Virgin Money Atlantic Challenge

On October 22, I received this email message from Virgin Money:

Hi John,

I represent Virgin Money and am spreading the word about the latest and greatest happenings. I came across Whispering Jesse, saw that you were a sailing/boating enthusiast, and thought you this news would pique your interest!

Sir Richard Branson, Founder of The Virgin Group, set sail early this morning with the America’s Cup Challenger, TEAMORIGIN. The squad will be attempting to break the transatlantic sailing record from New York to the U.K., which currently stands at 6 days, 17 hrs, 52 minutes and 39 seconds, to become the indisputable fastest mono-hull sailing yacht to cross the Atlantic. The Virgin Money yacht is equipped with the finest and most experienced crew. Coming straight off gold medals in Beijing are Ben Ainslie, Lain Percy, and Andrew Simpson.

Sir Richard Branson will be blogging daily so you can follow the adventures right alongside the Virgin Money boat. Check out the following site for information and updates!

http://www.virginmoneyus.com/challenge

If you’d like any additional info about the challenge, or about the Virgin Money company, please feel free to let me know. The whole crew at Virgin Money is excited to take on such an adventure and hopefully you will be too!

Take Care,
Kelly

Kelly Yahr
Virgin Money
kyahr@virginmoneyus.com

Virgin Money helps people access affordable and flexible credit, offering unique financial services and a customer experience that most banks cannot match. The main idea being that you can now formally borrow money from your friends and family, while Virgin Money lends a hand in the process. With money from friends and family, you can pick your own interest rate and loan terms to best fit your situation. Rather than giving interest to a bank, you can keep it in the family – often adding up to thousands of dollars of savings. What could be better?

Website: http://www.virginmoneyus.com/
MySpace: http://groups.myspace.com/virginmoneyus
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/home.php?#/pages/Virgin-Money/23335479119
YouTube: http://youtube.com/virginmoneyus
LinkedIn: http://www.linkedin.com/in/virginmoney

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Very ambitious! Unfortunately, I read on MSNBC.com that the attempt was aborted after just two days, and Sir Richard's blog confirmed it:

"After approximately 2 days and 4 hours at sea in the face of impossible odds the crew of Virgin Money had to admit defeat on their first attempt to set a new world record for the fastest mono-hull crossing of the Atlantic Ocean. After 2 days that saw the crew and Virgin Money overcome seas of 40ft and gale force winds of between 7 and 9 their dreams were finally dashed when a 'monster wave' took out the spinnaker, washed a ten man life boat overboard and ripped a huge gash in the mainsail."