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George David Reflects on Transatlantic Crossing

Rambler 100 is the first to finish at The Lizard in the 2011 Transatlantic Race.

Rambler

Mark Lloyd, http://www.lloydimages.com

July 10 – Rambler 100 skipper George David (Hartford, Conn.) spoke of his satisfaction after taking line honors in the Transatlantic Race 2011, just minutes after crossing the finish line at The Lizard, Cornwall, U.K.

“It was really nice to see David Aisher (Rear Commodore Yachting of the Royal Yacht Squadron) greet us on the line with some Cornish pastries and some champagne and beer. We feel pretty good; it was a remarkably fast time.

“For the first 80 hours of this race we were ripping along; towards the end we hit a few holes in the wind, but the net speed average was 15.7 knots across the Atlantic, which I think is going to prove a record in its own right–as a speed record for any transatlantic race. We feel pretty good about that.
 
”Kenny Read is about 100 miles behind us with his PUMA Team. The odds are he is probably going to win the race on corrected time, but we will see what happens over the next 15 hours, which is about the amount of time that we give them. We will keep a look out on the tracker, and we will see when the time expires, but just like politicians, we are not going to concede just yet.

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“Flying along at 28 knots is an exhilarating experience but one that concentrates the mind. Rambler is a finely balanced machine and anything can go wrong and there are huge forces opposing each other. If those forces go out of balance, bad things can happen very quickly. But as I say this has been an exhilarating race, where we have been well out of sight of land, completely unsupported and in a high performance machine, which you are taking close to the edge, for a very long time–that is, without doubt, exhilarating.”

Rambler 100 crossed the finish line of the Transatlantic Race 2011 on Sunday 10th July at 16h 08m UTC.

The elapsed time for Rambler 100 was 6 days, 22 hours, 8 minutes, 2 seconds.
 
It has established a new record for the 2,975 nautical mile course from Newport, R.I. to Lizard Point, South Cornwall, U.K., which is to be ratified by the World Sailing Speed Record Council.

Sponsors of the TR 2011 are Rolex, Thomson Reuters, Newport Shipyard, Perini Navi and Peters & May, with additional support by apparel sponsor Atlantis Weathergear.

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To follow the race via tracker and get real insight into life on board via the blogs, visit www.transatlanticrace.com
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