After five days of thick fog, a fair wind and good visability helped Paul Heiney in his boat Ayesha of St Mawes, a Biscay 36 clear the Nantucket Shoal and complete the OSTAR 2005 in 37 days.

It was Paul’s first time single-handed crossing of the Atlantic.

Meanwhile former owner of Jester, Mike Richey, has been invited to celebrate his 88th birthday at the New York Yacht Club on 6 July. He will be surrounded by his many friends – a good few of them having completed the OSTAR 2005 – for an eight day break in Boston where the race finishes.

Mike – who counts the late Sir Francis Chichester as a friend – attended the re-launch of Gipsy Moth IV at Gosport on 20 June. On his return home to Brighton he decided to go for a swim as it was a ‘beautiful summer’s evening’. On the way to the beach on his bicycle he lost control, hit the kerb, flew over the handle bars and broke his left collar bone. ‘It’s bloody painful,’ he said,’but I might as well be in pain over there as over here,’ he added with characteristic stoicism.