Posted by Graham Cox
Week three continued much the same as it had during the previous week, with all entrants experiencing fresh tradewinds, frequent squalls, and 1.5m seas on top of a 3-4 metre swell from the NE. As the result, little change was to be expected on the leaderboard before the first boats crossed the finishing line off English Harbour, Antigua in the first days of February. Despite the steady winds, there were plenty of things happening, with some interesting, entertaining, and occasionally sobering posts from skippers. The seas were a bit choppy, sometimes solid water swept the decks, and the motion could get quite violent.
Popeye had been keeping to the north, trying to avoid the worst of the squalls and boisterous seas. He could clearly see the squalls on the southern horizon. Eventually, after some goading that he might miss the best parties in Antigua, he altered course to the south. His day started with lighter winds on 28 January, and he decided to set the A7. He wanted to film himself poling the sail out, and strapped a GoPro (action camera) to his chest, before crawling forward on hands and knees (blessing his Gill kneepads), but discovered afterwards that he’d mounted the camera back to front, succeeding only in getting a close-up shot of his belly button.
Later that day, DELJA 99 was struck violently by a wave that knocked the boat down and catapulted Popeye across the cabin, where he landed heavily on his head. Having witnessed a boyhood friend suffer serious a neck injury during a rugby match, resulting in paraplegia, he was initially too afraid to move, but the only injury suffered was a bad headache for about 15 minutes. He later found a litre of water in his tool storage locker.
That night, he experienced the roughest weather since the start, struggling on the foredeck for several hours to tame his A7 and get the pole down. He did not get to sleep until 0200, by which time he was tired and drenched. However, he had a great day on the 29th, pushing the boat hard and helping the Hydrovane to steer, due to the steep seas that kept pushing DELJA 99 off course. He spent the day experimenting with the Hydrovane, mostly using setting #1, though sometimes #2, which turns the rudder more for a given windvane deflection. He had not tried setting #3, which he believes would be most effective in seriously rough seas.
Jasmine looked like she was taking it easier, practicing celestial navigation, dreaming of future dogs she’d like to own, and posting amusing videos on social media. NUMBATOU steadily sailed west at 4 knot all week, mostly just under jib. Judging by the expressions on her face in the videos, Jasmine is feeling happy and relaxed. In one of them, she was visited by some mysterious sea creatures, maybe sharks or killer whales, chasing the dolphins that had been frolicking around NUMBATOU. It’s a long way around the world, and Jasmine is just pacing herself.
Whether or not Dan Turk was influenced by questions about the state of LITTLE BEA’s bottom during his sat-phone call on the 27th, the following day he put his GoPro camera on a stick and had a look. His primary motivation was a low-key clunking sound. Concerned that the lower rudder pintle might be working loose from its bolts, he was relieved to discover it was just a little wear. The bottom of the boat was also gratifyingly clean. He also managed to get another sextant sight at noon; he’d been trying during the previous week, but cloud cover kept thwarting him. After moving his water around (probably to the windward side, to go faster), he was planning to get stuck into a tin of sardines for lunch.
On LITTLE WREN, Adam decided that it was time for a big fresh-water wash-day. He’d set off with 110 litres and had only used 50 so far. With about one week left to the finish, he washed his pillowcases and some other items, then used a little to rinse himself off after a saltwater bath. Everything gets sticky after a week or two at sea.
Despite sailing fast, Christian reported that he’d torn the jib on ARGO, due to it flapping when the boat went off-course while he slept. Luckily, he had a spare aboard. Talking of chafed sails, Don McIntyre noted that he was surprised to see that only a couple of the entrants had chafing patches on known wear-points.
More troubling for Christian is that his left shoulder continues to give him trouble, and his right one is now hurting as well. Adding to his discomfort, he had developed, ‘a serious bursitis on the right patella, absolutely impossible to kneel on it. I don’t remember if there was a bigger impact on the knee than usual, because there were so many, and I’ve pretty much been doing everything on my knees inside the boat and on deck.’
