SCRUB ISLAND INVITATIONAL - It doesn't get much better than this! ..... a race to Marina Cay
The second day of the BVI Spring Regatta & Sailing Festival saw 43 boats race the 11NM course from Nanny Cay to Marina Cay for the Scrub Island Invitational. This year, Scrub Island Resort, Spa & Marina hosted the post party at its neighbouring island Marina Cay, which with its cool island vibe was just the right complement to a perfect day of Caribbean sailing.
It was a wild and windy day, with gusts hitting 30+ knots in a particularly dark squall that hit the racecourse, washing off the salty water that had already drenched those sailors on the rail as big seas washed over the sides. Cruising Multihull, Bareboat, Cruising, and Performance Cruising sailed directly from Nanny Cay, finishing at Marina Cay, while Racing and Performance Multihulls sailed out around Ginger Island for a longer, wetter course, also finishing at Marina Cay and the post-race party.
No chickens on this boat! Poulet Peeps takes a first - Scrub Island Invitational
Ben Sampson, from Pittsburgh, PA, has been visiting the BVI for thirty years. Learning to sail at age 16 at a YMCA sailing camp in Pennsylvania ultimately led him to Monique and Julian Putley, long-time Tortola residents who became the reason Sampson makes the annual pilgrimage to the BVI to cruise or race.
“We took a bareboat class in the Chesapeake which recommended that we go to the Caribbean to sail so we came down here and fortunately found Captain Putley,” Sampson recalled. “He gave us the classes we needed to get our bareboat certification and we’ve been companions and sailors together ever since.”
Sampson and his friends have chartered both Cara, a Sunsail 40, to race on, and a catamaran to host their friends, and today their team Poulet Peeps (named for the humble chicken) took first in the Bareboat class on the 11 nautical mile race to Scrub Island. Other winners today included the Elan 450 Emily of Cowes, taking first in Racing class; the HH66 Lee Overlay Partners III took first in Performance Multihull; Leopard 50 La Novia took first in Cruising Multihull, and the Salona 45 Panacea X a first in Performance Cruising.
It was a wild and windy day with gusts hitting 30+ knots in a particularly dark squall that hit the racecourse, washing off the salty water that had already drenched those sailors on the rail as big seas washed over the sides. Cruising Multihull, Bareboat, Cruising and Performance Cruising sailed directly from Nanny Cay finishing at Marina Cay, while Racing and Performance Multihulls sailed out around Ginger Island for a longer – wetter – course, also finishing at Marina Cay and the post-race party hosted by Scrub Island Resort, Spa & Marina.
Skipper 27-year-old Jason Putley helmed Cara today noting that local knowledge helped the Poulet Peeps 100% today. Putley grew up in Tortola, sailing out of the Royal BVI Yacht Club since he was a kid, racing his first Spring Regatta with a Puerto Rican team when he was six years old, and only ever missing two Spring Regatta events due to Irma and Covid. These days Spring Regatta is the only regatta he makes time for as he’s busy running his business DEG BVI Powerboat Charters and Water Taxi.
“It was good, very windy, which we like, it was a practice day for us so we used it to get the cobwebs out, we did well to use a big squall to our advantage, and then just played the land,” Putley commented. “I love this regatta; the best part about it is that I normally sail with my dad who is almost 80. This year he’s watching from our mother ship but every past year I’ve sailed with him – it’s a father son duo.”
An advantage of being local is knowing the local bareboat fleet.
“We’ve done it enough times now that we know how to pick the best boat out of the Sunsail fleet,” Putley laughed. “You can absolutely tweak a bareboat – there is tons you can do; it has a lot of the controls you would have on a conventional race boat and we’re always changing things on the boat. The boat we have this week is pretty nice – it has twin rudders so you don’t get much weather even on a day like today!”
2025 Scrub Island Race Photo Alex Turnbull