Competitors at the BVI Spring Regatta presented by Nanny Cay Marina were put through their paces again today. The race committee squeezed in another three races for the Cooper Area participants, two races for the Norman Area racers, five each for the beach cats and six for the IC-24s. Competitors woke to partly cloudly skies which cleared to classic Caribbean sun this afternoon with winds in the 10-12 knot range.

In class A Tom Hill1s Titan XXII (1,2,1,1,1,1,2) continues to exact retribution for its fourth to Pyewacket’s (3,1,2,2,2,2,1) third in St Maarten’s Heineken Regatta. She scored another two firsts and a second today bringing her lead on Mr Disney’s Pyewacket to four points. Chippewa is in third place and Bill Alcott has retired with Equation suffering transmission problems that need to be fixed.

Earlier tonight, a request for redress that was thrown out yesterday was reopened. Redress was granted which resulted in the first race yesterday for class B and C being abandoned because the race committee improperly signalled a course change – they made the announcement on the radio but didn’t make a sound signal. This decision was the subject of much debate in the regatta village as local musician Quito played and Heineken and Mount Gay was quaffed. But perhaps more heinous, the announcement for boats to attend the hearing was made during the swimsuit show eliciting much booing and jeering; never let juries interrupt yellow polka dot bikinis.

While the ruling didn’t change the standings in Class A it did increase Rosebud’s (2,2,1,1,1,1) lead on Vim (1,3,2.5,2,4,2) from a hair at 0.5 points to 6.5 points – and it wasn’t Rosebud who opened the hearing even though they received a DSQ in that race because of the course change.

Post-race today Vim’s owner Craig Speck was expecting a ‘real dog fight’ with the previous 0.5 point gap, planning to trap Rosebud on the starts. His task is now a lot tougher in what is expected to be a two-race day tomorrow.

This ruling also closed the gap between Transpac 52 Rosebud and Ker 55 Aera (3,1,4,4,2,3) who been having “some real nip and tuck” racing according to owner Roger. Rosebud, hails from the US west coast and is populated by a multinational and highly experienced crew many from the America’s Cup. Jack Halterman is at the helm while Roger runs the Deckman tactical computer system; a role not unfamiliar to him. Roger has been “in computers since 1964” and if something has a chip in it, there’s a 95 per cent chance that Roger’s software helped build it.

Vim earned an unwelcome fourth place in the second race today. “We had some driving problems with me basically,” said Craig and, “we got a couple of bad shifts and then the wind slowed down on us right there at the end so we slowed down while the other boats finished.” With Vim, a Swan 45, twice the weight of some of the other boats the crew has to keep the boat powered up and moving and “real gentle and easy on the movements.”

In class C, Mistress Quickly (1,1,3.5,5,9,5) had a bad day today after its great start yesterday. Over early in the first two races of the day she racked up a fifth and a ninth in these races – and followed it with a fifth. Three wins went to Express 37 Cosmic Warlord (3,2,3.5,1,1.5,1) sharing one with BVI Melges 24 Crew Clothing (8,7,7,8,1.5,8). Puerto Rican Henderson 30 Soca was back on the water today after using the side of Crew Clothing’s hull to snap its spinnaker pole yesterday.

With the abandonment of yesterday’s race Cosmic Warlord has bumped to the top of the list with 12 points to Magnificent 7’s (2,3,5,2,3,2) 17 points reversing the four point lead that Magnificent 7 had over them. Mistress Quickly is in third place.

Martin Jacobson’s Swan 44 Crescendo (1,1,2,2,1,3,1) crewed predominantly by Antipodeans is still at the top of the Class E pile with 11 points. 1st Home (2,3,3,3,2,1,2) is second with 16 points and Lazy Dog (6,2,1,1,3,2,3.5), third with 18.5 points.

Geoffrey Pidduck’s Six Meter Trouble (1,1,4,1,1,1,1) from Antigua continues to mop up Class F with an ‘unbeatable rating’. BVI boat Dehlerious (3,2,2,3,3,3,2) is in second much to the chagrin of Pipe Dream (2,4,3,4,4,2,4), another BVI boat, in fourth. Pat Nolan and her all-women crew on Boomorang (4,3,1,2,2,4,3) are third. Boomorang’s owner Pam Nolan and Katy Isaksen are experienced sailors from Seattle, the rest of the crew are sailing students of Pat’s Sistership Sailing School.

Given the success of yesterday’s courses the PRO, David Brennen could not help but send the boats racing in the Norman course area on the same tour as yesterday. The first race took the fleet around “L” shaped Peter Island and the second race saw the fleet round Flannagan, a mark just north of Tortola’s Pockwood Pond, a mark set close to Peter Island’s Great Harbour and then to the finish. Regardless of the similarities of the race course, results today included some surprises and changes in positions.

