The GP14 is a wooden or
fibreglass
Fiberglass (American English) or fibreglass ( Commonwealth English) is a common type of fiber-reinforced plastic using glass fiber. The fibers may be randomly arranged, flattened into a sheet called a chopped strand mat, or woven into glass c ...
hulled double-handed
fractional Bermuda rig
Bermuda rig, Bermudian rig, or Marconi rig is a type of sailing rig that uses a triangular sail set abaft (behind) the mast. It is the typical configuration for most modern sailboats. Whilst commonly seen in sloop-rigged vessels, Bermuda rig is ...
ged
sailing dinghy
Dinghy sailing is the activity of sailing small boats - usually for fun, learning necessary sailing skills (often also within family), and competition.
RYA lists Five essentials of sailing dinghies as:
* The sails
* The hydrofoil, foils (i.e. t ...
designed by
Jack Holt in 1949.
The class is active in the UK, Ireland, Australia, South Africa, Sri Lanka and parts of the north-eastern USA. With over 14,000 built, the GP14 is popular for both racing and cruising.
Design
The GP14 was designed by
Jack Holt in 1949, with the assistance of the
Dovey Yacht Club in
Aberdyfi
Aberdyfi (), also known as Aberdovey ( ), is a village and community in Gwynedd, Wales, located on the northern side of the estuary of the River Dyfi.
The population of the community was 878 at the 2011 census. The electoral ward had a larger ...
.
The idea behind the design was to build a General Purpose (GP) 14-foot dinghy which could be sailed or rowed, capable of also being powered effectively by a small outboard motor, able to be towed behind a
small family car
The C-segment is the 3rd category of the European segments for passenger cars and is described as "medium cars". It is equivalent to the Euro NCAP "small family car" size class, and the compact car category in the United States.
In 2024, the C-s ...
and able to be launched and recovered reasonably easily, and stable enough to be able to lie to moorings or anchor when required. Racing soon followed, initially with some degree of opposition from Yachting World, who had commissioned the design, and the boat soon turned out to be an outstanding racing design also.
The boat was initially designed with a main and small jib as a comfortable family dinghy. In a design philosophy that is both practical and highly redolent of social attitudes of the day the intention was that she should accommodate a family comprising parents plus two children, and specifically that the jib should be modest enough for "Mum" or older children to handle, while she should perform well enough to give "Dad" some excitement when not taking the family out. While this rig is still available, and can be useful when using the boat to teach sailing, or for family sailing, and has some popularity for cruising, the boat is more commonly seen with the full modern rig of a mainsail, genoa and spinnaker. Australian boats also routinely use trapezes.
In the late eighties underfloor buoyancy was introduced to the foam-reinforced plastic (FRP) boats, and the internal layout of these boats underwent several stages of modernisation. In the early 1990s a new internal layout was introduced in the wooden boats (the "Series 2"), with built-in underfloor buoyancy.
This was further modified over the following years, led by boat builders
Alistair Duffin, who builds in wood, and Holt Allen (later
Speed Sails Ltd and now
Winder Boats), who manufacture in GRP (
glass-reinforced plastic
Fiberglass (American English) or fibreglass ( Commonwealth English) is a common type of fiber-reinforced plastic using glass fiber. The fibers may be randomly arranged, flattened into a sheet called a chopped strand mat, or woven into glass c ...
) and FRP. As of the 2011 RYA Dinghy Show a new builder in FRP,
Boon Boats, has entered the market with a significantly different interior layout, developed in agreement with the Class Association. The majority of wooden boats in recent years have been built by Alistair Duffin. Another highly respected wooden boat builder of the class, Tim Harper, has recently returned to building them after a period not doing so. New to the fleet of wooden builders is Gingerboats. A few boats are still amateur built, and one amateur-built boat won the National Championship in both 2002 and 2005 (and is still regularly winning in top flight competition), while another amateur-built boat came second in the 2006 World Championship. Racing honours are evenly divided between the wooden and the plastic boats. New boats are currently available in wood, GRP and FRP.
Racing
The biannual GP14 World Championships where most recently held at Plas Heli in
Pwllheli
Pwllheli ( ; ) is a market town and community on the Llŷn Peninsula (), in Gwynedd, north-west Wales. It had a population of 4,076 in 2011, which declined slightly to 3,947 in 2021; a large proportion (81%) were Welsh language, Welsh speaking. ...
,
Wales
Wales ( ) is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It is bordered by the Irish Sea to the north and west, England to the England–Wales border, east, the Bristol Channel to the south, and the Celtic ...
and was won by Matt Mee and Chris Robinson of Red Wharf Bay Sailing Club and Blackpool & Fleetwood Yacht Club respectively. The 2026 Worlds are due to be held at the Royal Northern Ireland Yacht Club in
Belfast
Belfast (, , , ; from ) is the capital city and principal port of Northern Ireland, standing on the banks of the River Lagan and connected to the open sea through Belfast Lough and the North Channel (Great Britain and Ireland), North Channel ...
,
Northern Ireland
Northern Ireland ( ; ) is a Countries of the United Kingdom, part of the United Kingdom in the north-east of the island of Ireland. It has been #Descriptions, variously described as a country, province or region. Northern Ireland shares Repub ...
.
Cruising
A number of owners cruise the boats, in some cases as well as racing them and in other cases in preference to racing, and cruises have ranged from the gentlest day sailing to such ambitious undertakings as crossings of the English Channel and the Irish Sea, and a circumnavigation of the Isle of Mull. Indeed in 1959 one intrepid owner sailed single-handed from Southend to Calais, and followed this in 1962 with a trip from Dover to Ostend. More recently, in 2011, two GP14s in company cruised the full length of the Great Glen, from Fort William to Inverness.
In the very early days of the class, when people used to a more traditional type of dinghy dubbed this new creation the "floating coffin", Roger Seal conclusively demonstrated her seaworthiness by sailing from Cardiff to New Quay, Wales, via St. David's Head.
Very occasional cruising owners camp aboard, although it has to be admitted that space for this is more than a little restricted.
Most serious cruising boats, even if only day-cruising, set dedicated cruising sails; these are constructed differently from racing sails and from heavier but more supple cloth, and are nearly always equipped with a means of reefing. The original design, with the small jib, provided for square gooseneck roller reefing for the main; modern boats usually prefer slab/jiffy reefing for the main, and some set fully reefable genoas by means of a headsail reefing drum and associated equipment (including a reefing spar).
[Mainsail, GP14 Class Association, issues for Spring 2006, pp. 45-6, and Summer 2006, pp.34-7]
An active Class Association supports both racing and cruising activities.
References
External links
GP14 International Association
{{DEFAULTSORT:Gp14 (Dinghy)
Classes of World Sailing
Dinghies
Boats designed by Jack Holt
Two-person sailboats
1940s sailboat type designs
Sailboat types built by Winder Boats