Cookson Yachts for Sale

Cookson Boats was a custom racing yard on Auckland's North Shore, started by Terry Cookson in the 1970s and run for most of its life by his son Mick as managing director. It built to order in carbon and advanced composite, from Volvo Ocean 60s to 100 foot canting keel maxis, and for two decades it was where New Zealand's America's Cup hulls were laminated. The nearest thing to a production boat was the Cookson 50, a Farr Yacht Design racer that became one of the best known offshore boats of its size. The grand prix market collapsed in the financial crisis and in February 2009 Mick Cookson announced the yard would probably close once two boats then in build were finished; it kept going, and in 2014 it took the 2003 maxi Lahana and rebuilt her from the chainplates aft with a new carbon hull, new rudders and a new lifting keel as Rio 100. The yard has since closed its doors, and when Emirates Team New Zealand needed AC75 hulls for 2021 it built them itself for the first time.

Anything wearing this name is a race boat, and it should be bought the way race boats are bought. The asking prices look absurd against the length, and the reason is that the purchase is the small number: a carbon hundred footer costs what a crew, a rig cycle, a sail wardrobe and a haul out berth cost, every year, forever. There is no yard behind the boat now, so survey and repair work goes to a composite specialist, and Florida and the northeast have several who do this properly. The items that decide the deal are the canting keel ram, bearings and hydraulics where fitted, the keel fin and its attachment structure, the age and history of the carbon rig and its standing rigging, the chainplates, and the structural bulkheads and ring frames. Ask for the laminate schedule, the original build records and every repair report, because on a one off carbon boat that paperwork is the only way to know what you actually own, and an ex grand prix boat has been hit at some point in its life. For a buyer who wants a fast passage maker rather than a trophy, these are usually the wrong boat, and that is worth saying out loud.