Sailing: Richards reaches Devon to make monohull history
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Your support makes all the difference.Emma Richards claimed fourth place in the first leg of the solo round-the-world Around Alone race early yesterday morning, steering Pindar across the finish line off Torbay just 13 minutes behind the Belgian Patrick de Radigues, on board Garnier, in third.
Richards, a 27-year-old Hampshire-based Scotswoman, is the only Briton and only woman in the race, as well as the youngest competitor. She achieved her grandstand finish having spent much of the past week in sixth place in the Class 1 fleet.
Her position to the south of the fleet allowed her to sail a better wind angle in the closing stage, first overtaking Graham Dalton on Hexagon, and then Simone Bianchetti on Tiscali. Tiscali eventually finished fifth, and Hexagon sixth.
"I'm tired but happy to be in Torbay," Richards said, after her daybreak arrival in Devon. "Make that very happy."
By completing the first leg, which started in New York on 15 September, Richards became the first woman to sail solo from west to east across the Atlantic in a monohull. If she completes the 29,000-mile, five-leg, eight-month race, Richards will become the first women to finish it.
The winner of the first leg, Switzerland's Bernard Stamm, aboard Bobst Group/Armor Lux, arrived in Torbay on Thursday afternoon, having set a record time for a single-handed crossing of the Atlantic. He was followed home by France's Thierry Dubois aboard Solidaires. Stamm set the record despite being without any on-board electrics for the last two days of his journey and having to steer in by hand.
After celebrating the end of the first leg, the fleet will have less than two weeks to prepare for the second leg to South Africa, which starts on 13 October. Richards' main task will be making repairs to a broken gennaker.
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