I have been working on Puffin’s race prep around the clock for almost three years now. It has taken far more time and labor than my first circumnavigator boatbuilding, because I have less money and professional help. I have not gotten the chance to step back and coordinate/supervise the boatbuilding from a managerial position, since [...]
The start of the race is only 164 days away, and there is no time for winter hibernation now! Speaking at the GGR Presentation at the 2017 Paris Boat Show Gathered with the other GGR 2018 skippers at the 2017 Paris Boat Show Final Pre-Race Conference In early December, the [...]
Puffin in Willsboro Bay Marina, late summer 2015 Puffin finally looks like a puffin again! Puffin’s launch on October 10 was an exciting milestone, but the celebration was literally short-lived since Puffin had not been in the water for the last decade. She was kept on the hard after her owner [...]
On October 10, 2017, after over two years of extensive refurbishing, Puffin was finally relaunched. This marked the first time the yacht had touched water in a decade. Johanna and Matt Nally--the widow and son of Puffin's original skipper, John F. Nally--made the long drive from upstate New York to take part in this special [...]
Piroska, my older daughter, was 12 years old when she christened Salammbo, my first solo circumnavigator boat. It's a good omen for me to see her with Puffin... The race of my life has become a race for my life. I feel what Jack London's gold digger heroes felt escaping south from the [...]
If— “…If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew To serve your turn long after they are gone, And so hold on when there is nothing in you Except the Will which says to them: ‘Hold on!’…” —Rudyard Kipling The opening of my first book features Kipling's complete poem, which has been the main [...]
Don Casey has a chapter with this title in one of his books, This Old Boat, which has served as my bible in Puffin's restoration. But it somehow skips the most serious difficulty in the hose replacement, which is snaking the heavy, stiffly reinforced hoses through the labyrinth of an old full-keel sailboat’s bilges and [...]
I have decided not to wear my wristwatch during this race prep period. I do a lot of manual work in confined areas of the boat where it's an obstacle, but more importantly I check off the days like minutes and the weeks like hours in my calendar. There is just one year to the [...]
The Rules of the 1968 Sunday Times Golden Globe Race—the first ever solo circumnavigation race—were quite simple for both the sailors and organizers. But the 50th Anniversary Race next year is a heavily loaded obstacle course for all parties involved. In order to replicate the original race, the race management wants to preserve its main [...]
“You don’t win the race at sea. You lose it at sea. You win the race during the preparation…” Conrad Colman said this recently, after his impressive Vendée Globe finish under jury rig. He had all kinds of troubles during his circumnavigation, including having a fire on board and losing his mast. His well-phrased statement [...]