He had mentioned before the difficulty of doing proper stretching exercises on such a small boat. The perceived wisdom for staying fit on long passage focuses on regular bodyweight exercises like push-ups, squats, lunges, and planks, or incorporates cardio activities like walking or jogging on deck. John Bankart and Graham Cox discussed this issue in a recent meeting, and John suggested it might be worthwhile for entrants to have a symposium on the topic while in Antigua. There are some long passages ahead in the MGR.
Niels, on BIGGEST MONKEY, reported, ‘All fine here, after a few rough days! The tradewinds are fantastic, only the squalls were not necessary in my opinion. These squalls kept on coming, some were really heavy, with lots of wind and sometimes rain. It forced me to do a lot of hand-steering instead of the windvane. The waves were too big, and the gusts too heavy, to rely on the vane.
‘Lots of times, the waves gave me the opportunity to surf them which was very cool! Sometimes they made the boat tumble like a washing machine. On one of these occasions, I broke one of my poles – too bad, because it limits sail combinations from now on. I’m okay, and happy again after some frustration and tiredness the last few days. Just a couple of hundreds of miles to go, watch out, here I come!
Aboard DELJA 100, life has settled back into a familiar routine after John Blenkinsop’s drama of losing his jib halyard. He sent a brief summary. ‘Last week till Antigua! Only one more egg left! No more chocolate! One more orange left! Lost my knife. Got drenched in my boxers this morning! VHF call with Dan Turner. Breeze has dropped but still consistent 15-20knts. Still having fun!’
Towards the end of the week, Renaud notified race management that he had discovered some rig damage to his Selden mast. He later posted, ‘During regular boat inspection, I discovered yesterday a split in my starboard spreader. That’s a blow to the morale. Fortunately, the winds are not too strong, and with the help of Ariane, my boat manager, and Don McIntyre, the replacement parts are on order.’
A general notice has been issued to other entrants to check their spreaders and advise if they too need replacement parts brought out to Antigua. Interestingly, the same damage occurred in the spreaders of the two leading boats in the 2021 Globe 580 Transat. Those skippers had been pushing their boats to extreme lengths, regularly being knocked down under spinnaker as they duelled for line honours. Renaud has had no such dramas, though he has certainly sailed CAPUCINETTE fast all the way.
These exertions haven’t hampered Renaud’s efforts in the galley. In another of his regular posts with a culinary theme, he wrote, ‘ETA Antigua Sunday, if the wind holds out. Made a grape apricot cake with my last 2 eggs. The wind has weakened in the last 24 hours, and varies a lot in strength and direction, making it is necessary to manouvre regularly. Inside the boat it is 28℃, with 80% humidity.’
Despite expressing frustration with her ability to hold a steady course aboard PETER PUNK during squalls, Pilar still found time to enjoy the beauty of the ocean. She sent the following brief message, ‘By night, when the waves are breaking, you have this amazing view of the glowing green plankton.’
Dan Turk is definitely enjoying life aboard LITTLE BEA, despite his physical discomfort, which leaves him unable to sit for any length of time. ‘The breeze has softened as well as the sea state. Johnny G (self-steering gear) is doing his thing and has enabled me to not touch the tiller in the past 9 or 10 days. Although my galley isn’t producing the wonderful meals that Renaud is serving, I am content with my morning Oatmeal, afternoon sardines or tuna, and a freeze-dried meal for dinner. Last night was a healthy portion of Mediterranean Pork! I did another sextant sight today and I was off by 40 nautical miles – I will blame that on a bouncy 19ft sailboat in 10 ft swell and waves!’
Dan Turner, aboard IMMORTAL GAME, was in 7th place, close behind DELJA 100. On the evening of January31, he texted his wife and manager, Nikki Jade, that the wind was 20-22 knots from the ENE, with a 2-3m sea, noting that it was a squally evening. The following morning, he texted, ‘Just dug into a wave and filled the cockpit, so had a free bath, ha ha. Taken some sail down, so more manageable now.’ Soon after, he sent another text, ‘I have just been hit by the biggest squall of the trip. Must have been 50+ knots. Had most the sails down anyway, so just needed to roll up the headsail.’
