Jersey Devil, skippered by 17- year-old Chris Stanton, won the 1999 BVI Spring Regatta. The overall Regatta win is the first by a St. Croix boat, and the first by a boat sailed entirely by juniors.
The ecstatic crew lead by Stanton and including younger twin brothers Scott and Peter, Larry Malanga and Tim Pitts, graduates of the St. Croix Yacht Club junior sailing program, and 13- year-old Mari Frances Bonett of Puerto Rico sailed well for a very hard fought regatta win. The J-24 Class they raced in was so close the regatta winner only finished fourth in class!
The BVI Spring Regatta sailed to an anticlimax as Sunday's racing was canceled due to lack of wind. Several hours of waiting for the very light air to settle into a consistent breeze ended with cancellation of the last day of racing. This did not prevent the awards ceremony from being delayed until after dark, however, leaving the champions departing after 9 p.m. to sail back to St. Croix and back to fill their desks at Country Day and Good Hope Schools.
The winning youngsters were sailing students of the recently honored Nick Castruccio of St. Croix. Castruccio was recognized at the Rolex Regatta banquet on April 5 for his contributions as a leader in sailing in the U.S. Virgin Islands.
The BVI Spring Regatta is known as a big charter yacht regatta, but some of the chartered boats were in the racing class this year, so the total of about 110 boats was split into 65 racers and 45 cruisers.
Big was also the correct word for boats in the ‘Big Boat Class' making its Virgin Islands debut this year in Tortola. There were eight entries in this class. The smallest three boats being 60 footers, and the largest close to 80 feet long. The class also contained the two new beautiful W- class sloops. The W-class boats have the beautiful wooden decks and graceful lines of yachts of the 1930's, but use modern design and construction methods.
BVI Spring Regatta was the final leg of the CORT (Caribbean Ocean Racing Triangle) sponsored by Seabago. The final presentations of the night went to the CORT winners. After 12 races in three countries, the winners were representative of the international nature of the series. Marriot Frenchman's Reef (St. Thomas) won Racing class. Mirage (St. John) won the Racer/cruiser class. Orion of Ponce, Puerto Rico won the J-24 class. Platero also from Puerto Rico won Cruising and Southside Utilities of the USA won in the Beach Cat class.
For complete results click on CaribbeanRacing.com
