I’ve joined UNICEF with four other leggers for the race to Oban. Below deck, my life revolves around my bunk, starboard s4. It’s eight feet off the ground when the boat is at its racing angle, access to the bunk is slightly bigger than the depth of a shoebox, and if I try to lie on my side my shoulders scrape the roof. But, because the boat is at that 70-degree racing angle, I can see straight out the tiny ventilation hole opposite me, across the deck, through the legs of the other watch grinding the winches, and straight down at the rushing sea around 12 feet directly below me. With that view, it’s the best bunk in the world.
Above deck, honestly, the best way I can describe the sailing environment is that it’s just like a high-speed version of the Clipper Race recruitment video. Twelve hours after Race Start, we are bobbing around in flat calm a hundred miles offshore in the Atlantic. Flat calm already- grr! We resort to wind dancing on the foredeck. It works - minutes later Champagne sailing (sadly without the champagne) begins. It's my turn on the helm. A US military submarine surfaces about a mile away to check us out. Presumably, my helming track when seen by sonar must be so erratic that they are investigating if we are a Russian decoy rather than simply a large sailing boat. They dive back down. For two hours, all is quiet again but then the wind suddenly builds. UNICEF takes off andsuddenly we are clinging onto the foredeck, waves drenching us, desperately making the heavy sail changes so we stay safe but still race as fast as possible. All that in one four-hour shift.It’s great.
If we can get the wind, and avoid bad luck, I am confident we’re going to do well in this race. Here’s why. The round-the-worlders have been feeding our captain, Dan, porridge for breakfast every dayand it is working.He’s now a master strategist. Our first mate, Laura, like me, comes from Northern Ireland and is thus clearly the best first mate in the fleet and a born master tactician. Our round-the-worlders and previous-leggers carrying on glide effortlessly around the boat, all chiseled jaws and tanned limbs, casually helming the boat to within decimal points of a degree. They have the skills. We leggers start to get with the program.
Our fingerprints disappear, ruined by the roughness in the ropes. Lugging sails - oh we had forgotten the pain. But the RTW-ers get us up to speed - turns out the self-styled movie stars are also super friendly and eager to coach us. Ninjas abound. Example: my galley duty partner is a professional chef. Mother watch, historically a day of sweaty hell frantically cooking boiled rubbish for 18 in a wildly heaving boat, is a tasty breeze where I simply wash all the dishes.
We leggers get into our stride. Now we are enthusiastically carrying and rigging sails, grinding everything that moves. Cue the Rocky Balboa theme tune - you know the scene, he’s sprinting up the steps ahead of the big fight knowing that it’s all coming together. Two more weeks of hard racing to go. Bring it on!
Thanks and best wishes to my fellow crew, the Clipper Race organisers, our competitors in the other boats, and all our friends and wonderful families. We’ll see you all in Oban. And a special shout out to Monty my dog, who apparently is really missing me!