Yacht Club as the crew aboard Windquest soaked up the moment of a lifetime yesterday after taking line honours in the Newport to Bermuda race, the first of the 149 sailboats to finish.

Windquest , one of 12 boats competing in the Racing Division, reached St.

David's Lighthouse at 2.25 p.m. yesterday, completed the 635-mile ocean course in 72 hours, 15 minutes and nine seconds -- four minutes and 20 seconds faster than Boomerang 's finish in 1992 but about 10 hours slower than the record set by Nirvana in 1982.

The blue-hulled maxi yacht was making her debut in the Bermuda race, owned by the De Vos family of Grosse Pointe, Michigan.

Dick De Vos and his father, Richard De Vos, Sr., a former America's Cup syndicate executive, own the 71-foot racer.

Dick De Vos, along with his brother Doug, were the first members of the crew of 20 to be greeted by RBYC commodore Brian Billings at 4.45 p.m. as the boat took its place in the winner's area outside the storied yacht club.

The De Vos brothers were handed bottles of Moet and Chandon and Veuve du Vernay by a beaming Billings while the weary crew found the energy to celebrate their lofty achievement.

Two other boats in the Racing Division crossed the finish line a few hours later, including one of nine Bermuda entries, Longobarda , third to reach St.

David's Lighthouse in 75 hours, 38 minutes and 52 seconds. Francis Carter and his crew crossed the finish line at 5.48 p.m. Second was Renegade , owned and skippered by Ken Meade, also of Grosse Pointe, Michigan, with a time of 75 hours, 21 minutes and 29 seconds.

Longobarda , however, stands at second on corrected time so far with Windquest first and Renegade third.

Several other boats were seen on the horizon late last night making their way through scattered squalls to the finish line.

The Longobarda crew were greeted by families and friends when the boat arrived at the RBYC shortly before 9 p.m. last night. Carter also revealed that he has filed a protest over the decision by race organisers to prevent boats in the Racing Division to win the Lighthouse Trophy, thus favouring boats with amateur crews over professional ones. The protest is now in the hands of an international jury and is expected to be heard on Thursday.

"This is a dream come true for us,'' said Dick De Vos yesterday. "We've sailed for a lot of years, mostly in the Great Lakes, and we just decided that we wanted a boat that had the capability of getting us line honours and hopefully holding that time if we did well.'' The boat, a Reichel/Pugh design, is a state of the art racer. Also aboard were captain Brian MacInnis, first mate Geordie Shaver, second mate Lexi Gahagan and tactician John Bertrand, all of Annapolis, Maryland.

Curt Oetking of San Diego was co-tactician and By Baldridge of Seabrooke, Texas was co-navigator.

Crew member Larry Leonard provided the scariest moment of the race when he fell off the boat during a sail change but was not hurt.

Bertrand, a former America's Cup helmsman in 1983, 1987 and 1991 with Dennis Connor, said the crew was forced to take a conservative approach because of the light winds.

"It was actually a pretty straightforward race and it was starboard tack the whole way except for maybe the last 60, 70 miles,'' he said. "We just went down the rhumb line and a few of the boats went a little further west into the Gulf Stream early and gained on us.

"Actually 48 hours into the race we had a couple of boats that we had to repass but we had some boats that were close to us that we couldn't leave so we were really conservative.'' Bertrand felt that with increased winds the boat could have set a new record.

"With 10 knots abreeze this boat does about 12 knots reaching, so if we had 10 knots headed for the Island the whole way we would have probably been very close.'' The crew must now play a waiting game to see whether Windquest will capture the Grand Prix trophy or whether other boats will overtake her on corrected time under the IMS system.

"For me this was very satisfying because I was very much involved in putting the project together for this family.'' At least one boat ran out of options when Moxie III , a Baltic 53 skippered by George Collins of Baltimore, broke its mast above the upper spreaders and was forced to retire from the race.