Key West preview

Record level of entries expected for January's top regatta

Entries are running strong for Terra Nova Trading/Yachting Key West Race Week 2002 which runs from 21-25 January.

Leading the way are 40 Melges 24s -- about half the total of 70-plus anticipated by class secretary Fiona Brown for what will be the class's rescheduled World Championship. This will run alongside what may be as many as 18 other classes sailing on the event's four courses.

"This year's calibre and depth of talent and technology is at the level that the sailing world expects in Key West," said Event Organizer Peter Craig. "The entry count is running only slightly behind last year's record pace of 326, and the only cancellation we have received is because of a boat-related mishap. Historically, over half the fleet submits their entries in the last three weeks before the deadline."

World, European and North American Melges 24 rankings will be settled in Key West. Laurent Pages (P&P Racing, France) and Richard Thompson (Black Seal, Great Britain) currently share first place in the world ranking. They'll be battling with other top sailors from Europe, Canada, Japan and a coast-to-coast list of American campaigners, including former world champion Vince Brun, three-time Key West winner Dave Ullman, North America's No.1 Ranking, and Argyle Campbell who is UK number two.

Double Olympic gold medalist Mark Reynolds will call tactics for Transpac winner Philippe Kahn, as he did a year ago when Kahn's Farr 40 Pegasus finished two points behind George Andreadis' two-time winner Atalanti XI.

Even with Kahn moving to a Melges 24, the competition will include the top four finishers from this month's Lewmar Cup at Miami, led by Jim Richardson's Barking Mad. Also, a returning contender will be Hasso Plattner's Morning Glory, with New Zealand's new America's Cup defender Dean Barker as tactician.

J/Boats will be out in force with as many as 75 of their one design 80s, 105s and 29s expected. It will be the J/80s' Mid-Winters. World champion and 2001 Key West winner and sailmaker Kerry Klingler will lead off a two-day cram course for J/80 competitors with a dockside speed and tuning session on Saturday, followed by an on-water clinic with Jay Lutz on Sunday, before racing starts Monday.

In the handicap classes, the list of PHRF-1 heavyweights will include Bill Alcott's Santa Cruz 70 Equation, trucking on down from Michigan; George Collins' CM 52 Chessie Racing from Maryland and Mike Rose's new J/145 Raincloud from Texas.

Early IMS entries include Isam Kabbani's C/M 60 Rima(right), 2001 owner/driver winner Ennio Staffini with his Farr 49 Uarshek2 and Larry Bullman's Farr 49 Javelin, which is destined for a better showing than it had last January. Javelin never reached the first mark of the first race before a collision beached it for the week.

The 1D35s, fresh from their Nationals at Miami, should build on their 18-boat fleet. The Mumm 30s, which started 20 at the Lewmar Cup in Miami earlier this month, already have more than 10 entries, including Bodo and Nick von der Wense's 2001 winner Turbo Duck.

The event has added a new dimension: a multihull one-design class of a dozen or more Corsair F-28R trimarans, which may seem almost airborne as they scoot over the aqua coral banks under spinnakers.