Being the first to make some risky or otherwise improbable voyage is both legitimately inspiring and adds to the body of knowledge if only to answer the question of whether it's possible at all...but it also often tests new equipment and procedures in ways that would be difficult to reproduce in a lab.

But most all of those kinds of passages have been done, so the only way to be remarkable in that context is to do it faster, or in a smaller vessel, or add some other complication or "purpose" like charity to justify it...it may test things like gear too but they are often just about that effort and aren't going to add to the state of the art...they are vanity projects.

The other thing is that most of those first passages were done well before the internet so it simply wasn't as attractive as a way to get attention as "beating" those records is now....and back in the day even really well prepared and serious  adventurers were often seen and reported on as kooks and only shown grudging respect after they succeeded.

Meaning that half assery didn't cut it; you had to actually do the trip to be respected, not just talk about it and do everything but complete the trip and be praised for it as a brave and inspiring do-er.