High winds and heavy seas tested 69-boat fleet that raced Friday on the first day of the 41st St. Thomas International Regatta.
Winds in excess of 30-knot gusts tested the mettle of equipment and crews, as the fleet sailed along the island’s south shore into scenic Charlotte Amalie harbor and back again amid a mix of sun and squalls.
“The winds were great today. We loved it,” said Australia’s Robert Date, at the helm of his RP 52, Scarlett Runner, with a crew of 15.
Date set sail last July on a ’round-the-world cruise to race some of the world’s great regattas. He chose three events in the Caribbean – STIR, Les Voiles de St. Barth and Antigua Sailing Week. Scarlett Runner finished fourth in the six-boat CSA Racing 0 Class, where the lead is tied on points between Switzerland’s Franck Noel’s TP 52 Near Miss, and the Netherlands’ Peter Vroom’s Ker 46, Tonnerre de Breskens 3.
The team aboard El Ocaso, American Rick Wesslund’s new J/122, also enjoyed the brisk breeze and finished at the top of the 10-boat CSA Racing 2 Class.
“It went well. We had a good day,” said Kyle Jones, primary trimmer on El Ocaso. “The course was fun and the squalls make it extra difficult. All and all it was good, especially since this was only the third time we sailed the boat in competition. The first was Key West Race Week and the second the St. Maarten Heineken Regatta.”
Puerto Rico’s Angel Ayala wasn’t as happy when a squall blew at the start and caused his J/80, Sun Bum, to broach and snap the boat’s shrouds in the process.
“We feared the mast might go, so we sailed in under jib,” Ayala said. He hopes to race Saturday after rigging repairs.
Meanwhile, fellow Puerto Rican sailor Francisco Figueroa, aboard his J/24 Colibri, took the early lead in the CSA Racing 3 Class.
In the unmeasured timeon time – or ToT – a new fun class added this year, St. Croix’s Tony Sanpere was ready for the start aboard his Catalina 30, Nauticayenne. Unfortunately, Sanpere’s high hopes came crashing down along with his mast some 150 feet off the dock.
“It has arthritis,” Sanpere joked about his 1976-built boat.
Sanpere has won his class many times in this event over the past four decades. Kastor Polux, a Moorings 4300 sailed by the USA’s Jerzy Poprawski, leads this class.
In other classes, St. Croix, USVI’s Morgan Dale, aboard his Melges 24, Boogaloo, tops the CSA Racing 1 Class; the BVI’s Jon Charlton, driving his C&C 41, Reba – Team Red Stripe, is in the lead in the CSA Non-Spinnaker Class; and Puerto Rico’s Marco Teixidor, at the tiller of his Cachondo, is winning the highly-competitive one-design, 15-boat IC-24 Class. Finally, USVI’s sailors John Holmberg and Terri McKenna finished strong and the front-runner in the Beach Cat Class aboard their Nacra 17, Flight Risk. Holmberg and McKenna hope to represent the USVI in the 2016 Summer Olympics in the Nacra 17.
The Captain Morgan Yacht Haven Grande Party, with Spectrum Band on stage, is slated to take place from 6:30 to 11 p.m. Saturday. Sunday features the final day of regatta competition. Music by Full Circle will greet the fleet from 2:30 to 5:30 p.m. Sunday, with the the Regatta Awards Ceremony beginning at 6:30 p.m. on the St. Thomas Yacht Club beach, followed by the Final Fling party with Ah We Band playing from 7-11 p.m.
Weather forecasts for the event by Weather Routing Inc. will be available by 6 a.m. daily during the regatta. They will be online at at www.wriwx.com/clientproduct.php?id=4759.
More information about the STIR and real-time results are available online at www.stthomasinternationalregatta.com. They can also be found by following on Facebook, www.facebook.com/rolexregatta; Instagram, #IRRSTYC; and Twitter @IRRSTYC
The St. Thomas International Regatta is sponsored by Captain Morgan and Heineken, distributed by Bellows International, Little Switzerland, and the U.S. Virgin Islands Department of Tourism.
