Baron Bliss Harbour Regatta scheduled for Sunday

And while La Ruta Maya is the weekend’s big sporting event, the annual Baron Bliss Harbour Regatta will also kick off on Sunday. The sailing boat race committee hopes that a couple of changes this year will add more excitement to the event. According to Harbour Regatta Chairman Edward Flowers, the race course has been designed for the spectators.

Edward D. Flowers, Chairman, Harbour Regatta Committee
?What we?re doing now is to take the first leg of the triangle, go up to the eastern point, come down, and instead of going back up to the eastern stake, they go on to the southern and sail right along the course, make the loop at the northern stake, come back down.?

Jacqueline Woods
?Sounds like a longer route.?

Edward Flowers
No, it?s not really longer. We try to use the same distance, but we believe that it would be easier for spectators, those people who love sailboat racing and I daresay who would like to see the sport develop. They?d have a better view if the course is set out like that.?

?Another thing that we?re trying to do this year is to get a commentator who will just, as the race is going on, he relay what is taking place from stake to stake, from beginning to finish, so that people could hear, see, and understand exactly what is taking place with the race.?

Jacqueline Woods
?Because in the past it was only visual.?

Edward Flowers
?I know. We?ve had complaints that all people see is the boats out there sailing and they don?t know exactly what it is.?

Jacqueline Woods
?Who is leading …??

Edward Flowers
?Quite so. But this year we hope that that could be arranged. We are working on it and hopefully it will be set up in time for Sunday?s events.?

?It will have of course the lighters, a small and a large class, we?re hoping to have the seagulls, and of course we?ll have the spectacular sixteen, we?ll have the dories. It was hoped that we could have included a paddling dory. A paddling dory is just a two-man dory. Again, paddling along the coast in the vicinity of the B.T.L. Park, right up to a given point is where we are going to do it. But that will be the dugout dory, not the fibreglass or any high-tech dories.?

According to Flowers, a total of twenty-five persons, including captains and their crew will participate in this year’s race. The Harbour Regatta gets underway from in front of the pier at the Princess Hotel and Casino at eleven on Sunday morning.