The Enterprise is a Bermuda rigged

sailing dinghy Dinghy sailing is the activity of sailing small boats by using five essential controls: * the sails * the foils (i.e. the daggerboard or centreboard and rudder and sometimes lifting foils as found on the Moth) * the trim (forward/rear angle o ...

with a double-chined hull and distinctive blue sails. Normally crewed by two, and sometimes carrying a third crew member, it may also be sailed single-handed.

History

The Enterprise was designed by Jack Holt in 1956 for The News Chronicle during the post-war sailing boom, becoming the first UK sailing dinghy to be sponsored by a national newspaper (followed in due course by the

Mirror Dinghy The Mirror is a type of popular sailing dinghy with more than 70,000 built. The Mirror was named after the ''Daily Mirror'', a UK newspaper with a largely working-class distribution. The Mirror was from the start promoted as an affordable boat, ...

, also designed by Jack Holt). It remains popular in the

United Kingdom The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Europe, off the north-western coast of the European mainland, continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotlan ...

and a dozen or so other countries, for cruising and

racing In sport, racing is a competition of speed, in which competitors try to complete a given task in the shortest amount of time. Typically this involves traversing some distance, but it can be any other task involving speed to reach a specific go ...

. Adopted by many sailing schools, the Enterprise's combination of size, weight, and power has widespread appeal. The Enterprise is accredited as an

International Class International Class is a status that the World Sailing grants, in exchange for fees of various kinds, to sailing boat classes that offered a “high standard of international competitive sailing” and satisfy a number of criteria regarding the num ...

by the International Sailing Federation, the ISAF. The Enterprise is most often sailed with no spinnaker. However the international class rules allow the decision of whether to allow spinnakers to be made by the national authority. In the U.K. and Canada, no spinnakers were allowed until 2002 when a new PY handicap was introduced in the UK to allow spinnakers to be used in multi class racing in clubs, although spinnakers may still not be used in "Class" racing; in the United States they are allowed. Early boats, wooden and GRP, used buoyancy bags fixed under the benches and thwarts for internal buoyancy but nowadays foam reinforced plastic boats have built in buoyancy tanks improving stiffness and removing much of the maintenance associated with air-filled bags. Wooden boats still tend to have buoyancy bags to the rear and a forward bulkhead. They are also relatively unstable in comparison with other dinghies of similar performance, they have handling characteristics which would generally be associated with much faster designs. The first two Enterprises built were sailed from Dover to Calais both as a test and for advertising purposes. This feat was repeated on the Enterprise's 50th anniversary, but this time the two boats not only sailed to France, but also returned to England.

References

External links

Enterprise Association UK International Enterprise class rules (2013)
at www.sailenterprise.org.uk
Brief History of the Enterprise Class
at http://www.yachtsandyachting.com/ {{Classes of the International Sailing Federation Classes of World Sailing Dinghies Boats designed by Jack Holt Two-person sailboats 1950s sailboat type designs