Carlo Falcone travelled to the UK yesterday to oversee the loading of the 10 Petticrow Dragon yachts ordered for the new Harmony Hall Yacht Club in Antigua. Falcone, owner of ‘Marielle’, the 80ft Fife classic and the fast 44ft ‘Caccia Alla Volpe’, has recently purchased the Harmony Hall Restaurant and Art Gallery and is establishing a Yacht Club. It is here that Carlo will introduce Dragon match racing.

The fleet of 10 Dragons leave Pourtsmouth on Sunday bound for St. John’s Antigua. The voyage takes about 10 days. The new yacht club was formed by Carlo’s sailing buddies and includes Dennis Conner, Russell Coutts, Poul-Richard Hoj-Jensen, Shannon Falcone (Carol’s son), Torben Grael and Mike Toppa. The Harmony Hall Yacht Club will be an exclusive venue and will also have a Hotel with individually owned condo-hotel units. For those who eat at this lovely restaurant I can mention that the kitchen is being upgraded to take even better care of your culinary needs.

Poul-Richard Hoj-Jensen - Petticrow’s CEO, HHYC founder member and owner of one of the 10 boats going to Antigua this week is keen to ensure that the Dragon club is opened up to encourage not only racing on a regular basis but training events throughout the year. Hoj-Jensen said: “To be honest this whole ‘Dragons in Antigua’ idea has happened so quickly. There is so much potential but first of all we need to organise the season. After Antigua Classic Week and Antigua Sailing Week next spring we’ll have an opening race at Harmony Hall YC, then we’ll have a race for all the captains from the Antigua Mega Yacht Challenge.

“We are hoping we’ll have 20 boats out there soon so that the idea is that all the other Caribbean islands can have a connecting championship where we can invite the best sailors - a bit like the Endeavour Trophy dinghy champion of champions race. Each island will have to have selection races and appoint the best sailors.

“But one of the biggest Harmony Hall YC’s events we’re working on right now is an 80-boat Dragon regatta in 2010. Chris Dicker who successfully organised the St Tropez Dragon 75th anniversary regatta is already working on it. I am sure it will be over subscribed but we have to keep it a bit under control. I’ve already had many telephone calls from sailors who would like to come out for a week’s training but I need to get that side of things organised. The charter side of things is also something we’ll be working on in the future.”

One of the most attractive aspects about being the owner of the yacht club and owing all the boats admit Falcone and Hoj-Jensen is being in total control. Hoj-Jensen commented: “It’s wonderful we can run the event exactly how we want to run it and there are no committees or anyone to stop us doing anything. For example we wanted to use 100 per cent jib because they are better for team racing but of course they are not in the class rule so, instead of having to ask the class association for permission, we just did it, and we also didn’t have to ask the class for permission to organise a race out there, we just did that too.”

Carlo Falcone, who has yet to race a Dragon, but is keen says: “I was originally thinking about creating a modern day design such as a sportsboat fleet at the club but I can now see the Dragon will totally befit the sort of image we hope to portray at Harmony Hall Yacht Club… I can’t think of a better class.”

Best Wishes to Carlo Falcone and the new Harmony Hall Yacht Club. I would like some comments from fellow Antiguans as to the impact of the Dragons.

The story was originally reported by Sue Pelling and Yachting World. Visit the link for photos and the original story.