In 1902 Pender won the King's Cup at the
Royal Yacht Squadron regatta at Cowes with his yawl
Brynhild (
Charles E. Nicholson design, 1899), beating the
Kaiser Wilhelm's schooner
Meteor III (Archibald Cary Smith design, 1902); the prize was presented to him by
Albert Edward, Prince of Wales. It was rumoured at the time that the Prince gave up yacht racing in favour of horse racing (at which he was very successful) as his Yacht
Britannia regularly lost to the Kaiser's yawl
Meteor II (
George Lennox Watson design, 1896). James Pender Bt was the Rear Commodore of
Royal Thames Yacht Club in 1904, and during that year he won the
Kaiserlicher Yacht Club regatta with
Brynhild at the
Kieler Yacht-Club and was presented with the prize by the Kaiser, who had anonymously (as he always used to at the Kiel Yacht Club) donated that prize to the Kiel Yacht Club in the name of 'A friend of Sailing'. In 1908, Pender's new
Camper & Nicholsons 23mR Brynhild II defeated the
Sir Thomas Lipton's
Shamrock and
Myles Burton Kennedy's
White Heather II (both
Fife designs) in the Cowes regatta and the King's Cup. James Pender's other yachts
Lamorna and
Florinda (later rechristened
Gosport Mistake and
Siesta) were all built and designed by
Camper & Nicholsons. ==Personal life==