The International 14 is a fast, exciting double-handed dinghy with a long history.

Fourteens have evolved from the beautiful wooden hulls of the 1920s to the carbon fibre machines of today. Fourteens have also gone global, becoming an International Class in 1928 and merging with the Australian 14ft Skiffs in the late 1990s. Throughout, the class has been at the forefront of development and represented the ultimate in double-handed dinghy racing. Today, there are active 14 fleets in the Australia, Canada, France, Germany, Japan, the UK and the USA.

The Fourteen is a development class, built to a basic set of rules that allows for innovation. The boats are 14 feet long and, within the current rules, six feet wide. Modern boats have twin trapezes, assymetric spinnakers and hydrofoils on rudders. Click here for current class rules and here for more on current designs.

The history of the class up to 1989 is captured in Tom Vaughan’s book “The International Fourteen Foot Dinghy: History and Handbook” – For more recent history, please visit our wiki. Feel free to contribute by contacting the class historian at history@i14.org.