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Due to technical difficulties with the Vostok capsule (say, repeated parachute failures?), the Soviet program falls behind by at least a month. On May 2, 1961 (the original planned date for Shepard's flight, scrubbed IOTL due to weather, assume it goes as planned TTL), Alan Shepard becomes the first human being in space. How does this change the Space Race of the 1960s?
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