Lawrence Karl Davidson (12 December 1926 – 4 October 2021) was a New Zealand sailing yacht designer. He is most notable for his International America's Cup Class sailboats which successfully challenged and defended the

America's Cup The America's Cup, informally known as the Auld Mug, is a trophy awarded in the sport of sailing. It is the oldest international competition still operating in any sport. America's Cup match races are held between two sailing yachts: one f ...

sailing trophy. In the

2000 New Year Honours The New Year Honours 2000 for the United Kingdom and New Zealand were announced on 31 December 1999, to celebrate the year passed and mark the beginning of 2000. The ''Honours list'' is a list of people who have been awarded one of the various or ...

, Davidson was appointed a

Companion of the New Zealand Order of Merit The New Zealand Order of Merit is an order of merit in the New Zealand royal honours system. It was established by royal warrant (document), royal warrant on 30 May 1996 by Elizabeth II, Monarchy of New Zealand, Queen of New Zealand, "for those ...

, for services to yacht designing. He was inducted into the America's Cup Hall of Fame in 2007.

Early career

Davidson was born on 12 December 1926. After leaving school he qualified as an accountant and worked in that profession until in 1969 he joined Morley Sutherland's boat building company at Greenhithe. In 1970 Tony Bouzaid commissioned the Blitzkrieg a half-ton yacht designed by Davidson. Davidson captained it to win the inaugural New Zealand Half Ton Championship. Encouraged by this success Davidson bought an

Olivetti Olivetti S.p.A. is an Italian manufacturer of computers, tablets, smartphones, printers and other such business products as calculators and fax machines. Headquartered in Ivrea, in the Metropolitan City of Turin, the company has been part of ...

computer and with software sourced from

Sparkman & Stephens Sparkman & Stephens is a naval architecture and yacht brokerage firm with offices in Newport, Rhode Island and Ft. Lauderdale, Florida, USA. The firm performs design and engineering of new and existing vessels for pleasure, commercial, and milita ...

began using the computer to design yachts. He was subsequently the first New Zealand yacht designer to hold the IOR rule on computer. in 1976 Davidson designed ''Fun'', a trailerable Quarter Ton yacht.

IOR success

In 1976 Davidson designed ''Waverider'' for Tony Bouzaid, which won the 1978 Half Ton Cup held at Poole, England. In reaction to the success of the light displacement yachts designed by Davidson, Bruce Farr and Paul Whiting, the

IOR The abbreviation IOR may refer to: * Importer of record, term in import and export * inclusive or - as opposed to XOR (exclusive OR) * Independent Order of Rechabites * Index of refraction * India Office Records * Indian Ocean Region * Indian Ocean ...

brought in new rules which required extensive surgery of ''Waverider'' to bring her into class for the 1979 Half Ton Cup series, which ''Waverider'' won, becoming the first yacht to ever win the Half Ton Cup twice. After the success of ''Waverider'', John MacLaurin commissioned ''Pendragon'' a Three-Quarter-tonner development of and big sister to ''Waverider''. Built lightly in wood by Ocean Racing Yachts in Auckland, ''Pendragon'' won the Three-Quarter Ton cup held in 1978 in Vancouver, British Columbia. In the following year it won the

One Ton Cup The One Ton Cup is a trophy presented to the winner of a sailing competition created in 1899 by the Cercle de la voile de Paris (CVP). Synopsis The One Ton Cup regattas were at the beginning of races between one-tonner sailing dinghies, acc ...

held at Newport, Rhode Island, a feat which was not achieved by any other yacht in level rating competition. Among his other designs have been the M20 fibreglass trailer yacht (1973), the Davidson 28, the Davidson 31 (1974), the Dash 34 (1981), the Davidson 35 (1981), the Davidson 40, the Cavalier 37, the Cavalier 45 production yachts. The only Davidson yacht in production is the Davidson 29, designed in 1990. Two boats racing and cruising are home ported in Seattle Washington, and Vancouver B.C.. Custom production at Center of Effort, sailboat shop, Port Townsend, Washington.Craig Ryan Montague. face book. Davidson designed ''Outward Bound'' for

Digby Taylor Digby Fergusson Taylor (24 October 1941 – 18 April 2017) was a New Zealand sailor who skippered yachts in both the 1981–82 and 1985–86 Whitbread Round the World Races. Taylor built and skippered the 51-foot sloop ''Outward Bound'', des ...

which competed in the 1981-82 Whitbread Round the World race, and won the small boat honours.

Death

Davidson died in Auckland, aged 94, on 4 October 2021.

America's Cup

* 1995,

San Diego San Diego ( , ; ) is a city on the Pacific Ocean coast of Southern California located immediately adjacent to the Mexico–United States border. With a 2020 population of 1,386,932, it is the List of United States cities by population, eigh ...

– Designed ''

NZL 32 ''NZL 32'', or ''Black Magic'', is an International Americas Cup Class yacht which won the 1995 America's Cup by defeating the American defender ''Young America'' in a 5–0 victory off San Diego, California. Design ''NZL 32'' was, in many wa ...

'' which won the

in five straight races * 2000, Auckland – Chief designer for Team New Zealand, and again won in five straight races (against challenger

Luna Rossa Luna Rossa Prada Pirelli, originally named Prada Challenge, then Luna Rossa Challenge, is an Italian sailboat racing syndicate first created to compete for the 2000 America's Cup. It won the Louis Vuitton Cup on their first attempt in 2000, but ...

) * 2003, Auckland – Designer for OneWorld Challenge who made it as far as the semi final repechage.

Notes

References

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Davidson, Laurie 1926 births 2021 deaths New Zealand yacht designers America's Cup yacht designers Companions of the New Zealand Order of Merit People from Dargaville