How it all began for the J/24 Class

At the 2024 J/24 US National Championship held at Fleet #1, founders John Gjerde, Rolf Turnquist, Dale “Dirtball” Anderson, and the Wayzata Yacht Club were honored with the J/24 Lifetime Achievement Award presented by Jeff Johnstone, President of J/Boats. The J/Boats newsletter relives how the J/24 Class got underway:

On December 1976, a small group of die-hard sailors from Lake Minnetonka, Minnesota learned of a new 24-foot design that had just dominated the eastern Long Island Sound series in Connecticut. The original RAGTIME had won 15 of 17 races sailing with a crew of Mom, Dad, and four kids under the age of 16. The new boat was going into production as a one-design. That new boat was the J/24.

John Gjerde and Dale “Dirtball” Anderson got on the phone with designer Rod Johnstone, peppering him with questions about specs, one-design rules, the builder, you name it. Rod recalls those first conversations, and how reaffirming it was to have such passionate validation of the J/24 and one-design keelboat sailing.

Less than a month later, John Gjerde and Rolf Turnquist went into partnership and ordered the first boat (Hull #7 OZ). Soon four more were ordered, and with an impressive five out of the first 25 J/24s ever built, J/24 Fleet #1 was born on Lake Minnetonka.

In 1978, Oz was towed by John, Rolf, and Dirtball for the inaugural J/24 North American Championship (Newport, RI), proudly representing Fleet #1 and the Wayzata Yacht Club. They helped set the tone early in the J/24 class for fun, highly competitive racing, and even more fun times onshore.

In those first years, with the class exploding in size, most clubs didn’t know what hit them – how to deal with non-stop general recalls, how to deal with teams sleeping on their boats and bringing campers, how to deal with sailors hanging out at the club all night until the kegs ran dry. The J/24 class was more like a rolling Woodstock Music Festival.

While John and Dirtball are no longer with us, their contributions to the J/24 class and one-design sailing will never be forgotten. Rod Johnstone recalls an early John Gjerde story that captures the spirit well. After that first season in 1977, John wanted to ramp things up and invited Rod to Minneapolis in late January 1978 (a few weeks after the first 1978 J/24 Midwinters in Key West – won by Mark Ploch’s TCHAU with Stu Johnstone as tactician!) to speak to a packed house.

A conference room was booked at a downtown hotel and 100+ people were invited to hear the latest about the J/24. Rod got stuck at LaGuardia airport in a snowstorm and couldn’t make it and had to cancel. When Rod spoke to John a few days later, he learned that the party went on anyway. Everyone showed up and all night long John, as a joke proudly wore a name tag that read “Hello my name is Rod Johnstone.” Fleet #1 doubled in size in 1978!

Wayzata Yacht Club’s adoption of the J/24 fleet in 1977 helped establish a one-design culture that has, in the years since, spawned an impressive number of other recognized one-design fleets, including J/22 fleet #1 and J/70 Fleet #2. And now, the Wayzata Yacht Club’s Thursday Night summer series draws upwards of 120 boats with no less than seven active one-design fleets.

The inscription on the framed half-model award reads: “In honor of J/24 Fleet # 1 founders Dale Anderson, John Gjerde, Rolf Turnquist, and Wayzata Yacht Club – for their unwavering support, enthusiasm, and lifelong dedication to the J/24 Class and one-design sailing.”

Above photo: Receiving the award (from L to R) was Andy Spence-Parsons (Former Commodore WYC), Rolf Turnquist, and Jeff Johnstone. The inscription reads: “In honor of J/24 Fleet # 1 founders Dale Anderson, John Gjerde, Rolf Turnquist, and Wayzata Yacht Club – for their unwavering support, enthusiasm, and lifelong dedication to the J/24 Class and one-design sailing.”