YACHTING: A FAMOUS racing catamaran with historic links to Southend is about to be restored.

The project will revive memories for Essex’s yachting community who, in the early 1960s, saw Thorpe Bay YC become synonymous with international yacht racing thanks to the Little America’s Cup Challenge series.

Memories have been revived following news that “Hellcat” (sail number K1), the first of the 25ft C-Class catamarans, is to be restored.

The multihull is heading to Ontario to be put back to her 1959 racing configuration.

And John Osborne, brother-in-law to Hellcat’s builder, Brightlingsea-based Olympic gold medallist Reg White — who died last May — will take on the restoration.

The challenge dates back to the late 1950s when John Fisk, a member of sailing’s top international body approached multihull designer Rod Macalpine-Downie and White to design and build a 25ft cat.

The idea was to challenge the American multihull association in the US in a one-on-one yacht racing series.

The event was inspired by the America’s Cup, which the New York YC had just reinitiated in 12-metre keelboats.

Fisk’s match race series involved sailors from Leigh, Southend, Thorpe Bay and Brightlingsea.

The first British wooden prototype Hellcat — the boat which is about to be restored to her former glory — was launched in 1961, and was followed almost immediately by a fibreglass version called Hellcat 2.

And it was in Hellcat 2 that the British sailors defeated the American crew off Long Island Sound.

In 1962 two Leigh-based racers, Ian Norris — the son of former Leigh SC’s commodore, John Norris — and Nicky Pope took on and beat the Americans from Seacliff YC.

And by 1963 another version of the Hellcat, sailed by future Olympian Reg White and MacAlpine Downie, won again.

Then, for 1963 and 1964 the action transferred to Thorpe Bay where White and his crew took on American and Australian challengers.

Last year the American owner of the original multihull was unable to persuade the National Maritime Museum to take on responsibility for the groundbreaking craft.

So instead he decided to try to bring the much-altered twin-hulled craft back to her prime.