A LOCAL sailor competing in a round-the-world yacht race has taken time out from her gruelling schedule to tie the knot in Australia.

Laura Alexander, 29, from Oakley, married fellow race competitor Graham Thompson during a romantic ceremony in Sydney last Friday.

The duo are competing in the prestigious BT Global Challenge and exchanged vows after arriving in Sydney from Wellington, New Zealand, at the end of the third leg of the race.

With half of the event still to go, a honeymoon is currently off limits, but the newlyweds couldn't be happier.

"Sydney is a beautiful place and I feel very lucky to have got married here," said the new Mrs Thompson, of Beech Tree Close.

"I'm not too sad about not having a honeymoon because Graham and I are having a fantastic time taking part in the race and are getting the chance to see some amazing sights.

"It will be difficult being apart from him for the next 42 days, but I'll definitely be keeping in touch via the radio."

Sydney is particularly poignant to the couple, who first met in the city during the Global Challenge event in 2000.

Mr Thompson, 31, was down under to watch his father compete in the race, while Mrs Thompson was a project manager for another team.

But it wasn't until they returned to the UK and enrolled on the same sailing course in Southampton that their relationship blossomed.

Mr Thompson proposed to his sweetheart over the radio two months ago as she rounded sailing's greatest landmark, Cape Horn.

Her boat, BP Explorer, was in the middle of the 6,100-mile second leg from Argentina to New Zealand.

He then spent the following weeks organising the wedding from his yacht, Pindar - buying the ring in Buenos Aires, organising the stag-do in New Zealand and ordering the wedding cake in Australia.

Both of the couple's teams were present at the wedding and 16 of Mr Thompson's crew-mates swapped their foul weather gear for morning suits to be ushers on the big day.

"We had a fantastic leg to Sydney and I am married to the woman of my dreams - I feel like the luckiest man alive," he said.

"Trying to negotiate the finer details of the wedding while at sea was quite a challenge, but the day itself couldn't have gone more smoothly.

"We're both looking forward to getting out on the water again. Although saying goodbye to Laura is always difficult and I do worry about her out there, we are still both very competitive people and it doesn't stop us wanting to win the race."

The fleet of 12 yachts will leave Sydney on Sunday, with BP Explorer in second place overall and Team Pindar currently in ninth.

The race itself is expected to finish in Portsmouth in mid-July.