Famous Ship Restored

Back in the days when MTV just showed videos, one of my favorite's was Duran Duran's "Rio".  A sailing video that got the heart pumping.  Well the boat had some damage due to a collision and sank shortly after the vid was shot.  Many years later (40), her original owners found her and restored her to her former glory.  She was first launched in 1937!  You can read the full story of the good ship "Eilean" here.


Go full screen!

Turns out the lead singer, Simon Le Bon, was a serious racer and did the Fastnet twice and the Whitbread Round the World race:
While Duran Duran was on hiatus in 1985, Le Bon drew media attention when his maxi yacht, Drum, lost its keel and capsized during the Fastnet race, just off Falmouth, along the southern coast of Cornwall. Before being rescued, Le Bon and other crew members were trapped underwater, inside the hull, for forty minutes. They were all rescued by the Royal Navy, using a Search and Rescue helicopter from 771 Naval Air Squadron based near Helston. The rescue earned the Rescue Diver, POACMN L Slater, a George Medal.^[4] Despite the accident, Le Bon and Drum went on to participate in the 1985-1986 Whitbread Round the World Race, coming in third overall in elapsed time. Le Bon and his partners eventually sold Drum; the events surrounding Drum and the races were chronicled in a 1989 movie entitled Drum – The Journey Of A Lifetime and the book One Watch at a Time^[5] written by Drum's skipper, Skip Novak.
Twenty years after his accident, in 2005, Le Bon made public his desire to race again. During a touring hiatus in August 2005, Le Bon again raced Drum in the Fastnet race, borrowing the vessel from her current owner (the Scottish multi car garage owner Sir Arnold Clark) to participate, and raising funds for the RNLI charity. Le Bon had to leave the race unfinished, as light winds were slowing Drum (and the other competitors), and would have delayed the boat's arrival at Plymouth, interfering with Le Bon's obligation to perform in Japan.^[6]