraulic rigging failure and will be unable to continue to compete. I repeat, we are officially withdrawing from the race. Our captain will notify the Race Committee that we have conceded. I will update you with further information. At this point we need no assistance. Blackhawke over, standing by on Channel 16.”