Sailing the boat his father primarily used in winning 16 national championships, Dave Peck of Niantic Bay Yacht Club won the Atlantic Class National Championship on Sunday aboard “Miss April.”

Peck, of Old Lyme, and his three-person crew finished first with five points in the five-race series sailed Friday, Saturday and Sunday at Cold Spring Harbor Beach Club on Long Island.

Peck’s father, Norm Peck Jr., won 15 Atlantic nationals in Miss April, the last coming in 2010. Norm Peck Jr., 86, retired from competing at the national level this year, but was still at Cold Spring Harbor to watch his three children compete.

Daughter Diane Rothman sailed along with Dave. Son Norm Peck III and his crew were 13th overall in Nonesuch.

“It was a little different. We definitely missed the teamwork that we’ve had for so many years,” Dave Peck, 59, said of the family’s latest venture to the nationals. “(My dad) was out there supporting me and my brother, who was in the race. … He still races on weekends, but as far as nationals goes, maybe he’ll take a pass until he’s forced out of retirement.”

It was the second national championship for Dave Peck as a skipper, having also won in 1987 aboard Challenger II, but Peck crewed for his father in 15 of his national championships.

This year’s crew featured Rothman; Dave’s uncle, Tom Peck, who has been sailing in the Atlantic Class since 1959; and John Moulthrop, the newcomer to the team.

The regatta featured just one race on Friday and Saturday and three on Sunday.

Peck was 10th in Friday’s race, following a 3-4-hour wait to for the wind to fill in, he said.

On Saturday, Peck won the first race and was in second place in a second race that was abandoned due to what he called a race committee error. He said the abandoned race provided his team with motivation for the following day, during which a northerly wind blew from 12-18 knots.

“It was shifty, puffy,” Peck said of Sunday’s conditions when Miss April finished second, first and first. “In a northerly condition, that provides a lot of opportunity to gain or lose. We kinda like those conditions.

“The team was fantastic. You really can’t win by just steering a boat; you need the whole team to execute. The team has to react. … Absolutely no question. It’s always fun to win. It’s always miserable to lose.”

Because there were at least five races sailed, each team was allowed a throw-out, meaning Peck’s 10th-place finish from Friday did not count.

Tim Britton from Kollegewidgwok Yacht Club in Blue Hill, Maine, sailing “Transit,” was second with eight points. Niantic Bay’s Hal Peatfield, sailing “Au Revoir,” was 12th with 40.

“It’s been a tradition for a long, long time,” Peck said of his family’s attachment to the Atlantic Class, although Peck also sails competitively in Lightnings. “Ever since I was 3, 4, 5 years old, my dad would sail and go to the nationals and I was staying with my grandmother, waiting for the phone call to see how they did. … He started in 1959 in an old wooden boat that leaked a lot.”

Norm Peck Jr. won his first national title in 1973 at Cold Spring Harbor and added titles in 1982-86, 1988-89, 1992, 1995, 2000-01, 2003, 2006-07 and 2010.

v.fulkerson@theday.com

Twitter: @vickieattheday