Two America's Cup champions and a two-time Olympic medalist are among the veteran sailors chosen by skipper Ken Read to crew PUMA Ocean Racing in the 37,000-mile Volvo Ocean Race.

PUMA Ocean Racing is the only American-based boat entered in the VOR, which starts Oct. 11 in Alicante, Spain, and ends in June 2009 in St. Petersburg, Russia.

Read said it was "almost an overwhelming process" to go through 400 resumes from "people crazy enough to want to do this race."

"Obviously, the human element of this sport and the human element of this race is crucial to the final outcome, so we did not take it lightly whatsoever," Read said Thursday during a conference call from Newport, R.I., where the team will train through the summer. "Combine it with the fact that the America's Cup is in such a state of flux, there were a lot of really good sailors in the marketplace."

The syndicate's boat will be christened Monday night in Boston by actress Salma Hayek. Boston will be the VOR's only North American stopover, next spring.

The 46-year-old Read helmed two America's Cup campaigns for Dennis Conner and was aboard Ericsson Racing for the final four legs of the last VOR, in 2005-06.

Heading the crew are bowman Jerry Kirby, 51, of Newport, R.I., and Jonathan McKee, 47, of Seattle.

Kirby won the America's Cup with America3 in 1992 and was aboard the second-place finisher Pirates of the Caribbean in the last VOR. McKee, who will be a trimmer-driver, won the gold medal in the Flying Dutchman category in the 1984 Los Angeles Olympics and the bronze in the 49er category in Sydney in 2000. He sailed in the 2007 America's Cup with Italy's Luna Rossa, and with Seattle-based OneWorld in 2003.

Read said experience and chemistry were the two most important factors for putting together a crew for a race that offers incredible extremes, from huge waves and icebergs to the boredom of the Doldrums. The last VOR was particularly dangerous. A Dutch crew member aboard ABN AMRO Two died when he was swept overboard in the North Atlantic, and the Spanish boat movistar had to be abandoned on the same leg. Several boats had serious problems with their canting keels.

"I don't want to go sailing for a year and a half out of my life with someone I don't like," Read said. "It sounds silly, but it's a simple attribute. We really have to like each other."

Read said he's previously raced with all but one of his crew.

"If at the end of the day you look at a guy and say you want to go have a beer with him and shoot the breeze, then it's safe to say there's chemistry. It's simple, but pretty real."

Watch captain Sidney Gavignet of Paris was with ABN AMRO One, the winning boat in the last VOR. Navigator Andrew Cape of Australia and trimmer-driver Rob Salthouse both have VOR and America's Cup experience. Cape was the navigator aboard movistar in the last VOR and won the America's Cup with Swiss team Alinghi in 2003.

Trimmer-driver Justin Ferris was the youngest member of the Pirates of the Caribbean crew in the 2005-2006 VOR. Media specialist Rick Deppe of Philadelphia is a two-time VOR veteran. Each team is required to have an 11th crew member to photograph the race.