Sunshine sailing in the picturesque blue waters of Key West is what the Cape 31 Class signed up for and that is just what they got. Roosters. Mount Gay Rum. Key lime everything. Blue water. Island culture. As well as some great competition - the Southernmost Regatta has it all.
A perfect week for the first ever Cape 31 US Class event. Five days of action packed close racing with four different race winners across the eight races. 2023 Southernmost Regatta kicked off on Monday 16th January with teams traveling to compete from around the world.
Antix, a team that have been at many Key West regattas in various forms of the years, shipped their boat over with the help from Peters and May from the UK/Ireland at the end of 2022 for the regatta. Sandy Askew decided to do the same after enjoying her first season with the Cape 31 in the UK before embarking on a Caribbean adventure doing Key West on the way.
The remaining three boats were chartered by teams who couldn’t wait to have a go in a Cape 31. Dan Cheresh, Extreme 2, Richard Thompson, Black Seal and Joel Ronning, Catapult. These teams had a few windy training days before the regatta but did not have long to get up to speed to compete against each other.
After dominating the first few days, Anthony O’Leary, Cork Week Champion, held onto the top spot for the entire regatta. This was no easy feat as the three charter teams got to grips with the boat surprisingly quickly and found themselves in the chocolates (or rum) all week.
With just 2 points separating the top 3 teams going into the last day, it was anyone’s game - but a little bit of Irish luck was on Antix’s side as there wasn’t enough wind to race!
After dominating the start of the week Anthony O’Leary, sailing with two of his sons Rob and Nin, came out on top of the international fleet in Key West! We can’t wait for next year - with hopefully many more Cape 31’s on the start line.
Cape 31
1. Antix, IRL3128, Anthony O Leary - 1 -1 -1 -2 -2 -[5] -3 -5 ; 15
2. Extreme 2, IRL31031, Dan Cheresh - [5] -4 -3 -1 -3 -1 -1 -2 ; 15
3. BLACK SEAL, GBR314X, Richard Thompson - 2 -2 -2 -[5] -1 -4 -2 -3 ; 16
4. Catapult, USA 311X, Joel Ronning - 3 -3 -[4] -3 -4 -2 -4 -4 ; 23
5. Flying Jenny, USA61567, Sandra Askew - 4 -[5] -5 -4 -5 -3 -5 -1 ; 27
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