Team UK in costume for the Nation's Challenge Cup. Photo: Linda Phillips

Over the last ten years, sailors have been supplanted on protest juries by professional jurists, International Judge’s (IJ’s), and regatta chairman Bob Phillips believes that this has deprived the competitors of a learning opportunity.   “Quite often the competitors have a different view of the on-water action and actual sailing conditions and this is what we are trying to get back into the protest room.  I expect that they will interject a very pragmatic and practical approach to this process.”

The 2007 BVI Spring Regatta will re-involve the sailors in the protest process by asking each skipper at registration if there is someone on board who is conversant enough with the Rules to serve on a Protest Committee.   No competitor will sit on a committee that hears a protest that would effect results of the class in which he sails and, if necessary, competitors will be given the opportunity to appeal a decision to an International Jury.

According to the racing rules of Sailing, although a decision made by a Protest Committee can be appealed, the decisions made by an International Jury are final.  “We will have enough IJ’s for a full International Jury if one is needed, as would be the case where liability or injury is involved, and to hear any appeals arising from decisions of the Protest Committee,” Bob Phillips added, “The first stop for adjudication will be four sailors and one IJ sitting as a Protest Committee.”

This is not the first time that the BVI Spring Regatta and Sailing Festival has broken the mold with innovations to promote more racing and more fun.  A few years ago, organizers introduced the rolling start format allowing competitors in one class to start their next race before all competitors from other classes were finished; separate race areas with different types of courses; the tent village; the inclusion of one design racing with a course and race committee all their own, and the Regatta Village on the beach at Nanny Cay Marina and Resort providing racers with fine entertainment, choices in food and a bar to quench the thirst of even the most parched Caribbean sailor. 

BVI Spring Regatta and Sailing Festival encompasses two great events.  The 2007 Sailing Festival - a low-pressure, three-day warm up for the regatta - starts on Monday, March 26 with a welcome party at Nanny Cay. Three days of destination cruising, racing and Layday fun including the Nation's Challenge Cup, lead up to the main three-day BVI Spring Regatta starting on Friday, March 30. The expanded seven-day format has turned the traditional three days of racing action into a week-long sailing festival that takes participants throughout the British Virgin Islands.

Held annually on the first weekend of April, the BVI Spring Regatta & Sailing Festival is celebrating its 36th anniversary next year. It is now a seven-day event with two events back-to-back attracting an average of 150 yachts per year with eighty percent of the competitors from overseas.  The BVI Spring Regatta is presented by Nanny Cay Resort and Marina; the BVI Tourist Board is a Platinum sponsor;  gold sponsors are Bitter End Yacht Club, Caribbean Cellular Telephone, First Caribbean International Bank, Heineken, The Moorings,  Mount Gay, and SOL.

Visitors can fly to the British Virgin Islands through San Juan, Puerto Rico with American Airlines, Caribbean Sun, Cape Air and LIAT. Flights are also available through Antigua and Barbados on Virgin Atlantic, British Airways and BWIA.