BVI Spring Regatta

Nanny Cay sponsored Triple KackA single day of racing remains at the 40th Anniversary BVI Spring Regatta and Sailing Festival (March 28-April 3, 2011), and the tussle for podium places is getting serious. Razor-thin margins define several classes, and Mother Nature is forecast to deliver a wild card tomorrow: less pressure. For the past two days, 122 participating boats have enjoyed 15-22 knots, so tomorrow’s question mark will test each crew’s ability to switch gears. While the party rages at the race village at Nanny Cay, the regatta’s base, everyone knows that change may literally be in the wind.

One pronounced format change here over most other regattas is the presence of on-the-water umpires in the IC 24 class. While the BVI Spring Regatta isn’t the first to use umpires in a fleet-racing format, we’re advancing a popular new protocol. Rather than using a protest room to settle an on-the-water kerfuffle, umpires observe and assign penalties in real-time; guilty sailors, in turn, serve immediate penance. “We don’t have 10-15 protests stacking up at the end of racing,” said Glenn Oliver, an International Judge and Umpire. “It speeds the game along.” When queried as to whether this innovation will spread, Oliver advises that it requires a sophisticated regatta to pull it off. “You wouldn’t see this in most places—[only] larger events where they can bring in umpires to do the work.”

Despite the calendar date, there were precious few pranks occurring today at the 40th Anniversary BVI Spring Regatta and Sailing Festival (March 28-April 3, 2011), where 122 boats assembled on four different racecourses, eagerly anticipating their starting guns. Fifteen to twenty knots and small seas greeted sailors racing in the protected waters, and classic Caribbean ocean rollers fueled surfing sessions outside of the lee of the islands. The race committees made sure to entertain, sending boats on a variety of courses, ranging from windward-leewards to scenic excursions around the numerous islands that pepper the Sir Francis Drake Channel near Nanny Cay Resort and Marina, the regatta’s base.
 
Back ashore, however, a few sly moves were attempted. “It was mostly in the racing class!” laughed Renata Goodridge, the Regatta Measurer. Caribbean Sailing Association (CSA) rules—the regatta’s governing rules—stipulate that owners can only change their rating three times per year, but this didn’t deter some shenanigans. “Guys always try to one-up each other. They’ll say, ‘that first spinnaker, we used it for one whole regatta—it’s really blown out, let’s measure a new one and see if it will make us go faster.’ But, for the most part, everybody plays by the rules.” Given that Goodridge is also an official CSA measurer, you can bet your last bottle of rum that nothing slipped under her radar.

Willem Wester’s Antilope wins the Nanny Cay CupThe atmosphere is crackling with excitement on the eve of racing at the 40th Anniversary BVI Spring Regatta and Sailing Festival (March 28-April 3, 2011). The race village is open, boats and sailors are here, and everyone is psyched for what promises to be three brilliant days of racing on the Sir Francis Drake Channel. Just poll anyone walking around Nanny Cay—the regatta’s base—and their comments are the same: It’s like summer camp for adults, sans chaperones.

Forty boats congregated on the Sir Francis Drake Channel this morning, just off of Tortola’s Nanny Cay Resort, for the start of the Bitter End Cup. This 21-mile Corinthian-spirited race to Virgin Gorda’s Bitter End Yacht Club (BEYC) marks the official kick-off for the 40th Anniversary BVI Spring Regatta and Sailing Festival (March 28-April 3, 2011). Lucky sailors in four classes enjoyed 10-15 knots, flat seas, and clean starts as the fleet of cats, cruisers, bareboats and serious raceboats pointed towards their fairy-tale destination. Once there, sailors can enjoy the club’s well-populated dinghy and beach-cat fleet and unwind before Thursday’s reverse-course Nanny Cay Cup.

The 40th anniversary BVI Spring Regatta kicked off today at 1000 hours, local time, with the start of the Sailing Festival’s annual Bitter End Cup. This 21-mile upwind course starts off of Tortola’s Nanny Cay Resort—the event’s home base—and takes the fleet of 40 boats northwest through the Sir Francis Drake Channel to the finishing line off of the Bitter End Yacht Club (BEYC), situated on nearby Virgin Gorda. Once there, sailors can relax, socialize and sail the BEYC’s dinghy and beach-cat fleet on Wednesday’s lay day. During Thursday’s Nanny Cay Cup the fleet will ease their sheets and retrace their wake, sailing a glorious downhill run back to Nanny Cay and the start of the annual Mount Gay Welcome Party. 

Necker Belle on A dock at Nanny CayThe final countdown has begun and racing will commence next week at the 40th Anniversary BVI Spring Regatta and Sailing Festival (March 28-April 3, 2011), giving attending sailors reason to celebrate. Historically, the BVI Spring Regatta has attracted some of the world’s fastest yachts and sailors, and this year’s exceptional entry list is proof that this tradition continues.

If sailing is your game, you’ve seen Mount Gay’s iconic, red regatta hats. Since 1987, these distinctive baseball caps have come to represent far more than just a stylish sunshade-they’ve become an internationally recognized symbol of competitive sailing, each custom embroidered with the name and year of a particular Mount Gay-sponsored event. But unlike mainstream fashion trends, Mount Gay hats are earned, not purchased. “The brand has never sold a red cap and it never will!” said Mount Gay’s Raphaël Grisoni. “There is no other way to get one than to sail in the regatta. They have become a sign of recognition among real sailors.”
 

Necker Belle, Virgin Limited Edition’s 105-foot luxury catamaran, will be racing in the 2011 BVI Spring Regatta & Sailing Festival and docking at Nanny Cay each night.  Nanny Cay is host and presenting sponsor of the the regatta  which takes place between the 28th March and 3rd April.  2011 is the 40th Anniversary of the BVI Spring Regatta.