Compiled by Outside Online

February 27, 2002 Yachtswoman Tracy Edwards will come out of retirement to lead her second attempt to break the non-stop, round-the-world sailing record and capture the Jules Verne Trophy.

The 39-year-old Edwards will sail the 110-foot catamaran Club Med, the same boat skipper Grant Dalton used to circle the globe in just over 62 days last year to capture The Race. She has renamed it Maiden II in honor of the boat she sailed to victory during the 1989-1990 Whitbread Round the World Race. Backing her up will be the same all-female crew from her 1998 Jules Verne attempt on the Royal & Sun Alliance, which ended 43 days into the race when the catamaran's mast was shattered by a 40-foot rogue wave in the Southern Ocean. The crew will begin their attempt in January of 2003.

"This is unfinished business, not just for me but for all of us," Edwards said at a press conference earlier this week.

The Jules Verne Trophy is awarded to the boat that completes history's fastest nonstop, unassisted global circumnavigation. The course begins and ends in the English Channel. Because it is an open challenge, teams race against each other's times individually rather than against others boats simultaneously.

Last month, fellow British yachtswoman Ellen MacArthur announced her intent to launch a Jules Verne bid in January 2003, but at the moment is missing one crucial piece of equipment—a boat. With only five boats in existence considered capable of beating the record, MacArthur is in the unfavorable position of being the sixth competitor and lowest bidder. Edwards told reporters she re-mortgaged her home in order to outbid MacArthur for Club Med.

MacArthur is now faced with two choices, according to CNN.com: Either bid successfully on Orange, a catamaran currently scheduled to leave mid-March under the command of 1993 record holder Bruno Peyron, or join forces with one of the American teams led by Cam Lewis of Team Adventure or Steve Fossett sailing the catamaran PlayStation.

French Skipper Olivier De Kersauson, holder of the Jules Verne since 1997, launched his attempt to beat his own record earlier this month on the 110-foot long trimaran Geronimo. He is currently two days ahead of his 1997 record pace of 71 days, 14 hours, and 22 minutes.