When Dan made his fortnightly sat-phone call at 2330 UTC on 2 January, he said that he’d found this trip pretty hard at times, physically and emotionally. After losing his twin daggerboards early on, he had to slow the boat down, losing 1.5 knots of speed, whenever he wanted the Hydrovane to steer the boat, since it would only do so under jib alone. He had mostly given up using the mainsail. At the time of his call, he had the jib poled out opposite the A7, but said that IMMORTAL GAME felt a bit hard-pressed. He was doing a great deal of hand-steering to keep average speeds up.
For someone with Dan’s competitive spirit, it was hard to accept that IMMORTAL GAME was not performing optimally at all times, so he tended to push himself hard, not eating or resting enough. He began to feel burned out and disappointed with himself, though after a talk with Nikki, wife and manager, who read him messages of support received on social media, he regained his equilibrium and enthusiasm.
He has a long list of things to sort out in Antigua but should have enough time to complete the work and undertake trial sails. Besides sorting out the rudder and Hydrovane, he needs to relocate his solar panels so they don’t interfere with the vane setup. He also wants to refine his headsail setup, with perhaps another jib, for times when one jib is not enough and the A7 poled out opposite the working jib is too much. Dan wants to win the MGR. Being a veteran endurance athlete, combined with survival training in the Australian army, he is tough enough to make that passion a reality.
Dan’s call was the first to come through this week. Renaud Stitelmann was scheduled to make the first call at 2300 UTC on 2 February, but a couple of hours before that time, he crossed the finish line off English Harbour, Antigua, to win the 2025 Globe Transat Race in 22 days, 5 hours and 26 minutes. It was interesting to see his twin furled spinnakers draped along the side decks, a clue to his consistently high speeds. He estimated that he’d spent, on average, one hour a day steering throughout the passage. He also mentioned that he got up once an hour to check the course and trim sails if necessary.
Keri Harris brought ORIGAMI across the finish line four hours later, under cover of darkness, to claim second position, after 22 days, 9 hours and 55 minutes. Despite long hours spent hand-steering ORIGAMI, he was freshly shaved and bright-eyed when he stepped onto the dock at the Antigua Sailing Academy, and as articulate as ever.
Niels, on BIGGEST MONKEY followed them across the line to secure 3rd place, with an elapsed time of 22 days, 23 hours and 20 minutes. He proudly flew his house flag from the masthead, and was delighted to find his father waiting for him on the dock. Video footage of his arrival revealed that BIGGEST MONKEY’s bottom was still perfectly clean.
Jasmine is usually the last entrant to call, but this week she was the next to make contact, as neither Popeye on DELJA 99, his son, John Blenkinsop, on DELJA 100, or Jakub Ziemkiewicz, on BIBI, kept their appointments, though Jakub called later. She sounded completely relaxed, as her videos clearly show. She has settled in aboard NUMBATOU now, and is well and truly in the groove.
She was sailing with just her working jib poled out, as conditions were a bit too fresh for the A5. She does not have an A7, and accepts now that it could be a useful sail. She speculated about buying one from Niels, since BIGGEST MONKEY is not doing the MGR, but says, ‘If I can’t, I’m not particularly frustrated. It will just mean that I’m slower, and that’s okay with me because it means I won’t push it. And therefore, I won’t damage anything, like other people are damaging quite a lot of stuff because they’re just pushing it too hard. I am not here to be competitive.’ She does have a second jib, or could pole out her storm jib, but was content to just take it easy.
One sign of how much she has settled in aboard NUMBATOU is that she no longer feels that rowing across the Atlantic was easier, as she initially thought. Now that NUMBATOU is merrily knocking off close to 100 miles a day, she is enjoying the ride. One difference from her rowing passage is that she is not using her muscles as much, and says they have ‘gone to mush’.
