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Voiles de St Barth Heats Up

Steve Schmidt drives Hotel California, Too, to a 7th out of 22 boats in class in the first of four Voiles de St. Barth races.

latitude/Richard
©2011 Latitude 38 Media, LLC

It sort of looks like . . . but it can’t be . . . but yes, steaming to weather just off the west coast of St. Barth and toward a finish line is Steve Schmidt, formerly of Saratoga, aboard his highly cruise-modified SC 70 Hotel California, Too. Schmidt has been spending most of the last decade living and loving the cruising life in the Caribbean.

Just two weeks after the greatest sailing spectacle ever, the 40-mega-sailing-yacht St. Barth Bucket, to which England’s Yachting World devoted a lavish 18-page preview, you’d think sailing activities would have calmed down on the 21-sq-mile French island in the Caribbean. But no. For the second year in a row, the island is holding a heavily-sponsored Voiles de St. Barth, which is sort of an upscale Antigua Sailing Week with a decided French joie de vivre.

Built for extreme sailing conditions and crewed by offshore experts, Rambler 100 had no trouble with moderately strong winds and sloppy seas.

© 2011 Voiles de St. Barth

More than 50 boats have entered, more than doubling the size of the first year’s fleet. Variety is what describes the fleet. You’ve got the big hot-rods, including Rambler 100 (ex-Speedboat), skippered by Kenny Read and his Puma around the world gang; Genuine Risk, a Dubois 97 under charter to Hugo Stenbeck of Sweden; and Vesper, Jim Swartz’s  no-expense spared TransPac 52 driven by Gavin Brady with Ken Keefe of KKMI at the back of the boat. There are also classics, such as Carlo Falcone’s 72-year old Fife 80 yawl Mariella from Antigua, and Kate, a gaff-rigged 12 Meter that Philip Walwyn home-built on St. Kitts that has subsequently been converted to a yawl. In addition, there is a cruising fleet of over 20 that, inexplicably to us, includes everything from a J/95 to 70 footers, with two of the boats being sailed by all-women teams.

After a mostly mild two months in the St. Barth part of the Caribbean, during which time the wind rarely blew over 20 knots, crews in the first race, many of whom were suffering from overindulging at the wild opening night party, were greeted with winds to 30 knots and sloppy seas. The toll began to mount even before the first start. For example, the back end of the boom on Lloyd Thornburg’s Phaedo, the lightest Gunboat 66 ever built but which had proven herself by frequently sailing in the mid-20s during the Caribbean 600, snapped right off.

Lloyd Thornburg holds up the back of his Gunboat 66’s carbon boom, wordlessly explaining why he and his crew never even got to cross the starting line.

latitude/Richard
©2011 Latitude 38 Media, LLC
In the 20 years that Carlo Falcone has owned his 80-ft Fife yawl Mariella, he hasn’t just kept her in great condition, he’s raced her frequently — including across the Atlantic.

latitude/Richard
©2011 Latitude 38 Media, LLC

Toto, our friend the race director, would say these were just the conditions that sailors were looking for. They worked fine for hardened crews of Rambler 100 and Genuine Risk — which reported hitting 30 knots of boat speed — but many other boats were knocked out or cripped by gear failures. Even the all-pro Vesper sailed the last third of the first race under headsail only because of damage. As such, it was a very, very quiet night at the race village in Gustavia, with all but the most hard-core pros hoping for the predicted lighter weather expected for the last three days. That would include us — not the pro part, of course — as we’re planning to do the last two races on Hotel California, Too, and slamming to weather in big winds and big seas is not that boat’s speciality.

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No one was more surprised than us when, 25 minutes after posting Monday’s ‘Lectronic Latitude, all 50 spots on the Delta Doo Dah 3D entry list were filled — that’s two boats a minute, folks!