As they brought their tiny Vapor into Ala Wai Yacht Harbor, official greeter Vern Russell bellowed over the p.a. system from the Hawaii Yacht Club: "Bill Boyd, Scott Atwood . . . you close the book on a century of Transpac."

The trade winds gasped a sigh of relief when wayward Vapor--crippled by a broken rudder and silenced by a faulty radio--sailed out of a rainbow at dusk last Saturday to complete the 40th Transpacific Yacht Race in 18 days 8 hours 16 minutes and 40 seconds.

The smallest boat--a 25-foot B25--ever to sail the race posted the longest elapsed time in 38 years. But Boyd, 47, and Atwood, 43, from the Alamitos Bay Yacht Club in Long Beach insisted they could have done much better without the rudder problem.

"We had an incredible sail," Boyd said amid 200 people who greeted them with a luau and draped them with leis at the Hawaii Yacht Club. "We had it going 20 knots the second night in the trades, but that's' when we broke the rudder."

They patched up the split rudder with a tourniquet type of repair that held together until the last 500 miles. Then they had to switch to their smaller backup rudder, which limited their speed to 5 or 6 knots.

"If we went any faster it would start to wobble from the strain," Atwood said.

That's why they finished without their main sail up and only their working headsail-no spinnaker-for propulsion. Otherwise, the boat held up well.

"It was agony for two racers to have to slow down," Atwood said.

They also sensed the agony of friends and family ashore when they were unable to report at the daily morning roll calls until the 16th day.

"We received but we couldn't transmit," Boyd said.

"It was a happy day when we finally got in touch," said Atwood, who was sailing his ninth Transpac. "We saw two freighters out there. One was a Mexican ship. We asked the skipper if he'd relay our message [to the communications vessel Alaska Eagle] and he said, 'Yeah,' but he never did."

They had an Emergency Position Indicator Radio Beacon (EPIRB) they could have activated for rescue when their rudder broke.

"It ran through our minds at the time," Atwood said, "but we didn't think it was a life-threatening situation."

They had a standard single side-band radio that would have been adequate-if it had worked. They learned it didn't on the way out to the starting line June 29 and had a worker aboard installing a new one minutes before the gun, "but maybe it wasn't tuned in properly," Boyd said.

After they tied up at the dock, a four-foot-long piece of California kelp floated up off the keel. Someone draped it around Boyd's neck. He was surprised and flabbergasted.

"We dragged that 2,000 miles," he said. "That was slowing us down even before the rudder broke."

It wasn't the slowest elapsed time in Transpac history. That was almost 24 days (23:23:55:04) by William Merry's Viking Childe in 1939. But it was the slowest since 1961 when Phillip Johnson's Juego took about eight hours longer to sail the 2,225 nautical miles.

By comparison, Roy E. Disney's 72-foot, high-tech Pyewacket lowered the record to 7:11:41:27 when it finished a week earlier-after starting four days behind Vapor. As Vapor struggled the final miles Saturday, Boyd and Atwood might have seen Disney flying over en route home in his private jet.

Photos, charts, crew lists and other information are available on the race web page, www.transpacificyc.org.

The 40th Transpac was sponsored by Iridium North America, the world's first global telephone and paging company. Several boats are carrying the phones. Through a constellation of 66 low-earth-orbit satellites circling the globe, customers can make or take calls and receive pages in the most remote regions on Earth. Additional information regarding the Iridium system is available at the web site www.iridium.com or by calling 1-888-Iridium.

Publicity: Rich Roberts From Monday, July 19: (310) 835-2526
Anytime: e-mail: richroberts@compuserve.com

Final standings (elapsed time/corrected time; boats listed in order of corrected handicap time):

DIV. 1 (started July 3)-1. Pyewacket, Roy E. Disney, Los Angeles YC, finished, elapsed time 7 days 11 hours 41 minutes 27 seconds (breaks record of 7:15:24:40 by previous Pyewacket, Roy P. Disney, 1997), corrected time 7:11:39:58; 2. Magnitude, Doug Baker, Long Beach YC, elapsed time 7:13:37:07/corrected time 7:13:36:07; 3. Zephyrus IV, Bob McNeil/John Parrish, St. Francis/San Diego YCs, 7:16:34:43/7:16:33:59; 4. Front Runner, Lou Grasso/Craig Lyons, Newport Harbor YC, 7:16:51:45/7:19:51:43; 5. Pegasus, Philippe Kahn, UC Santa Cruz Sailing Club, 7:17:51:20/7:20:50:20.

DIV. 2 (started July 3)-1. Grand Illusion, James McDowell, Lahaina YC, 8:02:52:27/7:08:40:10 ; 2. Cheval, Steve Popovich, Cabrillo Beach YC, 8:13:47:14/7:20:44:46; 3. Velos, Kjeld Hestehave, SDYC, 9:13:31:03/7:22:55:12; 4. Mongoose, Robert Saielli, SDYC, 8:16:58:37/7:23:09:01; 5. Medicine Man, Bob Lane, LBYC, 8:15:24:12/8:00:29:07.

DIV. 3 (started July 3)-1. Gone With the Wind, Bill LeRoy/Jim Cascino, StFYC, 9:11:41:04/7:14:45:18; 2. Stealth Chicken, Alamitos Bay Syndicate, Alamitos Bay YC, 9:08:46:14/7:19:06:40; 3. Warpath, Fred Howe, Santa Cruz YC, 9:11:37:40/7:19:56:46; 4. M-Project, Manouch Moshayedi, Bahia Corinthian YC, retired.

DIV. 4 (started July 2)-1. Great Scot, Tom Garnier, LAYC, 12:03:22:51/7:18:36:58; 2. Tower, Don Clothier, Waikiki YC, 10:16:48:47/7:22:55:15; 3. Glama!, Seth Radow, California YC, 11:04:45:55/8:07:29:10; 4. Prime Time, John Borkowski/Richard Sherlock, Channel Islands YC, 11:12:21:567/8:11:43:31; 5. Bolt, Craig Reynolds, Balboa YC, 12:17:28:13/8:19:05:27; 6. Sweet Caroline, William Rawson, Royal YC, Australia, 12:17:40:26/9:04:20:16; 7. Uproarious, Robert Bussard, Silver Gate YC, 12:08:43:14/9:08:04:48; 8. Apollo V, Ned Knight, Point Loma YC, 13:08:09:37/9:16:00:54 .

DOUBLEHANDED DIV. (started June 29)-1. Two Guys On the Edge, Les Vasconcellos/Bruce Burgees, Waikiki YC, 12:10:04:31/7:21:15:24; 2. Vapor, Bill Boyd/Scott Atwood, Alamitos Bay YC, 18:08:16:40/12:22:32:19.

CRUISING DIV. (started June 29)-1. Hurricane, Kim Stebbens, Sloop Tavern YC, 14:07:42:09/9:22:067:09; 2. Esprit, Bob Pace, Oceanside YC, 14:12:28:14/10:10:00:44; 3. Willow Wind, Wendy Siegal, Cortez Racing Assn., 14:16:23:04; 10:17:55:34; 4. Tango, Howard Raphael, Palo Alto, Calif., 15:20:26:22/11:05:17:37; 5. Pacifica, Doug Jones, Southwestern YC, 15:10:39:09/11:08:29:09; 6. Endeavor III, Randy Bell/Eleanor Clitheroe, Royal Canadian YC, 15:20:26:22/11:14:33:52; 7. Goodnight Moon, Carlton Vanderbeek, Dana Point YC, 15:02:24:33/12:00:20:38; 8. Derivative, John Robert Misko, Seattle, Wash., 15:19:18:14/12:04:15:44.