She hand-steers NUMBATOU often because she enjoys it, but also because it makes the boat go faster. She finds that the Hydrovane oversteers. She has experimented with the unit’s settings but has not yet fine-tuned the relationship between skipper, boat and sea-state. She has been regularly practicing celestial navigation, but finds the results less accurate than she’d like, due to the quick motion of the boat. Chasing the sun all over the horizon, as NUMBATOU swings and swerves through the tradewind seas, is a bit frustrating, as is bracing herself when both hands are occupied. Still, she reckons she could find land if needed.
She has not been cooking much, or eating a lot. She said she was a bit hungry, but unfortunately fancied something like fried chicken, not boat food, which she found uninspiring. She was looking forward to a decent meal in Antigua. At least she has not run out of chocolate, though did mention that she was going to look for a chocolate factory in Antigua and stock up on as much of her favourite treat as she could stuff into NUMBATOU’s lockers.
The last call received this week was from Jakub, aboard BIBI. He said the weather was very nice at last but he’d had a bit of an incident. When he first set off, he was having a good time, just cruising along, reading, sleeping and cooking good meals, but his manager, John, suggested he should try harder, since he was supposed to be in a yacht race.
So, he set his A5 in fresh winds but tore the fitting off the bowsprit, allowing the sail to fly up. While getting it down, it went under the boat and was torn when he recovered it. He repaired the bowsprit fitting with tools and spares carried aboard, then later set the A3 in lighter winds, but a squall caught him unawares, and laid BIBI well over. Now he is content to fly the jib opposite the A7, the configuration that BIBI was sailing under during his phone call. He would like to get a spare A7, as he finds it such a useful sail, and losing it would be unfortunate during the long passages ahead in the MGR. He also regrets that he did not have enough money to fit a roller-reefing gear on BIBI’s working jib.
He had not found enough time for reading, or other things he planned to do, and wishes the passage was a bit longer. Since he developed skin problems from sitting too long in wet clothing, he now sails mostly naked, and sits on a dry towel, which is helping his skin to recover. He never spent long periods sitting down before this race, and finds it a challenge. Also, his knees, damaged during a youth competing in wrestling matches, are giving him some difficulty. A structured regime for onboard fitness seems to be something that many 580 skippers could benefit from.
He forgot to make lee-cloths for BIBI, and often woke up on the cabin sole after falling out of his bunk. The other thing that keeps ending up on the floor is food. Jakub is one of the few 580 skippers with a decent stove, and likes to cook hot meals, especially when he is working hard or is stressed, but it is difficult to keep food from spilling. He said the cabin was still dry, but had become messy and slimy during the weeks of rough weather. Now that the weather had calmed down a little, he was giving it a good clean up.
He was full of praise for his Wind Pilot Pacific Light self-steering gear. Until his manager goaded him into taking racing seriously, it steered the boat 100% of the time, while he took his ease below. Since then, he has hand-steered for 50% of the time, for the old reason that a helmsman can anticipate what the boat is going to do next, and therefore push harder than the vane gear allows, as it only corrects the helm once the boat goes off course. He hands over the helm to the Wind Pilot around midnight and sleeps for at least six hours, only getting up once an hour to check for squalls, etc. He is now in the groove, and his boyhood dream of sailing solo around the world is becoming reality.
In another week or so, all of the 2025 Globe Transat entrants should be safely in Antigua, where, between parties and other functions, they will prepare their boats for the greatest adventure of all, a solo circumnavigation of the world on their tiny, home-built yachts, joining the ranks of a select group of sailors, like John Guzzwell on TREKKA, who have gone before them. 2025 marks the 70th anniversary of TREKKA’s circumnavigation, and the Mini Globe Race is a fitting tribute to her skipper, John Guzzwell.
The attached image is of Renaud Stitelmann on CAPUCINETTE, crossing the finish line off English Harbour, Antigua, to win the 2025 Class Globe 580 Transat.
