28th Annual Bitter End Yacht Club Pro Am Regatta

Slowly, very slowly, the seven pro skippers invited to race in this year’s Pro Am Regatta have been arriving at the Bitter End Yacht Club on Virgin Gorda in the British Virgin Islands.

Dave Ullman arrived on Friday – the first of the seven skippers to check in. Normally, Ullman would arrive at a championship regatta a week in advance, to fine tune his program – but the Pro Am is a little different. So far Ullman’s schedule has not included even one minute of tiller-time. He seems totally focused on just relaxing in this Caribbean paradise with his wife Linda and son Charlie.

Most of the other skippers arrived late Sunday – just in time to participate in Monday’s warm-up event – the Mount Gay Defiance Day “ocean race” down to The Baths for lunch … and a race back later in the afternoon. Skipper Taylor Canfield, was still in Bermuda Sunday night – collecting his prize for taking third place at the Argo Group Gold Cup. Obviously, Canfield will miss the race to The Baths, but he’ll be ready when the Pro Am starts on Tuesday.

In addition to Ullman and Canfield, this year’s Pro Am skippers will be Dave Perry, Stephanie Robles, Zach Railey, Alec Anderson (last year’s Pro Am winner) and Anthony Kotoun. They will be doing windward – leeward races in a matched fleet of IC24s, with guests of the BEYC (all attired in spiffy new crew shirts) rotating through the fleet as their crewmembers.

Monday: Pro Am race from BEYC to the Baths and return in four large multihulls.
Tuesday: Pro Am racing in IC24s.
Wednesday: Lay day to relax. Moth demo with Anthony Kotoun.
Thursday: Pros race in the morning; Ams race for the SSC championship in the afternoon.
Friday: Pro Am finals, match racing in IC24s.

Bitter End Yacht Club – Pro Am Regatta