St Thomas Int Regatta- Nine bullets for Annie Gardner in Nacra 17
by Bob Fisher on 31 Mar 2015
St Thomas International Regatta, Day 3 Christine Thompson
Regular weather produces regular results, but sailors, being what they are, are not totally regular, and on the third and final day of the St. Thomas International Regatta they provided some surprises. Sunshine and a fine breeze of around 15-17 knots gave the competitors the challenge they required and they all enjoyed a variety of courses.
Annie Gardner and her husband Eric Whitte posted a straight line of ten victories in the Beach Cat class with their Nacra 17,. Their victory in their ninth and final race was by a stunning margin of 8:21`over a two hour course, a clear indication of their superiority over the Falcon F-16, Whiplash of Teri McKenna. It marked a great return for the husband and wife whose boat was badly holed at the start of the sixth race the day before by an inexperienced competitor. Overnight work produced a workable watertight hull and granted redress for the races missed, their scoreline was an impressive one of nine bullets.
Once more in the two-boat Class 1, Steve and Heidi Benjamin’s Spookie, a Carkeek HP 40, clung close to the faster TP 52 Conviction of Clint Brooks and reversed the finishing order on corrected time. After this short race, Spookie returned to her mooring and allowed Conviction to sail round alone and collect a hollow victory.
The Melges 32 class of four, had the tightest overall finish with Sergio Sagramoso’s Lazy Dog and Eric Juarbe, Soca, steered by Mark Ploch level on points, bt the overall victory went to Lazy Dog. It might have been different if Ploch had resorted to match race tactics as they came to the finish of the penultimate race. It appeared that he could have held Lazy Dog outside the line, but gybed and allowed his rival room to do the same and finish with his nose ahead.
In class 2 Todd Stuart’s White Rhino, a Swan 56, posted two first places today, but the two second places of Peter Coor’s Corr’s Light Racing/Southern Child had better results on the preceding two days and with two second places today took the top award easily. A one/two by Jonathan Lipuscek’s J-105 Dark Star was a comfortable points winner in Class 3 as was the SC70 Hotel California of Stephen Schmidt in the Non-Spinnaker class.
The most races sailed was by the IC 24 class with 20 competitors. They completed their programme of 12 races with Puerto Rican boats filling the first two places. Marco Teixidor’s Cachondo has been the best performer of the week with five wins and four second places; her worst was an eighth in the final race, one that finished right in front of the St. Thomas Yacht Club.
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