(Gustavia, St Barthelemy)- With winds whipping briskly at 15-20 knots,
it was a lively show on the water for opening day of Les Voiles de St.
Barth. After an equally lively opening party held on the Quay General de
Gaulle the night before, 70 teams in 10 classes were raring to begin
what they really came here for: hard core racing. The regatta
organizers, knowing their audience, took no prisoners, sending the
classes on a 23-mile course that started off Gustavia Harbor and led
counter-clockwise and three quarters of the way around the
eight-square-mile island of St. Barth before rounding a buoy off St.
Jean and heading back in a clockwise direction.“Today was typical St. Barth conditions--20 knots of wind, big waves and a lot of reaching legs, so it was a lot of fun being on a boat that could surf downwind in big waves,” said Gavin Brady, a tactician sailing in the regatta.
On the second day of sailing, it was another great day for setting records. Another serving of clear skies and classic trade winds made it a very good day for promoting racing in the Caribbean, and Les Voiles de St. Barth organizers capitalized on the stellar conditions with a decision to “go big” on the regatta’s second day of racing.
Making good on an earlier promise to give the largest, fastest boats a new marquee race designed for flat-out speed, the race committee sent the Maxi 1, Maxi 2 and Multihull classes on a 42 nm course that started off Gustavia and looped around St. Barth before continuing across the Canal de Saint Barthelemy to round the island of Tintamarre (off the eastern end of St Martin) to port and return its players to a finish near where they had started.
During
Lay Day at Les Voiles de St. Barth, the teams racing were invited to
compete in a caviar treasure hunt in the waters off Eden Rock along St
Jean Beach. The goal was for participants to find the most tins of Roman
Kaviroff caviar. Taking the win in the competition was Greg Slyngstad’s
J/125 HAMACHI team, finding three tins!Talking about their performance on the second day of sailing, Slyngstad said, “We had a great day. It was just enough wind for us to plane downwind and once we could get up on the step on our boat, a J/125 goes downwind really well. We went well upwind, mixing it up between several boats but then downwind we were able to separate and get some distance from those guys.
We rounded the last mark in second and then we got by one of the big swans going downwind and then it was right before the finish line that Phaedo (the 70 ft trimaran) came whipping by. We raced against two Melges 32 in St Martin (Dingo and Lazy Dog) and won. However, if it gets lighter we are going to struggle, but if it gets windier we should do well.
We had a great start and we got out in front on the leeward side and had a clear lane and many of the boats in our class were mixing it up in bad air while we were able to get some distance, which was the biggest gain. We were able to turn the corner eventually and put up the spinnaker and we gained a lot of distance there.”
At the middle stage of the regatta, HAMACHI is holding onto 2nd overall with a 3-2 scoreline in CSA Spinnaker 1 class. In CSA Spinnaker 2 class, Rick Wesslund’s J/122 EL OCASO also has a 3-2 scoreline and is just 2 pts out of first place overall. Finally, in CSA Spinnaker 3 class, the J/109 POCKET ROCKET from Ireland skippered by David Cullen is holding onto 5th place with a 6-5 tally. For more Voiles de St Barth sailing information
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