Crew Clothing skipper, Andrew Thompson, with crew members Peter Tarn, Arjan Stoof and Gerard Kraakman, accept the big prize from Governor Macan.

In years past, the BVI governor may have been a guest on one of the yachts sailing in the Governor’s Cup and then following the race, assisted in the prize giving, This year was different. The 2004 Royal British Virgin Islands Governor’s Cup was the inaugural race of Governor Tom Macan, at the helm of his own boat, Juno, a Cape Dory 25.

After a week of nearly no wind, the crews of the twelve boats smiled on Saturday morning, February 24, when they awoke to enough breeze to have a race. The sun was shining and a north variable wind blew at 7 – 12 knots. As this race is used by many as a tune up for the busy race season that will kick off in mid-February in St. Croix, the course was set with a number of short windward, leeward legs requiring those boats in the racing class to race and lower their spinnakers four times during the race.

After a short postponement, the cruising class, consisting of three boats started their race of five legs at 11:10 and the ten racing class boats started on a seven leg jaunt at 11:15. Line honours went to the biggest boat in the entire fleet, Hotel California, a Santa Cruz 70, and the last boat to finish was none other than our BVI Governor, Thomas Macan. In this type of racing, the place in which one crosses the line often does not correspond to one’s actual finish position in the race. This race followed suite with the cruising class being won by Bill Bailey on Second Nature, followed by the governor in his new (to him) Cape Dory 25, Juno, and third place went to the boat that was first to cross the line, Hotel California.

Unlike the cruising class, the first two boats that finished in the racing class, took first, and second place and in the same order that they finished. Andrew Thompson with his Melges 24 Crew Clothing took both line honours and the first place prize. He was followed by Guy Eldridge with his Melges 24, Mistress Quickly. Third place went to Peter Haycraft in Pipe Dream.

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