Cowes Week: Dunstone saves best until last

After a week of sailing almost flawlessly in IRC Class 1, Dunstone and his talented crew were richly rewarded with top prize for the first time, the handicap system favouring the heavier displacement boats in the class earlier in the week rather than the likes of his lightweight Bashford Howison 41.

Nokia was bought by Dunstone, the boss of Carphone Warehouse, after Cowes Week last year and this season has put in a series of top class performances including a sixth in the round the island race in June and impressive showings in the Hamble Series and Berthon Source.

But this result, giving him a third overall for the regatta was welcomed by the crew, who hours later boarded Dunstone's other boat, the newly refurbished Swan 86 Nokia Hamilton, to compete in the gruelling 600-mile Fastnet Race.

"We did as well as we could have in this class," said Dunstone, who was also responsible for the hugely successful live entertainment in the Yacht Haven every night during the week.

"But the rating system has worked against us. On Friday, we made a small error that cost us 45 seconds at most, but on corrected time, we were 12 minutes behind the leaders. You have to accept that in handicapped racing but we are pleased with our performance this week."

Victory in the class went to Wolf, helmed by Kevin Sproul, who took fourth on the final day with Peter Ogden's Swan 60 Spirit of Jethou coming third overall. The Lymington Swan 48, Jacobite, owned by Stephen James, won Class 2 after dominating the week's racing.

Pani Munta, the National Squib that achieved seven wins in seven races failed to go into the Skandia Life Cowes Week record books after staying put on land on Saturday. By missing the day's racing she missed out on the chance to match the record of eight wins in a row set by Harmony in 1990.

Converted for the new archive on 25 January 2001. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.