SAILING/Fastnet Race:In what now appears set to be the best Irish victory in offshore racing for two decades, Limerick's Ger O'Rourke brought Chieftain across the finishing line of the Rolex Fastnet Race in Plymouth last night to take the overall lead of the 608-mile classic contest.
With a fresh northwest breeze for the entire distance from the Fastnet Rock back to the finish, the Irish Cookson 50 surfed across the finishing line shortly before 8pm at speeds close to 15 knots, hot on the heels of the super-high-tech Open 60-footers and 10 hours after the American 90-footer Rambler, the previous provisional overall leader.
In turn, Rambler had finished early yesterday morning less than an hour behind Mike Slade's super-maxi, the 100-foot ICAP Leopard, which succeeded in smashing the 1999 course record set by Ross Field on RF Yachting.
With eight hours sliced off, the new course time stands at 44 hours and 18 minutes, breaking the notional two-day barrier with apparent ease at an average speed of 13.5 knots.
Wind strength and direction did favour the bigger boats among the 300-strong entry for the race, while the attrition rate since the start on Sunday had reduced the competing boats to around 50 last night.
However, the majority of these boats remain at sea, and for this reason the Royal Ocean Racing Club organisers declined to declare the race won by O'Rourke until the last boat finishes.
Theoretically, an upset could be caused by the French offshore racing supreme Gery Trentesaux on his Beneteau 44.7 Courrier du Cour, though with 150 miles to sail in 11 hours to beat Chieftain on handicap-corrected time, this seems improbable.
Among the back-markers, on the water at least, the 2005 race runner-up and two-time winner of the Round Ireland race was making slow but steady progress. Eric Lisson's Cavatina from the Royal Cork Yacht Club had more than 60 miles to sail before rounding the Fastnet Rock as the winds that brought such favour to O'Rourke were slowing the smaller, heavier and older boats considerably as they beat toward the Irish coast in a confused seaway and up to 20 knots of wind.
But Cavatina's skipper has steadfastly refused to quit in the past when going on to enjoy fruitful rewards, and this race is unlikely to disappoint either.
On current pace, Lisson and his crew can look forward to collecting the Class Three winner's trophy in Plymouth later this week.
Meanwhile, the boats of the La Solitaire du Figaro single-handed race were about to finish stage three of that race from Brest to La Coruña in Spain late last night.
Corentin Douguet led the fleet with more spacing between the boats compared to earlier stages after a rough passage across the south Bay of Biscay.
The Irish rookie Paul O'Riain on City Jet was holding his own 50 miles behind the leader in 36th place with one stage remaining.
