Vanquish, co-skippered by Bermuda's Buddy Rego, has become first amateur boat to cross the finish line in this year's Newport to Bermuda Race.

Sailing with a multi-national crew onboard, Vanquish, a STP 65, Rego capped off an impressive showing after completing the 635 nautical mile ocean crossing at around 12.05 p.m. yesterday.

The veteran sailor, who was skippering Vanquish alongside American Russell Lucas, said he was surprised how well they fared against the professional crews.

"The biggest surprise was how well we did against the professional boats Titan, Beau Jest and Bella Mente," he said.

"We had Beau Jest and Bella Mente in our sights the whole time. At one point Beau Jest was even behind us so we knew we were doing the right thing.

"It couldn't have gone any better as far as we're concerned.

Rego said that the race tactics of Vanquish, which was competing against more than 100 other boats in the St.David's Lighthouse Division, had worked to perfection.

"We're very happy, it wasn't a very heavy race, and we saw no more than 22 knots.

"We have a great new navigator who we found two days before the race. She just told us to stick with it and it all panned out until we got to Bermuda."

"We never went east of the rhum-line, never, we just went straight down."

Later in the day Aurora just replaced Vanquish as the leader in Class 8.