The Cruising Club of America, the Boston Yacht Club, the Royal Bermuda Yacht Club, and the Royal Nova Scotia Yacht Squadron announce a major new trophy for offshore yacht racing: the Olin J. Stephens Ocean Racing Trophy, to be awarded to skippers competing in consecutive Newport Bermuda and Marblehead-to-Halifax races.

The Olin J. Stephens Trophy will be awarded yearly to the skipper with the lowest total point scoring in consecutive races of the subset of boats competing in both of these prestigious ocean-racing events. The low-point scoring will be determined using the ORR, the VPP-based handicapping system which serves as the primary scoring system for the Newport Bermuda Race and numerous other North American offshore races.

Skippers who compete in the St. David’s Lighthouse and Gibbs Hill Lighthouse divisions of the Newport Bermuda Race will be eligible for the trophy, as will competitors sailing in the spinnaker divisions of the Marblehead-to-Halifax Ocean Race that elect dual-scoring using ORR for that event.

In joining with the sponsoring clubs of the Marblehead-to-Halifax Ocean Race in creating the Olin J. Stephens Trophy, the sponsors of the Newport Bermuda Race continue their tradition of supporting joint trophies to encourage wide-spread participation in ocean racing. The Newport Bermuda Race also co-sponsors the Bermuda Cruising Yacht Trophy with the Marion-Bermuda Race, awarded for consecutive-year performance in the Marion-Bermuda Race and the Cruiser Division of the Newport Bermuda Race, once again using ORR low-point scoring.

The Olin J. Stephens Trophy honors a living legend, the man who is arguably the most successful designer of offshore racing and cruising yachts in the last 100 years. For much of the 20th Century, designs by Olin Stephens dominated ocean racing. He also produced a series of America’s Cup Defenders that stretched over five decades. Since his retirement in 1980, Olin Stephens has been a world-wide ambassador for sailing, and has been the conscience and a perpetual voice of reason for the highest levels of the sport.

The Olin J. Stephens Trophy will be awarded for the first time in Halifax, Nova Scotia this July, based on combined performance in the 2006 Centennial Newport Bermuda Race and the 2007 Marblehead-to-Halifax Ocean Race