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SAILING BOOKS – Most all grand prix sailors have heard of Californian Jim Kilroy (Marina del Rey) and his Maxi race boats named KIALOA, famous in the mid- to late-1970s and ’80s for accumulating more sailing trophies and records than just about any other campaign, then or since. Kilroy’s beautifully illustrated autobiography—KIALOA US-1: Dare to Win—recounts the adventures of the KIALOA teams as they raced around the world and the lessons in business, in sailing and in life that they took away from it all. The 446-page hardcover book is available for US $50.00 at Barnes & Noble, and online at Amazon.com, BarnesandNoble.com, and smithkerr.com.
Woven throughout the story, which provides a window on a remarkable era of high-stakes grand prix yachting, are object lessons on how to succeed from Kilroy’s own “rags to riches” journey that took him from Alaska to Los Angeles, where he survived the Depression years as the entrepreneurial son of a single mother and went on to develop one of the most impressive commercial real estate empires in Southern California.
“To declare that Jim Kilroy has lived a full, challenging, interesting and accomplished life is to traffic in understatement,” writes Herb McCormick, the former editor-in-chief of Cruising World magazine and yachting correspondent for The New York Times, in the 446-page coffee table book’s forward. “It’s like saying Alaska is a large state or the Pacific a wide ocean. It diminishes the adjectives. It’s also inaccurate. For Jim Kilroy has actually experienced a wide range of different but equally successful existences: family man, veteran, developer, businessman, athlete, civic leader, political insider, adventurer, and yachtsman.”
About the KIALOA sailors, McCormick writes, “In sailing circles, the best sailors are often referred to as ‘rock stars.’ I think the first real rock stars, the origins of the species, if you will, were the crews of KIALOA.”
KIALOA US-1:Dare to Win is published by Smith/Kerr Associates and its imprint Seapoint Books. All proceeds from the sale of the book will go to the John B. and Nelly Llanos Kilroy Foundation, to be contributed to youth sailing and educational purposes. For more information, visit www.kialoa-us1.com
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