It never even crossed our minds to race with SEDEM, but as we’re in the Caribbean, this might be the chance to challenge our boat and race her in the famous Caribbean 600. It's a 600-mile spectacular offshore race nicely zigzagging between eleven islands, generally in a predominant Easterly trade wind. They are iconic islands with start and finish from Antigua. The race is organized by the Royal Ocean Racing Club, which happens to be our club when we race from the Solent, England.
But racing needs a lot of preparation and so we started with a hoist at the North Sound Marina. After two nights on the dock and the necessary cleaning, sanding and repainting of the anti-fouling, it was great to be back in the water again. We headed for Falmouth Harbour where our crew, Deb, Rob & Simon had already arrived. It’s funny as normally we sail against each other in the Double Handed competition in the UK. Kind of ‘5 skippers on 1 boat’, but it went surprisingly well.
For a couple of days we trained and started to get rid of all the cruising stuff from the boat. The boxes and bags kept on coming; it must have been over 1000 kg. And every day we felt the boat go better and faster. The Friday before the start of the Caribbean 600 we first raced around the island of Antigua. It was a good test for the manoeuvres we needed to have under control for the big race.
What I should explain is that 5 persons to race a 50-foot yacht is actually not too many. Roeland, the youngest and fittest (the Nipper and Skipper), did the bow to handle the sail changes. Tactics were in the hands of our RORC Commodore Deb and helming was for Rob (Bellino), Simon (Kestrel) and Astrid. Rob and Deb have won many races Double Handed and are three years in a row Overall Season Winners. It was the perfect setup to learn their tips and tricks. Let’s say: If you can’t beat them, join them!
Fully prepared, we were ready to start the race on Monday. All in all, some 56 boats participated. Many of them were the latest, newest and fastest on the planet. It was really very exciting to be at the start line.
The race was really amazing. Generally in shorts and T-shirts, in amazing blue waters, with beautiful islands and a good breeze, we raced in 3 days and nine hours around the course. We managed pretty well behind the windless zone behind the huge volcano at Guadeloupe, we had a couple of squalls to deal with and we had great powerful reaching conditions.
This was the first time we had the boat set up fully for racing. It was actually the best and hardest we had pushed Sedem. We found that especially at the fast angles Sedem is very fast and always fully under control and in the right balance. At one point in the race we were even in second place.
But of course Sedem is not a racing yacht and racing against these weapons we think we actually did very well. We finished 8th in class and 21st of 41 monohull IRC race boats. It was a good test. We had smashed against waves in 28 knots, we were reaching and never broached. All without damage. We are so very proud of how the Pegasus 50 performs when she gets really pushed.
On arrival we were welcomed with beer and rum. A great way to wash the salty faces and make for a very good night’s sleep. Which we needed as the next day would be the prizegiving and party.
For one time only we raced our home. And we fully agree, you should never do it. But then having said so: we learned every angle and corner of our Pegasus. She can be fast, is always balanced and under control, while she shows lots of seaworthiness and we have full faith in her capabilities.
Astrid & Roeland
Owners of Pegasus 50 SEDEM
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