Lagos Nigeria Lightning Lab
&
Nigerian National Championships
May 2007
 

Purpose for the trip:
In 1946 the Lagos Yacht Club was searching for a new one-design boat to sail and race.  Their venue consists both of inland “harbor” racing and racing in the open waters of the Atlantic Ocean.  They chose the Sparkman/Stephens designed Lightning, but for reasons related to the gross weight of the boat (built from native materials), the boat wasn’t classified as a “Lightning”, rather it was called a “Tarpon”.  Tarpon was the name of the 1^st boat built from the Lightning Plans.

For over 60 years, the members of both the Tarpon and Lightning (they have been importing fiberglass boats since the 70s) have been sailing in the Lagos Harbor and have set their boats up based on experience, written tuning guides and articles written by sailors of the Lighting around the world.  Never was there a visit from the class association until May of 2007, when Steve Davis and Skip Dieball decided to visit, help and sail in the Lightning/Tarpon Nigerian National Championship.