ANTIGUANICE YACHTING INSIDER NEWSLETTER

Sasha in friendlier conditions!  Photo by Amory Ross.

The 2011 Transatlantic Race from Newport, Rhode Island, USA to Lizard Point in Cornwall, UK, saw the final yacht finish the race in no Force 10 winds.  Sasha, a 42-foot Sparkman & Steven-designed wooden yacht, experienced up to 55 knots of wind and 40-foot breaking waves in a storm that came up while on its final approach to The Lizard.  The husband and wife crew of Munich, Germany had difficulty slowing the boat down, even with three reefs in the main and a storm jib.  They were also taking on water and simple survival was the name of the game for them in the storm.  Sasha did finally finish the race at 20:10 UTC on July 17, the last yacht over the finish line to take 5th place in IRC4 class.

Rambler 100 after finishing the Race.  Photo by Mark Lloyd - lloydimages.com.

In the early hours of July 15 no less than 16 yachts finished the 2,975 mile race.  Of those 16 yachts, 10 started in the second of three starts designed to see all yachts finish at The Lizard as close together as possible.  Ambersail started the procession at 02:58 UTC and the Race Committee was kept busy for a further four hours while the next 15 yachts finished.  Beau Geste finished 19 minutes behind Ambersail, followed by Vanquish, Sojana and Varuna, all a few minutes behind each other.  The last four boats to finish the day were Snow Lion, Nordwind, British Soldier and Carina, all across the line by 06:44.  After 17 days of racing, Carina and British Soldier finished less than one minute apart!

The two Class 40s, Concise 2 and Dragon, battled it out until the end with Concise 2 beating Dragon to the finish line by only 29 minutes.  The two skippers agreed that it had been close racing all the way across the Atlantic, making it an exceptionally memorable event for both of them and their crews.

ICAP Leopard finished the race on the 12th of July, having broken its bow sprit only 36 hours into the race.  The breakage wasn’t even report until several days after it happened but the skipper and crew kept their spirits up, thinking on their feet and improvising where necessary while enjoying the race to the best of their ability in the circumstances.  Although they had no chance of winning their class as a result, they still had an excellent performance picking up the 3rd place trophy in the IRC1 Class.

Soon after Leopard, Maltese Falcon finished the race.  Also not in contention to win her class, she put on an incredible performance considering she is a large super sailing yacht and not a racing machine.  First place in the Open Class in which Maltese Falcon was one of only two boats went to the bright orange Gunboat Phaedo which finished the race in just under 12 days, 15 hours and 43 minutes.

Line honours went to Rambler 100 on July 10, finishing the 2,975 nautical mile race in 6 days, 22 hours, 8 minutes and 2 seconds, a new record for the race from Newport, RI to Lizard Point, Cornwall, UK.  Rambler 100 did not manage to take home the top prize however.  That went to Puma’s Mar Mostro, the second boat over the finish line finishing in 7 days, 11 hours and 40 minutes.  Puma won IRC1 Class and IRC Overall on corrected time after all results had been tabulated.

Gunboat Phaedo finishes 1st in the Open Class.  Photo by Richard Langdon/Ocean Images www.oceanimages.co.uk.

The 2011 Transatlantic Race was an exciting event enjoyed by all the skippers and crews which saw, for the most part, excellent conditions and fantastic racing with few breakages.  Congratulations to all 26 yachts and crew who participated in this exciting event.

For complete results see:  http://www.antiguanice.com/v2/documents/results.pdf.