British Olympic Gold medalist Andrew Simpson has died after his yacht capasized in California

[Nicosia Gooner]

[Snin]

http://www.nigelirens.com/images/Scatpic.gif

had a 40 ft tri designed by nigel irens..it was mental..remember getting 38 knots out of it but whole thing was twanging and tweaking and flying on one outrigger on its hydrofoil..one mistake and it would have gone tits up, but been out on 80 ft,90 ft cats and seen elf aquatine flip http://pmcdn.priceminister.com/photo/Pajot-Marc-Elf-Aquitaine-Un-Catamaran-Pour-Vaincre-Livre-139156530_ML.jpg

marc pajot ..:cloud9: its unlucky to die but you know its a risk...the old man broke 3 ribs and punctured lung 1000 miles south of tasmania on his single handed round word race,dangerous game plus they prefer to die at sea..singlehanders are like everest climbers...screw loose imo

"Alan Wynne-Thomas and Nigel Burgess were the first British skippers to start a Vendée Globe race. Tragically Burgess drowned in the Bay of Biscay three days into the race. Wynne-Thomas retired into Hobart, Tasmania after his Cardiff Discovery was knocked down between the Kerguelen Islands and Heard Island. With his rudder and tiller smashed and having sustained several broken ribs and a partially collapsed lung he struggled into Hobart, Tasmania where he retired from the race.

Briton Pete Goss was the hero of the 1996-97 race, a brutal edition in which only six of the 16 starters finished and Canadian Gerry Roufs was lost. Goss relinquished any chance he had of winning the race to return 160 miles upwind in storm force winds to famously rescue Raphael Dinelli from a liferaft after his boat had capsized and sunk.

In the 2000-2001 race Ellen MacArthur became the youngest sailor at 24 years old, and the first and only woman yet to finish on the podium of the Vendée Globe when she finished second just 24 hours after the victorious Michel Desjoyeaux. In the following race Mike Golding finished third after losing his keel some 60 miles from the finish.

But it was in the record breaking 2008-9 edition when the complement of 30 skippers comprising seven different nationalities including no fewer than seven British skippers, Mike Golding, Alex Thomson, Sam Davis, Dee Caffari, Brian Thompson, Steve White and Jonny Malbon. In that race in which only 11 boats finished four were British and three finished in the top six. "

[eastgermanautos]