Views on the Vendée Globe

If you have never been to a Vendée Globe start, you have missed out on one of life’s great experiences, especially, but not only, if you are a sailor. It’s a truly amazing experience and if you are someone who loves the sport and struggles to understand why the masses don’t, go to France. Your heart will be warmed. The scene on the docks the weeks leading up to the start was nothing short of amazing. Ten of thousands of ‘ordinary’ people standing in long lines (in the pouring rain) for an opportunity to get close to the boats and to come face to face with a skipper. The skippers have rock-star status, and in my humble opinion, it’s well deserved. The top sailors are amazing athletes sailing space-age craft around the globe, alone. You try it. You try hoisting the massive mainsail, or worse yet, deal with the sail after a crash gybe. You try sleeping when the boat is hurtling along at 35 knots. It’s impossible to imagine how they do it.

So that’s the scene, or rather, a thumbnail sketch of the scene in France. The start, however, was a different story. What were that race organisers thinking when they sent the fleet off into the teeth of an early winter Bay of Biscay gale? The morning of the start tens of thousands of people flocked into Les Sable d’ Olonne causing back-up’s and traffic jams that would have done New York rush hour proud. Such is the interest in the race. The long, narrow canal leading from the marina to the start area was 20 deep with ecstatic race fans, and for the sailors it much have been euphoric. Until the first cresting wave crashed over the deck at the harbor entrance.

The  number or tightly jammed ferries full of well wishers was only surpassed by the number of choppers filling the sky. As the countdown to gun was called over the VHF it was clear that a number of boats were over the line early but only Mike Golding, probably because he does not speak a word of french, was the only one called back. Dee Caffari, the gutsy British sailor paid for her sponsorship in the first 10 minutes of the race roaring across the start line a few seconds astern of defending champion Vincent Riou, and holding pace with him upwind for the first hour of the race. It was a great sight which I witnessed from a large ferry boat strategically place a hundred yards to leeward of Aviva. The sounds of cheers from onboard the ferry was only matched by the sound of puking souls as the boat heaved and wallowed in a heavy seaway.

The first three days of the race have been mayhem; three dismastings (Aquarelle, Groupe Bel and DCNS, two boats broken (Hugo Boss and Maisonneuve) and multitude of other problems. You have to ask yourself why they started the race. Granted, I know it’s a big deal for the people of France to watch the start and weekends are a good time to watch the start. But these are multi-million dollars projects and the Vendee is the culmination of years of work only to have it all end less than two days into the race.  It’s just not right for the sailors and their sponsors. Eight years ago they postponed the start because of weather and it worked out much better for everyone involved.

Still, others may argue that the cream always rises and the top sailors are out front giving it hell. Jean-Pierre Dick on Paprec-Virbac is slaying dragons at the front of the pack with a chasing pack of Sebastien Josse, Loick Peyron and Roland Jourdaine hot on his heels. Amusingly the British girls, Caffari and Sam Davies are not far off the pace and Mike Golding is slowly picking off boats as he fights his way to the lead. Only 23,000 miles to go.

Some advice for Barack Obama

It’s perhaps a little presumptive of me to offer Barack Obama some advice, but I think it’s advice her can use, so here goes. The challenges that face him as soon as he takes office next January are daunting.  I was thinking of running for president myself but thought better of it when I noticed what a mess the world was in. I have two perspectives on this. First, the world is a small place. Very small.  When you can sail around it, all alone, in a small boat, in just a few months you soon realise what a tiny, fragile place it is we call home. By the time the sailors participating in the Portimão Global Ocean Race get back to Portugal next summer they will have circled just about every country, culture and religion on earth. They will have their own unique view of this big blue marble.

My second point. When you start an around-the-world race it can be daunting. You look at the course that stretches out ahead of you and it seems endless.  I am thinking of the Vendée Globe skippers who take off from France this Sunday. The voyage ahead of them is massive and there is only one way for them to deal with it. The same way Barack Obama needs to deal with the global problems that face all of us. Bite-size pieces. You cannot do it all at once. It’s overwhelming. Break it down into smaller pieces, just like a circumnavigator does. 

A person sailing around the world does not think of the entire 30,000 mile course. No, they think of the race as five legs. Each leg is made up of various stages. Portugal to the Equator, for example. Even smaller than that. Portimão to the Canary Islands the the Canary Islands to the doldrums. My friend Skip Novak wrote a great book a few years ago about his time as skipper of Drum in the Whitbread Round the World Race. The book was entitled One Watch at a Time. That precisely is how you get around the world. One stage at a time, one day at a time, one watch at a time, one hour at a time. Before you know it you have done it. That same principal can be applied to just about anything in life, even the world’s biggest problems. Break them down into bite-size chunks and get started on the first one.