Sailing / Whitbread Round the World Race: Sea changes ahead for an inspirational event: Stuart Alexander reviews the high drama of the high-seas spectacle and charts its future course

IT WAS a cracking sixth Whitbread Round the World Race. High-speed, life-threatening drama, records broken, prizes snatched away by fate, some recriminations, and the odd attempt at smear and scandal.

The Maxi prize went comfortably to Grant Dalton's New Zealand Endeavour. The W60 prize was Yamaha's, whose skipper, Ross Field, could hardly believe he had done it, rather than Tokio, whose skipper, Chris Dickson, could hardly believe that his had been the only W60 to be dismasted when he thought the race was his.

The Italian yacht, Brooksfield, survived a broken rudder trying to crash its way through the bottom of the hull in the Southern Ocean. One of the yachts which went to her aid, Winston, lost third overall to Spain's Galicia by less than the four hours of compensation they were docked by a replacement international jury.

Dickson brought a new level of preparation and intensity to the race, and Dennis Conner, a sailing heavyweight, for the two legs he sailed on Winston. Lawrie Smith came back from the dead of a Maxi crippled by dismasting 24 hours into the race to push Intrum Justitia to second overall, and the 24- hour world record to 428.7 miles.

Dickson is a little coy about coming back, balancing a race he found delivered 'everything and more than I ever thought it would be' with an unhappiness, shared by Conner, of the way it is being run. Some good, old-fashioned communication seems to be the answer.

The confusion of having two classes -Maxi and W60 - will be removed next time. The W60 sailors wanted to say that the Maxis should win, and also that they were out-moded dinosaurs. But there were two races in one, and most people could make the distinction.

The 60s have proved a worthy vehicle and, though there will be changes to some of the construction rules, the fears about the extent of damage sustained by the high-speed bashing they had to endure should easily be allayed. Deeper hulls, to reduce the amount of water rushing over the deck, and a tougher core material between the inner and outer skins are part of an inevitable development process in a new kind of yacht.

The greatest sea change has been in the speed of the yachts. The new, water-ballasted Whitbread 60s have beaten the predictions of the men who designed them, knocking eight days off the old record, half of that on the final leg.

Not that this has been a windy Whitbread - quite the opposite in the Southern Ocean. There has not been much light air either, and the direction, allowing higher reaching speeds, has been favourable. And there has been an increasing will, or need, to take risks. Racing near blind at 15 to 20 knots through ice is tempting fate. Not, again, in the Southern Ocean, but on the last leg in summer in the northern Atlantic. Inevitably, there were predictions that a boat and all its crew could be lost. This time, again, the elements have successfully been defeated. But the risk is always there.

On the course itself, there are moves to bring Sydney and Baltimore into play, and Cape Town is seen as a must. The French connection is important in the consolidation of national entries from all the major countries in Europe, though whether anyone in France sees it that way is

debatable.

Much needs to be done away from the race course. Everything, from the structure of media coverage to the choreography of the race starts and finishes, needs a radical re-appraisal. Both the race and the stopovers are too long. Whether the rootstock, the race director, Ian Bailey-Willmot, or the vineyard owner, Whitbread plc, have the vision, ambition and professionalism, plus the investment to support it, to produce a vintage Whitbread Race in 1997/98 will not take four years to determine.

This is no time to be afraid of bringing in a switched-on, if still small, team of high-tariff movers and shakers. The men at the top know that, but have yet to demonstrate they know how to implement it. We shall know in the next nine months if there is to be a bold jump to a higher level, and so will potential syndicates and sponsors.

WHITBREAD ROUND THE WORLD RACE Sixth leg (Fort Lauderdale to Southampton) Results and positions with miles to the finish: Maxi class: 1 New Zealand Endeavour 12 days 22hr 55min 07sec; 2 Merit Cup 13 02:15:35; 3 13 06:35:59; 4 Uruguay Natural 365. Whitbread 60s: 1 Tokio 12 19:36:27; 2 Winston 12 20:27:00; 3 Yamaha 12 20:57:25; 4 Intrum Justitia 13 01:02:49; 5 Reebok 13 07:34:21; 6 Galicia '93 Pescanova 13 07:34:21; 7 Brooksfield 14 01:00:36; 8 Hetman Sahaidachny 14 16:49:47; 9 Odessa 188; 10 Heineken 540.