It was another good day for the Farr 52s yesterday with Peter Harrison winning the prestigious Britannia Cup at Skandia Life Cowes Week after a close fought contest between three identical boats.

Harrison, the man behind Britain's America's Cup Challenge, snatched victory by less than a minute in Class 0 in his new £600,000 Chernikeeff 2, which he has owned for just a month.

Just behind him was the consistent Australian contender Loco, skippered by Melbourne property man David Lowe and bringing up the rear in third was the other Farr 52, Bear of Britain, owned by Essex duo Kit Hobday and Tim Louis.

"Yabbadabbadoo - we won the Britannia Cup," said millionaire Harrison who bumped up his crew for the day with three sailors from his GBR Challenge, Jules Salter, Ian Budgen and Chris Main.

"It has been a wonderful day - the weather conditions were blustery and we had to wear life jackets but the sailing, especially the downwind legs were thrilling, absolutely brilliant and our boat reached 15 knots.

"We had a tremendous start and within a few hundred yards had a 40-yard advantage on the other 52's," said Harrison, who revealed that he and Hobday had agreed at Cowes last year to buy Farr 52s and race against each other in 2001.

"We thought they would be good training vehicles for upcoming match-racing talent so we specified the boats and sails exactly the same.

"That was before I made the decision to run the GBR challenge but I decided to honour the agreement. It was our best day but these 52s are very powerful machines and we found we got into broaches fairly easily on Tuesday but we did not make any real mistakes yesterday."

Richard Loftus once again carried John Caulcutt and his High Voltage crew on board his Swan Desperado for the second consecutive day and in conditions that suited the heavier boats, was runner-up in the Britannia Cup with the Farr 52 Loco third.

Peter Ogden's Spirit of Jethou returned one of their worst results of the week with a seventh in Class 0 - despite staying out of the pub on Tuesday evening - but remains top overall.

Desperado also scored an emphatic victory in Class 1 by more than five minutes over one of the First 47.7's Nick Hewson's Team Tonic.

Charles Dunstone has taken his time to come into form on his Corby 41.5 Nokia but yesterday took third to put him second overall for the week though he trails Team Tonic by a substantial 13 point margin.

Archie Massey, 24, from Sussex won the Skandia Life Young Skipper Trophy yesterday after sneaking victory in his National Swallow Skua from the favourites Michael Henning in White Rabbit and last year's winner Edmund Peel in Quail.

Racing in his fourth Cowes regatta, Cambridge graduate Archie, who took up racing when he was five, sailed with Douglas Pattison and George Nurton to dominate the Skua racing.

Last year's Class 1 winner Gloves Off is having a less satisfactory regatta in 2001 dealing with a series of problems and breakages. The crew were dining out in Cowes on Tuesday when they were told that a corporate hospitality yacht had bumped into the back of the boat, moored up in the yacht haven. The bump broke the spinnaker pole and dislodged the stanchions, which were then ripped out in yesterday's racing.