25-year-old rows across Atlantic
According to Forbes, Paul Ridley was the youngest American to complete a solo row at age 25. On Sunday he rowed into Antigua's English Harbor. It took him 88 days to cross the Atlantic. Ridley wrote a daily blog via a solar-powered satellite phone. CNN reported that the trip took 3,000 miles. He started from the Canary Islands off the north African coast on Jan. 1 and ended on the Caribbean island of Antigua at 2:30 p.m. on March 29. His goal was to raise $500,000 for research at the Yale Cancer Center. He started an organization Row for Hope to raise money for cancer. The idea came after his mother died of skin cancer in 2001. CNN said Ridley was not the first to row across the Atlantic alone; he was the third American, but at age 25 he broke the record for the youngest. Ridley told CNN his sister spent $60,000 of their own savings to have his boat custom built.