Winning the ARC

Tyco's new owner Hamish Oliphant on their record breaking passage across the Atlantic

Having all their drinks bought for them was just one benefit to the crew of Spirit of smashing the ARC course record.

Spirit, formerly Kevin Shoebridge's VO60 Tyco sailed by skipper Hamish Oliphant and his crew of 15 knocked more than 10 hours off the record set in 2001 by Spirit of Diana. The new record now stands at 11 days, 13 hours, 12 minutes and 20 seconds.

During the Atlantic Rally for Cruisers the crew reached a top speed of 21.3 knots surfing down a wave but also spent two days getting very hot and bothered in no wind.
Oliphant commneted: “Looking at the weather after the first few days, we realised it was not going to provide us with a "traditional" trade wind race. We had to work hard to avoid falling in some large wind holes combined with passing through squalls typical of the Doldrums. We spent two days with winds less than 10 knots watching the clock ticking away...frustrating.”

He added: “Our lowest time was knowing we had to get through the light winds to find more wind, with no option to sail around it, knowing our competition behind still had good wind.”

Luxuries were low down on the list for Spirit’s crew, with the main priority being weight saving to get as much speed out of the yacht as possible,

Wash day consisted of buckets of sea water and there was also a trade off in the food department for speed with the crew’s diet consisting mostly of bland, rehydrated food, smothered in ketchup - until they ran out. And ketchup was not the only thing the crew ran out of. Towards the end they lacked bread, sugar, milk powder, normal tea and ketchup and were almost out of cereal and UHT milk.

“Life on board Spirit was hard work but rewarding with constant trimming, sail changes and the heat of trying to sleep below in the heat of the day and with the noise of the winches above," continued Oliphant. "The crew worked very hard and never gave up, despite the soul destroying light winds.

"Breaking the record was fantastic, it made all the hard work seem worthwhile. The welcome in St Lucia was great, everyone one is so friendly and news travels fast! It was almost impossible to pay for our drinks the first night!”

Owned by Pure Sailing in Plymouth, Spirit will now spend the winter in the Caribbean taking part in the main regattas including the Heineken Regatta, British Virgin Islands Spring Regatta and Antigua Race Week on which berths are available for purchase. .

She will return to the UK in May.

For more information see the Pure Sailing website