Childhood VO65 takes the Atlantic honours

Bouwe Bekking-led campaign grabs first place in RORC Transatlantic Race to GrenadaText by Jonno Turner

Childhood 1, the VO65 campaign led by The Ocean Race legend Bouwe Bekking, has taken line honours in the iconic RORC Transatlantic Race.

The competition – which sees boats race 3,000 miles west across the Atlantic from Lanzarote to Grenada – is a classic race on the sailing calendar, and Childhood 1 took the plaudits in a time of 11 days, 11 hours, 34 minutes and 49 seconds.

Bouwe was joined onboard by a total crew of 14, including four-time Ocean Race veteran Antonio Cuervas-Mons ('Ñeti') who raced on MAPFRE in 2017-18.

Childhood 1 was unveiled in October as a Swedish-flagged boat with the ambition of competing in the next edition of The Ocean Race. Led by some of the world's most prominent yachtsman and project managers, including eight-time Ocean Race legend Bekking, seven-time Ocean Race sailor Roger Nilson, Pelle Norberg (former CEO of Team SEB in The Ocean Race) and Gideon Messink (former Team Director of Team Brunel in The Ocean Race), the team is not short of skill or experience.

The sponsors of the project have decided to donate the name to the World Childhood Foundation and to name the boat to Childhood 1. With this decision, Childhood is given new opportunities to reach out with its global work to protect children from violence and abuse.

"Our objective is to create the opportunity for a start in The Ocean Race 2021 and we see this collaboration between our sponsors and Childhood as an important first step towards that goal."

Childhood 1 already has an action-packed calendar for next year, including competing in the 2020 edition of the Round Gotland Race in Sweden.