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.”