Day three at Antigua Sailing Week delivers superb racing
by Rupert Holmes/Antigua Sailing Week 30 Apr 03:23 BST
26 April - 2 May 2025
Superb conditions on day 3 at Antigua Sailing Week © Paul Wyeth / pwpictures.com
Sailors ranging from newcomers to veterans of multiple America's Cup campaigns enjoyed Caribbean sailing at its best in today's racing at Antigua Sailing Week, with lots of sun and moderate tradewinds of 10-12 knots.
CSA Racing Classes 2, 3 and 4 had three short races totalling 22 miles, with plenty of mark-rounding action. All three classes finished the day with two boats tied at the top of their respective leaderboards, underscoring the quality of racing here.
CSA Racing Class 2 had three different race winners: Don Terwilliger's Beneteau First 47.7 Dauntless, Woody Cullen's Swan 58 WaveWalker, and Wayne Zittel's X-Yachts XP50 DNR. WaveWalker and Dauntless now top the class leaderboard tied on 9 points, while Dauntless is carrying 15.
With seven races sailed so far, more than 70 per cent of the CSA Racing Class 3 fleet have notched up at least two podium results, while more than half have won at least one race. Jim Vos' RP37 Warthog won the first two races today, while Richard Matthews' J/122 Team Oystercatcher prevailed in the third. This class also has two boats tied at the top of the leaderboard, with both Warthog and Steve Rigby's J/122 El Ocaso on 13 points, while Matthews is only two points adrift in third.
Two firsts and a third place for Carlo Falcone's Italian 47ft IOR racer Caccia Alla Volpe in CSA Racing Class 4 saw his team finish the day on 10 points, matching Ryan Hope Ross' J/105 More Zessin' from Saint Maarten. David Carr's venerable Frers 46 Quintessence III is lying third with 15 points.
The CSA Cruising and Bareboat classes all sailed one 11-mile windward-leeward race. In the CSA Bareboat Class Radboud Crul's Dufour 44.3 North Star scored a first race win of the regatta, finishing more than three minutes ahead of Jakob Oetiker's KH+P Revival. Stephen Clarke's Moorings 44.3 Sorrel has put in a notably consistent performance in this class, with three consecutive third places.
Crul is a member of Schveneningen Yacht Club in the Netherlands, where he sails a Dehler 36 he's preparing for his seventh Rolex Fastnet Race. He first competed in Antigua Sailing Week in 2004 and likes the event, "very much because it's serious sailing in a lovely environment, with proper race courses."
What is his recipe for success in this fleet? "You have to learn while you're sailing," he says. "This is a totally new boat for me to understand and some of my crew had never sailed a race with me, so we are all learning - we enjoy it very much."
In CSA Club Class B Sandy Mair's Beneteau First 35 Cricket took her first victory of the week, ahead of Carrack & Tyden Jones' young crew on the J/30 Absolute Properties (Blue Peter). In CSA Club Class A Sebastian Gylling's Finnish Swan 51 Eira took line honours by a considerable margin and achieved the double of also winning on corrected time. Eduardo Lentz Jeanneau Sun Odyssey 44 Voilactus was fifth on the water, but rose to second place on corrected time.
"It was a good course for us today, with tactical options," says Gylling. "Antigua is the perfect spot for racing. It's not always an easy race, so you have to position yourself tactically and have a little bit of stomach to go quite close to shore at times."
He also values the atmosphere and camaraderie on shore, saying the regatta has a "nice setup because you don't have to be that serious about things - you just go out there and have fun on the water. It's just a fantastic thing to do."
Antigua has long been a magnet for boats based elsewhere in the Caribbean. Darcy Carr, for instance, sailed his 33ft 1980s Beneteau First Class 10 Wajang from Trinidad, a round trip of around 800 miles, and is competing in CSA Racing Class 4. "Competition is high, with some very good local boats from Antigua," he says. "There are challenging conditions and competitors, but it's super friendly. Everybody's together in the bar afterwards, so there's lots of fun to be had.
"If you are a sailor and you want an experience of the Caribbean, the tropical warm weather and the sea conditions with steady tradewinds, the location is excellent," Carr adds. "I think it is the people that make it - you can't find anyone here that's not super nice.
"A lot of us raced here in the nineties," he says of Wajang's crew. "We've had a lot of fun, a lot of memories. It's such a great place and such a fantastic regatta. Tonight is Rum and Reggae night. They killed us on the water today, but now we're going to go kill it on the dance floor."
Antigua Sailing Week places a high priority on providing an experience on shore that's as just as good as that on the water. After racing today the regatta village bars had live music from 1600, ahead of the daily prize-giving, followed by the Rum and Reggae evening.
Tomorrow (Wednesday) is Lay Day, with activities on Pigeon Point beach, just round the corner from the Antigua Yacht Club. There will be fun dinghy racing for race crews at midday, while the afternoon will see a mix of beach games, followed by live music and a DJ on the beach late afternoon and early evening. Racing resumes Thursday.
For more information about Antigua Sailing Week including racing, watching the action and the fun-packed shoreside entertainment, visit the official website: sailingweek.com
Provisional results can be found here.