1. French adventurer Bruno Peyron is on standby for the "window of opportunity" to break American Steve Fossett's North Atlantic crossing record (from New York to The Lizard, in England)
   • Fossett's record is 4 days, 17h, 28 minutes and 06 seconds. (established in 2001)
   • By comparison, a cruise ship takes 6 days to make the 3100 nautical mile Transatlantic voyage
   • Only Peyron has tackled this record since Fawcett's '01 accomplishment; in 2004, he missed the record by a mere 31 minutes
2. Peyron will use as his weapon the giant maxi-catamaran Orange II
   • The boat is longer (121 ft.) and nearly as wide (59 ft.) as a tennis court
   • It stands, with its rotating wing mast, as tall as the Arc de Triomphe
   • It sails downwind with 5X more sail area than a Volvo Open 70
3. The best weather would be a low pressure system, with constant wind at 27-35 knots (and no waves), that Orange II could ride -- without interruption -- across the entire ocean
   • To beat Fossett's record, a boat speed average of 26 knots must be maintained at all times
   • Peyron holds the 24-hour speed record (established in 2004) aboard Orange II, having averaged 29.42 knots.
   • Peyron holds the around-the-world speed record (established in 2005) aboard Orange II (50 d, 16 h, 20 min, 4 sec, established in 2005)
   
   
    Read full article: 'Bruno Peyron and Orange II Set to Attempt Transatlantic Record' (181 more words)

This year TheBeachcats.com will have on-the-scene reports from the Great Texas Catamaran Race. The race starts June 14th, so watch this space for reports and photos.

If you aren't familiar with the Great Texas, which started in 2003, here is a description from the race headquarters site "The Great Texas Catamaran Race is an off-shore beach catamaran race along the Texas Coast. Starting in South Padre Island and finishing in Galveston, the race covers approximately 300 miles along the Texas coast over the Father’s Day weekend. The race will be conducted in four stages with each stage starting and ending on the beach! This will be the fourth year that the Great Texas Catamaran race is held."

Click here for the Great Texas Catamaran Race, Notice of Race for more info.

Team Holmatro started inconsistantly at the Volvo Extreme 40 Grand Prix in Portsmouth (GBR). After two days and eight races, the Dutch entry claims a fourth position overall. The Austrian Andreas Hagara, former European and national Champion Tornado, did the honours as a skipper on Sunday. He performed pretty well with a series of 4-2-2-4. On Tuesday May 30, Mitch Booth returned in his role as skipper with Hagara next to him. The crew experienced difficulties with the short course and a drop on the point table was inevitable. Tommy Hilfiger and subsequently the Volvo Ocean Race multihull made history as first VX 40's to capsize in a breeze up to 25 knots. Basilica stood up against all risks and is leading, followed by Tommy Hilfiger and Motorola.

"That was an entertaining day", said Mitch Booth afterwards on the dock. "I was so much distracted on the downwind leg, that I sailed over the starting buoy." It was Leigh MacMillan that pitchpoled first with the Motorola in the second race. The crew was hanging in the air for seconds, with the rudders free. The VX 40 came down snail-like and everybody drew a breath of relief, as nobody knew the consequences of a capsize. The answer came in the last race: the carbon boat and the sailors were very strong. Randy Smith and his teammates were given the honour to be the very first VX 40 upside down. They were just recovering from a pitchpole, as the next wind gust came in. It blew the American multihull over. A heavy rib was needed to upright it. While being in this rescue process, the Volvo Ocean Race team pitchpoled merciless. Skipper Yves Loday, designer of the VX 40 and 1992 olympic champion Tornado, could not avoid this unvoluntary swim and crashed badly into the mast. Loday, who had a bruise in his face: "The cold water relieved the pain, but my back hurts now." Nevertheless, the sailors could still make fun of it. Randy Smith, sitting on the upper hull and shouting down to the people in the rib: "Of course we will finish the race anyway." This did not happen.

Lake Neusiedl, Austria, May 19th 2006 - Team Zwitserleven Booth/Dercksen is close to a medal at the ISAF WorldS ailing Games 2006 in Austria. After eight races on Lake Neusiedl, the Dutchmen are second on the points table of the Hobie Tiger class. The Australians Darren Bundock and Glenn Ashby are leading. The medal race on May 20 will be decisive for the final podium ranking. According to Mitch Booth, the competition is close. Theoretically, it could be a win or a tenth.

Before Herbert Dercksen starts to talk about today's racing in Austria, he expresses his feelings about the tragedy onboard ABN AMRO II: This is a really tragic story and our deepest sympathy go out to all at the ABN Amro team, and our hearts go out to Hans=92 family and close friends.

Team Full Tilt Race Report, Saturday, May 20, 2006
My crew Corey M. & I entered my Tornado "Full Tilt" in the annual "Hardway" distance event this past Saturday. This race starts in Santa Barbara and finishes in Ventura harbor. There are several courses between the different fleets participating. The ORCA class big multi's typically go around Santa Cruz island for a ~70 mile distance...though this year they voted for the lesser 45 mile option of going around Anacapa island.

This year's event was officially opened up to the beachcats for the first time thanks to much lobbying by several individuals, including Ventura Nacra driver John S. Though John could not make the event himself, he did a lot of leg work promoting the it and even shuttled teams to SB the morning to the race!

We had 7 boats turn out....4 I20's, 1 Hobie Tiger, 1 Prindle 19 with spinnaker and our T. We were given the shortest course, sharing with the non-spinnaker class keelboats. Start outside SB harbor, Oil Rig Platform "C", Platform "Habitat", Platform "Grace" then finish inside Ventura harbor...for a 29 mile race distance.