Newport Bermuda Race - News and Video

Bermuda - Peter Rebovich’s Cal 40 Sinn Fein has beat the other boats in Class 1, and the entire 123-boat St. David’s Lighthouse Division of the Newport Bermuda Race to win top honors. This is Rebovich’s fourth successive Class 1 win and his second lighthouse win in a row at the Newport Bermuda Race. Sinn Fein is also the first boat to win the North Rock Beacon Trophy for the winner on corrected time among all of the IRC rated sailing boats.

The crew of Sinn Fein are not new to winning the Newport Bermuda race, as all of them were aboard when the yacht won honors in 2006. Peter Rebovich said of his crew, “This is the best crew in the race without a doubt and this was one of the most difficult races, because it was all upwind. No one got sick, but we did have mechanical issues. It was an unexpected win because we lost our electronics when we swamped the computer and lost use of our satellite phone. We could navigate, but we couldn’t communicate. It was a total surprise!”

Tenacious, Julian Dougherty's Beneteau First 36.7 was the smallest boat in the Gibbs Hill Division in this years Newport Bermuda race, and won against the big boys like Rambler and Moneypenny. Tenacious had a total elapsed time of 103:00:28 which corrected out to 56:53:20. The sailboat finished two and a half hours ahead of Thomas Carroll’s J 133 Sirensong, the second place boat in Class 10 of the Gibbs Hill Lighthouse Division. The Beneteau sailboat was sailed mostly by amateurs from Long Island Sound including: Stephen Cain, Julien Dougherty, Gerard Girsti, Thomas Mikolasko, Heather Schultes, Jeffrey Tyrel, and Adam Lorry, who was the only professional sailor on board.

In the double-handed division, the duo of du Moulin and Reyling won once again sailing Lora Ann, an Express 37. According to du Moulin, the 2008 Newport Bermuda race marks the fourth time in a row that he has won the division, and the third time the two have won together. A twenty time Newport Bermuda race veteran, du Moulin spoke for the team saying, “we like double handing because there is more adventure. It’s not insane like single handing because at least there is always someone who can keep an eye out for ships.”

The corrected time for Lora Ann was 80 hours 37 minutes and 47 seconds. Speaking from dockside in Bermuda while their boat was towed in for repairs. Reyling said “It was a tough race. We normally have four hours on and four hours off, but this time it was more like five to six hours on and three hours off. We didn’t have an autopilot for most of the race.” Reyling went on to say that for the last 36 hours of their 100 hours 14 minutes and 41 second hour race they had to resort to hand steering, which was according to him "monotonous and trying.”

In the Open division, Privateer, a Cookson 50 is now the provisional winner ahead of Puma’s Volvo 70 yacht Il Mostro. Chief Scorer for the Newport Bermuda race noticed a mistake in the scoring for Class 16 and the Open Division today, resulting in Privateer posting a corrected time of 60:40:09 - 22 minutes and 42 seconds less than the corrected time of the yacht Il Mostro. Although the Volvo Ocean 70 crossed the finish line in Bermuda nearly 20 hours ahead of Privateer, she now slips to second place in the four boat division yachts with canting keels. Ian Henderson, Privateer’s captain, was surprise by the news. Back at home in Newport, all Henderson could say was, “I’m extremely thrilled.”

We just spoke with the race committee who are working hard on the final results for the Newport Bermuda race, and are of course dealing with some discrepancys and protests. They promise to send us the "final" results tomorrow, which we will post here for our readers.

- YC for YachtPals / Photos by PPL

Newport Bermuda Race Class and Division Winners

• First in Class 1 and winner of the entire St David’s Lighthouse Division, also the winner of the North Rock Beacon Trophy for all IRC-rated boats, Sinn Fein, Peter S. Rebovich, Corrected Time ORR: 61:06:38. Corrected time IRC 100:13:44
• First in Class 2 of the St. David’s Lighthouse Division, Aurora, Andrew F. Kallfelz, Corrected Time: 63:22:21.
• First in Class 3 of the St. David’s Lighthouse Division, Babe, Dr. Colin E. Couper, Corrected Time 63:03:41.
• First in Class 4 of the St. David’s Lighthouse Division, Cabady, Randall G. Baldwin, Corrected Time: 63:44:58.
• First in Class 5 of the St. David’s Lighthouse Division, Vamp, Leonard J. Sitar, Corrected Time: 65:50:44.
• First in Class 6 of the St. David’s Lighthouse Division, Tabasco, John Levinson, Corrected Time: 64:55:44.
• First in Class 7 of the St. David’s Lighthouse Division, Eden, Allen Fan, corrected Time: 68:48:04.
• First in Class 8 of the St. David’s Lighthouse Division, Bombardino, James Sykes, Corrected Time: 68:04:14.
• First in Class 9 of the St. David’s Lighthouse Division, Chippewa, Clayton Deutsch, Corrected Time: 69:45:24.
• First in Class 10 of the Gibbs Hill Lighthouse Division and overall winner of the Gibbs Hill Lighthouse Division, Tenacious, Julien Dougherty, Corrected Time: 57:31:25.
• First in Class 11 of the Gibbs Hill Lighthouse Division, Aquarius, Sam Fleet, Corrected Time: 63:04:10.
• First in Class 12 of the Cruiser Division, Bermuda Oyster, Paul B. Hubbard, Corrected Time: 81:38:51.
• First in Class 13 of the Cruiser Division, Sabre, Jeffrey A. Urbina, Corrected Time: 86:41:16.
• First in Class 14 of the Cruiser Division, Bandera, John Watts, Corrected Time: 87:51:47.
• First in Class 15 of the Double-Handed Division, Lora Ann, Richard T. du Moulin, Corrected Time: 80:37:47.
• First in Class 16 of the Open Division and winner of the Royal Mail Trophy, Privateer, Ronald O’Hanley Corrected Time: 60:40:09

FINAL RESULTS FOR THE NEWPORT BERMUDA RACE POSTED BELOW!

READ MORE ABOUT THE NEWPORT BERMUDA RACE

Video: Start of the Newport Bermuda Race, sailing from Newport Rhode Island to Bermuda.