There seemed to be a small reunion of champion J/24 alumni racing in the RORC Caribbean 600 before the start of the race off English Harbour, Antigua. RORC Chief Eddie Warden-Owen was on hand to manage the event, a former J/24 European and U.K. Champion. Ken Read, former J/24 World Champ (many times) and College Sailor of the Year was sailing with a former J/24 owner, George David on the colossally fast 100 footer- RAMBLER 100- the "new J/100"??.
Amongst the J/24 cognoscenti was Cam Lewis (left) doing tactics/ speed on the awesomely cool looking hot orange Gunboat PHAEDO (built by brother Peter Johnstone). Also in the hunt for top awards was Andy Beadsworth and Simon Rogers
sailing on the Rogers 82 AEGIR built by Carbon Ocean- both Andy and
Simon are former J/24 UK Champions. At the end of the day, all these
J/24 sailors powered up and guided some of the fastest boats around the
600 nm circuit.
Kenny
and George (right) won overall line honors and set a new record for the
600 nautical mile race course- 1 day 16 hours 20 minutes and 2 seconds-
that's FAST-- you spend about 80% of the time reaching across the
steady, strong trade winds-- very cool race course and a dream to sail
with good breeze. Kenny Read commented dockside in Antigua- "That was a
lot of fun but hard work for a while, you do something like sail around
the world and that is almost easy compared to this, because there is no
time to take any sleep, you're taking so many corners and turns but it
is also a gorgeous course, it's a dream come true type of event. I am
glad we came and that George invited me. Probably the most memorable
part of the course was at night with a full moon at the top of St.
Maarten, big breeze 
and
massive breaking waves, it was huge fun and really cool, we came out of
their doing 26 knots, it has been a real adventure and Rambler 100 is a
whole new dimension for sailing."Not to be outdone by the 100 footers, Cam and PHAEDO became video stars, see this very cool YouTube video. Also, there was another good YouTube video of PHAEDO on its race preparation. For more RORC 600 sailing results go here...you'll see the Guboat 66 (left) was a pretty darn quick cat- not bad for a "cruising boat"!
