It can rain on Antigua, it can rain on the first day of the Antigua Classic Yacht Regatta, but no matter, because as one competitor said to the contrite race committee, “sailing is an outdoor sport.”
The practice day was everything one would want from a day of sailing classic boats. With warm, good wind and flat seas, Sincerity, the 84-year-old, Italian-built, all teak, 70′ ketch we were sailing, just ate it up. We sailed upwind at nine knots, powerfully going by schooners of about our own size. The crew onboard, a mixture of Brits, Mainers, and a Norwegian owner, were feeling cocky. If the wind just held, we’d be fine in the first race.
The Antigua Classic Yacht Regatta is not just about boatspeed, it is about the incredibly beautiful boats or, more properly, the yachts. Many of the boats racing had been at some time in the not too distant past derelicts, boats that had outlasted their first, sometimes second, sometimes more, life and had been left in some last harbor or boatyard to finally die. Many of these fantastic creations of the early days of the twentieth century were being left to rot away during an era of the ascendency of fiberglass boats.
Starting around forty years ago, there began a revival of interest in these wonderful sailing craft. Men and women started devoting their lives to restoring these boats to their former glory. At the Antigua Classic Yacht Regatta this commitment is honored with a Concourse d’Elegance,where the finest are judged to see who is the finest. Lovely Sincerity, in the midst of a ongoing upgrade, won third prize.
Our glory did not extend to the first race, sadly. An evening and morning of hard rain had driven the good winds of the day before to some other racecourse, and we had to watch the light wind flyers dominate the day. On this day we did not go fast, but we looked good.
Photos of Maine Sailors Look Good in Caribbean Races
