Three Cuban refugees who escaped the island on sailboards glided for 12 hours as sharks circled them-then, exhausted, they stretched out and took naps.

Three hours later, at 3 a.m. Wednesday, they heard the rumble of a boat and sent up a flare. It was a group of American fishermen on their way back from a tournament in Cozumel.

"I was thinking, `Please, let a boat come by and pick us up. Enough with the heroism,"' said Alexander Morales, 21, a professional windsurfer. "And the boat did come."

Hitching a ride with the fishermen, Morales, Carlos Lopez Gonzalez, 26, and Roberto Gonzalez Ortiz, 22, arrived in Key West Wednesday morning.

The men first concocted their plan more than two months ago.

They rigged their sailboards for the trip across the Florida Straits with special seats, similar to swings, and sturdy sails. And they trained every day, at least four hours a day, often longer.

But they lost a powerful ally the moment they left the coast of Santa Fe, their hometown, at 12:30 p.m. Tuesday. The wind died, leaving them idle and impatient for long stretches. The sharks edged in closer. At night, the predators never left them alone.

"It's very risky, very tiring," said Morales, who competed on Cuba's windsurfing team. "You are nothing compared to the sea. So insignificant."

Cuba's border guards never suspected a thing. Windsurfers sail along the Santa Fe coast all the time.

"We had done this all our lives, so the border guards couldn't say anything to us," Morales said.

Just to be safe, he and the others hugged Cuba's coastline as they sailed toward Mariel. They each carried a liter of water. Twenty miles offshore, they changed course and headed to Key West. They didn't feel safe from Cuban authorities until nightfall.

Their conditioning served them well: During 12 hours of non-stop windsurfing, their feet and hands throbbed, but they didn't think about the pain. Only at midnight, after they nearly collapsed from fatigue, did they let down the sails to rest.

"I had trained my whole life for this," Morales said.

The men aren't alone. Three other Cubans have windsurfed their way to South Florida this year, according to the Church World Service resettlement agency.

On Friday, Morales was reunited with his father, Alexander Morales. Father and son hadn't seen each other since 1979. Morales' mother and half his family are still in Cuba.

"That's a small little board, 3 inches of width. You have nothing to protect yourself with," Morales' father said. "It's unbelievable."