One of Bermuda’s most accomplished and renowned sailors has taken his rightful place in the prestigious Bermuda Race Roll of Honour.

Warren Brown, who passed away nearly a year ago at the age of 85, was a highly competitive sailor and yachtsman, explorer and adventurer, and is only the second Bermudian sailor behind the late Sir Eldon Trimingham to receive the honour.

The late sailor had an extensive and distinguished sailing career, spanning more than six decades and over 300,000 nautical miles.

“Warren Brown has been chosen for the Bermuda Race Roll of Honour because of his dedication to, and his 20-race participation in, the Newport Bermuda Race,” John Rousmaniere, chairman of the Bermuda Race Roll of Honour Selection Committee, said.

“For his lifelong commitment to close relations between all sailors, and especially Bermudian and American sailors, and in recognition of his sterling example as the consummate yachtsman and skilled seaman as he sailed the oceans of the world.”

Brown competed in 20 Newport Bermuda Races on 11 different yachts, won the King Edward VII Gold Cup three times, and also won line honours and records in The Middle Sea Race in Ted Turner’s former America’s Cup Class 12-metre yacht, American Eagle, as well as in the Marion Bermuda Race.

Among his greatest achievements was sailing one of his many yachts that were named, War Baby, to the Arctic, then down the Atlantic and through the Panama Canal to the Chilean fiords, South Georgia, Antarctica and eventually around the world.

That achievement earned Brown the coveted Blue Water Medal for a most meritorious example of seamanship by the Cruising Club of America, of which he was a member.

“I think Dad will be remembered as both a sailor who contributed not only to the development of the race particularly in the area of safety and good seamanship, but also to the many young crew (men and women) whom he took offshore under his wing,” Warren Brown Jr said.

Brown’s participation in the Fastnet Race, and the Admiral’s Cup Series, led him to co-found the Onion Patch Series, now in its 52nd year.

Together with Shorty and Jerry Trimingham, he hatched the idea of bringing the Admiral’s Cup model to North America. The initial concept was to race in Newport, complete the Newport Bermuda Race and end with a race in Bermuda.

Brown competed in his last Newport Bermuda Race in 2012 on The Spirit of Bermuda.

That same year he donated the prestigious Grimaldi Coupe Prada Cup that he won at the helm of War Baby in the Mediterranean Sea to the Royal Bermuda Yacht Club. The cup was renamed the War Baby Trophy, and is now awarded to the winners of the “Spirit of Tradition” Division in the 635-mile Newport Bermuda Race.