Moving up in the standings from second to first, the performance cruising class is now being led by Ron Noonan’s Wild Flower (1,5,2,1). Northern Child (7,2,3,2) has broken away from the pack and is now in second place with 14 points and Natural Magic (2,1,4,8) has dropped from first to third, and is currently tied with Kracker Jack (4,4,1,6).

After ending yesterday’s racing tied for first place, Javelin (1,2,1,1) has forged ahead of Triple Jack (2,1,2,2) in the multihull class. Piglet (3,3,3,3) continues to hold on tight to her third place position. Chris White, designer and owner of Javelin almost didn’t come to Spring Regatta but his crew talked him into it. Chris shared a little about his boat: “It is designed to be a cruising boat so I am very happy to be doing so well. The boat was built in Cape Town and is the newest of the five Atlantic 55s that have been built. Javelin was launched in early December and we really didn’t have a chance to test sail her before we made the crossing. We did well in St Maarten and although we did not beat the trimarans in our class, we were clearly the fastest catamaran.”

Dunbar, in Dot Com (1,3,4,1), holds on to his first place position in Bareboat A. BVI Yacht Charters (2,4,1,10), sailed by Val Doan wrestled her way to first place with a spectacular first race today but dropped into second after the day’s second race. Kenneth Powell, with Team BVI (3,1,9,7) crewed by staff from BVI Tourist Board after an intensive training programme, has dropped from second to fifth place with a ninth place finish in the first race and a seventh in the second. Moving into the third place position is Sea-duction (6,9,2,2), skippered by Justin Barton.

Frevo/Team Germany are looking unstoppable with four firsts to their credit. Something Hot (5,2,6,1), the all-girl Heineken crew is looking like something hot moving from a tied third place position to sharing second place with Northern Lights (2,3,5,4). Mickey Mouse (3,4,2,6), who ended yesterday tied for second, has now dropped into third place.

Sailing in Jib and Main, Jamie Bibby, age 14 continues to impress the troops as he moves into second place. Bibby said of the racing: “There is lots of competition out there. I feel very excited.” Although Jamie indicated that he prefers a little more breeze, the light winds may favour his lightweight crew. Sailing on Barclay Kats 2 (2,4,3,3), with a crew whose average age is 13, Jamie splits the driving with Jevon who is also 14. Barclay Kats 2 is currently solidly in second place ahead of Bill Bailey’s Second Nature (5,3,2,5). At this point, Affinity seems hard to beat with four first place finishes.

Although winds were mostly only 6-8 knots, the one-design course racing was action-packed today. Wow (5,4,5,4,4,5,5,5,6,6,), a Prindle 19, sailed by Davis Murray and Rakel Holmes, was well into their ninth race of the series when the mast came tumbling down. On the beach Davis was taking the whole incident in his stride. He explained that the boat was old and had not been maintained. He knew that the rigging was weak but just did not have the time to re-rig it before the event. He and Rakel have every intention of mending the rig and going out tomorrow. Between them they have over 40 years’ experience sailing beach cats and Davis has sailed the Worrell 1000 twice.

After sitting on a mooring for two years, the boat is new to Davis and he has just begun the learning curve. Regardless of the less than spectacular finishes and the mast mishap, Davis says, “The fun factor of this regatta out weighs everything else.”

Wave Magnet (3,1,2,1,2,2,2,2,1,1,3) is currently on top of the Beach Cat (non-spinnaker) class with 20 points. Trailing behind with 26 points is Lolo Too (2,2,1,3,6,1,1,1,6,2,1) and Rush (1,3,3,2,1,4,3,3,2,3,4) is close on their heels with 29 points.

Misreported yesterday, but corrected today is the beach cat spinnaker division. (Yesterday’s results did not have them broken out of the beach cat class.) With just two boats in this class, HF Mortgage (2,2,1,1,1,1,2,1,1,1,1) dominates with 14 points, and Caribbean Auto Mart (1,1,2,2,2,2,1,2,2,2,2) has 19 points.

On the same racecourse, the IC24s proved themselves to be an excitable group in the third race of the day when a quarter of the fleet was over the line early. Only one of the three boats responded to the hail of the committee. Tingum (10,10,8,11,12,7,8,7,10,9,5,4) turned around and restarted but Old and Gray (4,8,5,4,4,8.5,6,4,13,8,6,5) and Brand-new Secondhand (1,7,2,1,1,1,2,1,13,4,1,8) continued on. Richard Johnson and John Holmberg in Stinger (2,1,1,2,3,2,3,2,1,3,3,3) continue to stretch their lead. Although Holmberg must find the ride painfully slow after sailing beach cats for so many years, he and his father-in-law Richard are 11 points ahead of Seahawk.

Seahawk (7,2,4,3,2,3,1,5,3,1,2,2) has moved up from yesterday’s third place position and is ahead of third place boat, Brand New Second Hand, by 7 points. Brand New Second Hand was OCS in the ninth race and placed a disappointing eighth in the day’s last race.