We have a short attention span in sport. Only six months ago, the triumphs of Sam Davies and Dee Caffari in the round-the-world Vendee Globe race made a nation in the chill grip of recession feel a little warmer about itself.

Sailing in Roxy, the oldest boat in the fleet, Davies, a Cambridge engineering graduate and fluent French speaker, finished a remarkable third on the water — later corrected to fourth on time allowance, the handicap system that gives an equal chance to different types of boats. Her daily blogs, bright and bubbly, made light of the hazards of a race enveloped by drama and her countenance, all English rose, melted hearts on both sides of the Channel.

Caffari came from a different school, literally. The former PE teacher from Hertfordshire was not born to the sea in the same way as Davies but encouraged by her father — “Are you just going to talk about it, girl, or are you going to do it?” — she followed her star, turning a curiosity into a passion and then a profession. By finishing an impressive sixth in the Vendee in Aviva, a new generation Open 60, Caffari became the only woman to sail single-handed non-stop both ways round the globe: east to west, against wind and tide, and the more conventional route on the Vendee.

In June, just to pass the time, the two girls teamed up on Aviva to shatter the Round Britain and Ireland monohull record by almost a day, their all-girl crew of five taking six days and 11Å hours to complete the 1,800-mile route. Their exploits, single and joint, have made them leading contenders for the Sunday Times Sportswomen of the Year Awards, which are launched today. Now comes the hard part, jogging memories in the boardroom. In the teeth of an economic gale, both girls have to find sponsors to fund their dream of winning the next Vendee in 2012. Caffari’s highly successful partnership with Aviva ends in September; Roxy, Davies’ long-term backers, have the will but not the financial muscle to fund a new-boat campaign for the 2012 Vendee.

Davies took a new turn in her career last week and signed up to the Artemis Ocean Racing team, initially on a short-term contract to race the Artemis-sponsored Open 60 — which British skipper Jonny Malbon raced in the last Vendee race — in the Fastnet next Sunday. She will then tackle the Transat Jacques Vabre, a double-handed race across the Atlantic, in November.

Sailing with the Frenchman Sidney Gavignet, a veteran of four circumnavigations and 16 Atlantic crossings, Davies’ job is to hone the powerful, but heavyweight and unpredictable, Artemis into a boat capable of competing on the Imoca Open 60 circuit. The new role is confirmation of Davies’ growing reputation in the solo sailing community and marks a new, more intense, phase in the career of the 34-year-old. When she finds a sponsor for her new campaign, expectations will rise with the pressure.

After serving her apprenticeship the French way, in the Figaro class, at the elite training school at Port La Foret on the Brittany coast and in the Vendee, Davies feels ready for the challenge. “I’ll never be able to replicate the last Vendee in terms of the pressure on me,” she says. “I’ve not had the pressure of having to win yet or making a bigger team work as well as my small Roxy team, but in taking the next step up I mustn’t blow the whole thing out of proportion. I like to think I can bring what I learnt in a low-pressure Vendee to a more high-pressure Vendee.”

Davies’ performance in the most recent Vendee race was a masterpiece. Confidence in her boat was developed over many hard miles of training. In contrast to Caffari, who was learning to sail a new boat, Davies knew how hard she could push, and when to do so.

Before the start, she experienced what the French know simply as “Zen”. “I’d never felt like that before,” she says. “Right from the start I didn’t feel stressed or worried at all. I was ready to go.”

When she crossed the finishing line 96 days and 12 hours later in the early hours of Valentine’s Day, she had made a race marked by two dramatic rescues and a host of abandonments look easy. Pas de probleme, she told the waiting press on arrival back in the French fishing port of Les Sables d’Olonne. The following weeks of rehabilitation proved far more stressful. “One moment you’ve had an objective for 2.5 years, the next there’s no goal any more and you’re totally lost,” she says. “It happens about two seconds after you cross the finishing line. A few weeks later I got ill, which always happens, but it was a relief. I was able to lie in bed and have a good reason for doing nothing.”

For Caffari, the leader of a well-drilled, well-funded team, the level of post-Vendee stress has risen with the looming prospect of unemployment. “Every other conversation in the team is about the end of the contract, so you feel awful,” she says. “I want them to be okay, but I don’t want them working for anyone else because they’ve been such a great team. The biggest fear for me is losing the boat just when I’ve learnt how to make her go fast.

“At the moment, I’m trying to keep my profile high to attract a sponsor, keep my sailing level high enough to be competitive and to earn enough money to keep food on the table. It’s a tough thing to balance and it’s stressful, because for two years every single day in my calendar was planned. In October, there’s a big gap. That’s exciting, but scary.” Racing in the Fastnet next Sunday could be the last time Caffari sails Aviva competitively. The race, with her shore team as crew for once, will be part wake, part celebration. The last Vendee already seems ancient history. “When I’m out sailing with other people, I think, ‘Did I really do all that on my own?’ But memories of the race are very strong.”

As the number of retirements grew in the Southern Ocean, Caffari momentarily lost her nerve, throttling back to make sure of a safe passage to Cape Horn. She was bolstered by messages of encouragement from Davies, who seemed blissfully unaware of the dangers the race posed.

“By the time I’d got back into the Atlantic I had an issue with my mainsail, but I was ready to push hard all the way home,” Caffari recalls. “Some people thought it was only an adventure for me, that I wasn’t going to compete, but I surprised a few people. In my first solo race on an Open 60, I didn’t eat, I didn’t sleep, I cried pretty well the whole way. I was an emotional wreck. By the start of the Vendee, however, I wasn’t thinking about going to my impending doom, I was ready and excited to get going.”

Caffari earned the respect of the solo sailing community for her skill and competitiveness on the water, for her humility and for her erratic but enthusiastic French off it. With the incomparable Mich Desjoyeaux, who started two days behind the fleet and still won, Caffari and Davies dominated the headlines as the 11 survivors out of a starting fleet of 30 returned home, gaining permanent celebrity in France and a place on the BBC Breakfast television sofa in England.

Their friendship has blossomed, too, first through the race and subsequently in their incredible record-breaking sail round the British Isles.

“Dee has improved so much,” says Davies. “When I first started sailing against her you could tell that she was out of her depth with the boat. By the end of the Vendee I was glad the race was over because she was catching up fast.

“Sailing together has been a real buzz. We come from entirely different sailing backgrounds, but we learn so much from each other. Above all, we have fun.”