J/24 Fun, J/122 Offshore Success(St Georges, Grenada)- Long-time J/sailor, Hilary Noble, has been on the pointy end of many top teams over the years in J/24s, J/70s, J/105s, and J/88s. This past week, she was down in the Caribbean sailing in the first major event of the winter season “down island”- Grenada Sailing Week. Here is her report on the proceedings.
“The Caribbean racing season is now underway with the 6th edition of Grenada Sailing Week that was held from January 28th to February 1st.
A record fleet of 40 boats gathered at Port Louis Marina, and it being my first year racing in this event, I was really excited to see what this so-called “friendly island” was all about. Just as I expected, the competitors brought their A-game and race officials and volunteers had one goal in mind: great racing, hospitality, and tons of fun!
Racing began on Monday, on the south end of the island just west of the airport, off the pristine Grand Anse beach. Local knowledge played a key role in staying in pressure and setting up for what new pressure was to come. Most of the local teams played the shoreline often, giving them the famous “elevator lifts” to easily one-tack the top end of the race course.
If you could break away from the pack and get into the pressure first, you had a great chance of leading around the windward mark. The wind was pretty shoddy on the south end, with the land breeze mixing with sea breeze funneling over the huge mountainous terrain.
This created huge puffs and huge holes, something to really keep an eye out for! We dug into a lot of puffs, but we may have found a hole where it seemed like our world stopped, while the rest of the world kept spinning. Thankfully, we weren’t the only ones to find it.
Day two was very similar, presenting puffy conditions that made the racing fun and unpredictable. It reminded me of college sailing, with the auto-tacks and huge lifts that would give you 30-degrees more point than the boat just to leeward of you.
The last race on day two was a 12-mile race and a downwind start. We checked our angles to assure that our starting line plan would be successful – and boy was it ever! Instead of leading our fleet in, we tailed the competition and right as we started we executed a perfect jibe-set, hoisting our code zero.
Being one of the last boats to enter the starting area by the RC end allowed us to fulfill our higher angle with ease after our set, while some boats chose to use their A2, making it impossible to get to us. At that point, it was full-steam ahead.
As we approached the tip of the runway, a massive JetBlue airliner came in hot, landing right over us. That was exhilarating and got my adrenaline pumping for the next leg. At that point, you could see the land clearing ahead where our next mark was for us to honor and head upwind.
There was a 10-knot increase around the end out in the open on the east end of the island that made for the freshest upwind leg we had yet. We had a last minute call to change our headsail, we had 30 seconds to plug and hoist before we could get our code down.
We had one hell of an epic takedown with the wind howling and waves crashing on our port side, we got her in and we were headed uphill, keeping an eye out for the next mark. We hadn’t seen the other end of the island yet and WOW, she was beautiful. Finishing off the point of Prickly Bay, I thought to myself, after the salt water shot under my sunglasses, this just doesn’t get any better!
On our lay day, we left our Port Louis and stopped just outside to snorkel the underwater sculptures. We headed over to the beach after that and went ashore to the spice market and had lunch. After loading up on some local fare, we casted off and motored around the point to relocate our mother ship, a 50-foot catamaran to the east end of the island in Secret Harbour where racing would commence the remainder the week.
The last two days were just fantastic. Excellent racing, fun courses, and stiff competition. The courses were interesting and kept it fun and exciting for the pointy end. Our team vibe was great all week long and we all had a blast racing together.
The Caribbean circuit is unlike any other racing circuit in the world. Sailors from all over the world come to experience new cultures, taste the amazing food, and make new connections. For most, it’s a vacation in itself. Living in Rhode Island these days, I appreciate the aspects of warm-weather sailing more than I ever have before.
For this event, I had the pleasure of making new friends and teammates. A few of the crew I’ve known for years and have spent a lot of time on the water racing and some were new crew to the program that meshed really well with the team and were fun to sail with. This regatta was a great experience and I highly recommended it to those who want to escape the winter and get a taste of some really fantastic sailing. I can’t wait to sail in Grenada again!”
Living it up and enjoying their entire week was a well-known crew from Antigua, Pamala Baldwin’s J/122 LIQUID. Sailing in the largest class of the event, the thirteen-boat CSA Racing Division, Pamala and her crew sailed by far the most consistent series of any boat on the water. LIQUID’s worst race was a 4th (their toss race) and all the rest were 1st, 2nd, and 3rds, finishing on the podium to take the silver in their first outing in the Caribbean winter circuit!
Meanwhile, one wonders if it was a case of sheer joy or pure exhaustion for the half-dozen J/24s that sailed off St Georges for the entire regatta. After eighteen races (!) it was quite apparent that the top of the leaderboard was going to be determined by a “war of attrition”. In the end, Fred Sweeney’s ATTITUDE from St Lucia never broke down, never lost focus, and never finished worse than 4th place! Amazing! Consequently, ATTITUDE maintained the pressure on the fleet after winning the first three races to take the J/24 crown. Second was Robbie Yearwood’s DIE HARD from Grenada; posting nearly as many 1sts, 2nds, 3rds as Sweeney’s crew, but not nearly enough, settling for the silver. Rounding out the podium was Stephen Bushe’s HAWKEYE from Trinidad, taking the bronze- a truly international podium. Thanks for contributions from Hilary Noble and Scuttlebutt Sailing Newsletter. Follow Grenada Sailing Week on Facebook here For more Grenada Sailing Week sailing information Add to Flipboard Magazine.
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