Talk:Day's run

Champion of the Seas record?

I'm puzzled by the claim of 465m for Champion of the Seas. Several books, including this one suggest that the record of 436m set by Lightning held this record. Champion of the Seas was larger than Lightning but carried the same sail so it seems intrinsically unlikely and the book above has full details of both ships. The wiki page for Champion of the Seas has a citation needed note. There is also on that page another citation to W.H. Bunting's:Portrait of a port: Boston 1852-1914 which states on p76:

Carl Cutler, a clipper authority, held that the Champion of the Seas very likely made the best day's run of any sailing vessel, covering 465 miles in twenty-three hours twenty minutes. As with other records, this should be accepted with reservation...

This doesn't seem to be an adequate support and I'll replace this with the more commonly cited value unless anyone knows better. The figure does appear in Cutler's Greyhounds of the Sea but I don't have a copy. Chris55 (talk) 22:25, 7 May 2013 (UTC)

To answer my own question, it seems that the Champion of the Seas' record is as well (or as badly) attested as any other. In particular, it appears on the WSSR 24 hour distance record page. Since both this trip and that of the Lightning were achieved in North Atlantic gales when sunsights were probably hard to make, one has to be suspicious of both. No accident they both happened on maiden voyages when lightly loaded and with clean bottoms and new rigging. Since Lightning did it 10 months before, I've added it to the page. Looks like some nationalistic pride at work. Chris55 (talk) 10:27, 8 May 2013 (UTC)

Redirect?

I've moved the 24 hour records to the Speed sailing record page because they are clearly confusing two different records: traditionally they measured noon to noon for obvious navigational reasons: it was the way you fixed the distance. The time could vary from roughly 23.5 to 24.5 hours. There is possibly something left for this page in the fascinating history of sailing ships, but I'm still inclined to redirect this page to the sailing record one. Chris55 (talk) 11:16, 18 May 2013 (UTC)

Noon, in the context of noon to noon, and as used in astro-navigation means that moment when the sun is on the observers meridian bearing due north or due south as the case may be. It happens irrespective of what the local time is. This will rarely happen at 1200 hours observers local time. Therefore the average speed of Champion when she set her record was greater than stated in the article. My memory is that the time was 23hours 15 minutes which gave a daily average of exactly 20.00knots. I'd swear that many moons ago these figures were published in Wikipedia. Importantly the statement above "Since this trip and that of the Lightening were achieved in North Atlantic Gales when sun sights were probably hard to make ..." is incorrect. Champion sailed from Liverpool October 11 and set her record two months later on December 11. She was on a great circle route in the Great Southern Ocean pretty close to the longest day of the year. So its very likely that they were able to get a position line in the morning and run it up to noon to intersect with Latitude obtained from a meridian altitude of the sun. They were highly likely to have been able to fix their position by star sights at evening and morning twilight. I'd be very surprised if they did not know exactly where they were during the entirety of that historical day. It's a shame in my opinion, to just assume that the days run was 24 hours. John Sampson Extra Master Mariner. Pajos1 (talk) 07:06, 14 February 2020 (UTC)