Did I know, wonders Tim Petitt, that another former world-girdling Challenge 67 besides Podorange has undergone extensive modifications – of the luxury kind?

Yes, I had heard but I hadn’t seen the pictures. Tim, who used to work for Challenge Business and “for my sins have continued visiting most of the old 67s & 72s [to carry out] MCA code surveys” has been keeping an eye on the transformation of Mike Golding’s old Group 4 yacht, in which Golding won the 1996/7 BT Global Challenge and later sailed solo westabout the world.

It has, unbelievably, been transformed into a mini superyacht, at a cost rumoured to have run to several millions.

The yacht was refitted at Danish Yachts in Skagen, which has changed tack to specialise in carbon fibre superyachts. It has been renamed Ecover Zero of Skagen and is off to the South of France.

The connection between all these strands is Jorgen Philip-Sorensen, former chairman of Group 4 Securitas, a major shareholder in Ecover, longtime sponsor of Mike Golding, majority shareholder in Mike Golding Yacht Racing – and owner of the yard in Skagen.