Love of sailing carries Iowan to America’s Cup

Tom Speer never felt landlocked in Stanwood.

“I was always interested in sailing,” he said. “In high school, I taught myself to sail by rigging our canoe to a sail. I'd sail it on Lake Macbride.”

The son of Dr. Edward and Lenora Speer of Stanwood got his first taste of sailing at a Missouri camp, where he became an American Red Cross water safety instructor.

That was four decades ago. Weather permitting, Speer's fingerprints will be on Wednesday's opening race of the best-of-three America's Cup in Valenica, Spain.

Now 57 and a flight-controls research engineer at the Boeing Co. in Seattle, Speer has a role in the world's premier sailing regatta match. He is a designer and consultant for BMW Oracle Racing, the U.S. challenger to Swiss Cup-holder Alingi.

The cross section shape of the 223-foot-high wing sail on the USA boat was designed by Speer. It is bigger than the wing of an Airbus A380, the world's largest passenger airliner.

“In 2008, I got called out of the blue by Mike Drummond, the chief engineer for BMW Oracle Racing,” Speer said. “He'd seen my Web site on land yacht and multihull sailboat design and wanted to know if I would consult with them for 10 or 20 hours a month.

“Of course, my answer was yes.”

After getting his engineering degree at Iowa State, Speer entered the U.S. Air Force. He would sail in his free time wherever possible, including on the Thames River in London during a three-year assignment there.

When he retired from the Air Force as a lieutenant colonel, he moved to Seattle to work for Boeing. He became the owner of a 34-foot trimaran that he sails in Puget Sound.

“He always liked the racing, the challenge of the aerodynamics and all that,” Lenora Speer said.

In 2001, four crewmen were on a 31-foot trimaran that capsized during the two-week-long Van Isle 360 yacht race, which circumnavigates Vancouver Island in Canada. The men, who emerged from the ordeal in good condition, clung to the boat for about 20 hours before getting rescued by a Polish fishing trawler. One of the crewmen was Speer.

“But it didn't dampen his enthusiasm for sailing,” Lenora said.

Now Speer is in Spain, watching the chase for the 159-year-old America's Cup that the United States hasn't claimed in 15 years. The race almost surely pairs the two fastest sailboats ever built.

“For me, this has been an enormous learning experience,” Speer said. “This is the only thing I've ever done professionally in the yacht-design field, though it's always what I wanted to do.

“I'm seeing the highest level of the sport and very grateful for the chance to do it.”