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Information Pages
From the 20th to the 23th of May, the 7th edition of the already famous Captain Oliver's Regatta filled Oyster Pond with "Joie de Vivre", the joy of life which the late captain, Olivier Lange, used to share with his friends. And, although emotions were clearly present at the inauguration evening, everybody knew that Captain Oliver had wanted this regatta, which he created, to go on. And on it went, under some rain and cloudy skies on Saturday and with bright sunshine on Sunday, although everybody would have loved some more wind.
27 boats were present at the departure to compete in 6 classes: Beachcat, Racing Multihull, Cruising Multihull, Racing Monohull, Cruising Monohull and Corporate Challenge. The regatta started like always, with the briefing and cocktail party on Friday night. And then, on Saturday, participants had a rainy start to the race around the island: The light wind finally picked up near the Dutch side airport. On Sunday, a clear sky welcomed everybody for the race in the St. Barth channel.
Results:
The crew of Bobby Velasquez on "L'Esperance" won the overall "Most worthy Performance", and finished first in the Cruising Monohull class on both days. "Maelia" from Raphael Magras of St. Barth finish second and "Moondance" third (overall result).
"Budget Marine Gill" finished first in the Racing Monohull class, followed by "Coors Light" (overall result).
"Nikki Beach" from St. Barth ended with the overall victory in the Beach Cat class, and received a prize for the fastest boat around the island. "Image Real Estate" from St. Martin finished second (overall result) and "Cirrus 31" came third.
"Quality Time" was the overall winner in the Cruising Multihull class, followed by Jean-Michel Ricour's "Billboard Media" and "Tight Five" in third position.
The Racing Multihull class was won by Eric Clement's "Dauphin Telecom" trimaran. "Carib Cat" ended second and "Calisto" third.
Finally, the Corporate Challenge saw the victory of "Turtle Island", while "Vwel-o-Ven" finished second and the team from the Louis-Constant Fleming Hospital ended in third place.
Two female crew member of "Mr. Walker" won the Best Costume prize for their pirate costume. Another award went to three young sailors on "Lil Poe", participating in the marine program of the Secondary vocational school in Dutch St. Maarten.
And Finally came the most emotive moment of the ceremony, when Maggie, the life time partner and skipper of the late Captain Oliver,presented Bobby Velasquez and the crew of "L'Esperance" with the Captain Oliver Memorial Trophy. "L'Esperance" has proven to be amazingly successful all over the Caribbean, and Bobby Velasquez was a close friend of Olivier Lange. His words while receiving the trophy: " I can't see the captain, but I know he can see us here today... Thank you for making sure his dream continues."
And evidently, it will continue to be a great sailing event in St. Martin, hopefully for many more years to come! |
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