Wednesday, June 2, 2010

J/109 Captures Delta Lloyd North Sea Regatta

J/109 sailing North Sea Regatta

(The Hague/Netherlands- May 21-24)-  Considered the largest sailing event in the Netherlands for offshore racing, the Delta Lloyd North Sea Regatta is hosted in front of The Hague, Netherlands and includes everything from dinghies, to catamarans, to J/22 One-Designs to IRC offshore handicap racing.  As a result, most of the top offshore sailing teams from the region participate to compete for top honors in the Belgium/Netherlands region.

The IRC classes race from The Hague over to England and back.  Despite the wide variety of conditions, the J's continue to demonstrate their remarkable capabilities to sail well, and fast, in challenging conditions on all points of sail (no one trick ponies, flying wedges of cheese here!).  In short, 4 of the 6 podium places J/109 XCentric Ripper Winning Team- sailing North Sea Regattafor IRC2 went to J/109s!  On the race to England, the J's finished 1st- J/105 PANTHER, 2nd- J/109 XCENTRIC RIPPER, 4th- J/109 JETI and 6th- J/109 ARETHUSA.  On the return trip from England back to The Hague, it was 2nd- J/109 X-CENTRIC RIPPER and 3rd- J/109 JETI.  As a result of their consistent finishes, the J/109 X-CENTRIC RIPPER skippered by John van de Starre was also the Overall Winner of IRC2.

The J/22s didn't follow their bigger sisterships across The Channel, thank goodness.  Instead, they opted to race around-the-cans just off The Hague for one-design class honors.  It was a great turnout, great racing and the winner in the J/22 one-design class was John den Engelsman.   For more information about sailing the Delta Lloyd North Sea Regatta and race results.