Sailing: Thorne masters missing buoy and light winds

Good weather made for tricky conditions as just under 550 yachts in the Ford Cork Week opened their accounts in the light southerly winds of Crosshaven, Ireland, yesterday.

First blood in the high-performance class went to Chris Thorne's Mumm 30 Tigger as the bigger boats short of enough gas to power them to the front, struggled.

In the harbour, on the course running up to Cobh, things were more chaotic.

In addition to the breeze having more holes in it than Swiss cheese, which meant numerous rapid and violent place changes, the buoy to which the yachts were being sent and proudly emblazoned with the sponsor's name, Ford, had managed to disappear. No-one has yet claimed responsibility.

In the final west-coast leg of the Tour de France à la Voile from La Rochelle to Bayonne, the Anglo-Australian student team Force EDC, skippered by Simon Sutherland, was leading. The 40 Mumm 30s will be lifted out and taken by road to St Cyprien for the Mediterranean stages to Nice.

The 27-year old Emma Richards will sail Josh Hall's Open 60 under the colours of Pindar in the Around Alone Race, which starts from New York on 15 September. Richards will be both the youngest and the only female skipper in the event, which stops at Brixham, Cape Town, Tauranga, New Zealand, and Salvador de Bahia, Brazil, before finishing in Newport, Rhode Island.

Richards had previously been expected to play a key role on the 110-foot catamaran Maiden II in its attempt this winter to break the non-stop round-the-world record for the Jules Verne Trophy.

The figurehead of that syndicate, Tracy Edwards, has said that if she cannot raise the required $5m (£3.2m) in sponsorship by the end of this month, the project will be shelved for this winter.