As winner of the Golden Globe Race, Kirsten Neusch\u00e4fer is the first woman to win a solo around the world race. Helen Fretter finds out what drives her\u201cSometimes in the tropics, if it\u2019s nice and calm, I\u2019ll drop sail and I\u2019ll lash the helm over to one side,\u201d recalled Kirsten Neusch\u00e4fer before the start of the Golden Globe Race. \u201cI\u2019ll jump overboard and have a swim around the boat, and sometimes I\u2019ll swim away from the boat, just to get that feeling of vastness. That sense of eternity. That if the boat did sail away, it would be eternity. And it is a scary thought, but it\u2019s also kind of intriguing.\u201d
\nWhat does it take to compete in the longest race in the world, over eight months of isolation? Where the odds are firmly stacked against you. So skewed, in fact, that the risk is not of failure, but of literally having to abandon everything. Perhaps that is part of the appeal: this is a race that can take you to the edge, tempting you to touch the void, to peer into eternity.
\nFive years ago, the sailing world witnessed a grand experiment. Eighteen solo skippers set off on a recreation of the Golden Globe Race. Small long-keeled yachts, carrying only the most rudimentary technology, plunged into the southern ocean in a bid to race around the world in a homage to the 1968 pioneering event. But the attrition rate was devastating: four skippers had to abandon their boats \u2013 one seriously injured; five yachts were dismasted; 13 retired.
\nYou might think potential entrants who witnessed how the 2018 fleet was ravaged by knockdowns, barnacles, even toxic mould, would be put off. But there is something about the Golden Globe Race, a \u2018back to basics\u2019 around the world race, that earns it a unique place in sailors\u2019 psyches. It is sailing\u2019s Everest climb. And so in 2022 another 16 (15 men, one woman) set off to do it all again. Among them was Kirsten Neusch\u00e4fer.
\nNeusch\u00e4fer cut her teeth in the Southern Ocean with Skip Novak\u2019s Pelagic Expeditions. Photo: Kirsten Neusch\u00e4fer
\nSpirit of adventure
\nNeusch\u00e4fer, 40, grew up in Pretoria, South Africa. Far from the sea, she learned to sail as a child on inland lakes in Optimists and Hobie cats. But the seed of a bigger sailing adventure was planted from an early age.
\n\u201cMy dad actually wanted to go cruising around the world; that was his big dream. He started building a boat before I was born, but ran out of funds so he sold off his share. But he kept on talking to me about his dream. So I thought, well, if you\u2019re not going to do it, I\u2019m going to have to do it one day!\u201d
\nAfter leaving school Neusch\u00e4fer was wavering about whether to become a wildlife vet, working in the bush.
\n\u201cI took a gap year after I finished high school, and the gap year turned into multiple years, and I was less and less attracted by the idea of spending 10 years at university to become a vet,\u201d she recalls.
\nAfter four years in Europe, working jobs as diverse as a sailing instructor to training huskies to wilderness guiding in Spitsbergen, she took on her first enormous challenge: to cycle home to South Africa. Having bought a cheap mountain bike in Berlin, she cycled the length of Africa alone aged 22, covering 15,000km across 12 countries on a year-long adventure.
\nNeusch\u00e4fer finds time for a selfie while up the mast on Minnehaha. Photo: Kirsten Neusch\u00e4fer\/GGR2022
\nMany tried to put her off doing it, with dire warnings about the risk of dehydration in the Sahara, of tropical diseases, of a violent attack, of failure.
\n\u201cBy the time I started my trip I was full of fear,\u201d she recalled on a podcast, but she not only completed it \u2013 sometimes pushing her bicycle for 20km over rutted dust tracks in 40\u00b0 heat \u2013 but had what she describes as \u201cthe most life enriching experience\u201d.
\nIt also crystallised her ambition. \u201cAfter I\u2019d completed my bicycle trip I was standing at Cape Agulhas, looking out towards the ocean and thinking \u2018Now it\u2019s time for me to go to sea\u2019. That\u2019s when I then started trying to get jobs, crewing on sailboats whenever I could just to clock up the miles so that I could do my skipper\u2019s ticket.\u201d
\nShe spent the next decade working out of East London, on the Eastern Cape of South Africa, delivering all kinds of boats around the world, from brand new Leopard catamarans (built at Robertson and Caine, just outside Cape Town) to private vessels and even barely seaworthy salvage yachts.
\n\u201cEast London was a good place to be because everyone had to stop, coming from Durban down to the Cape. So I met delivery skippers that were heading offshore across the Atlantic and all over, and that\u2019s how I got a foot into doing the offshore deliveries. It was fantastic, we went everywhere. We were in the Caribbean, North America, South America, Hong Kong, China, New Zealand, Australia, the Indian Ocean islands like R\u00e9union and Mauritius and the Seychelles. And we went up to Europe and the Mediterranean.
\nNeusch\u00e4fer\u2019s Cape George 36 Minnehaha passes through the GGR\u2019s Hobart gate on Christmas day 2022. Photo: DD&JJ\/GGR2022
\n\u201cFor Leopard it became really interesting because they used to deliver those new catamarans via Panama if we were going to go to Australia or Tahiti. But they urgently needed a boat to get to the Sydney Boat Show, and asked the skippers, is anyone willing to go via the Southern Indian Ocean because we don\u2019t have time to go to Panama? No one wanted to do it, but I said, \u2018I\u2019d love to do it, I\u2019d love to experience the Southern Indian Ocean.\u201d It was an eventful trip, sailing through 60-knot winds with the catamaran surfing down waves at 25-plus knots under bare poles, but Neusch\u00e4fer had her first taste of the South.
\nBefore the reincarnation of the Golden Globe had even been re-imagined, Neusch\u00e4fer was building the skills that would see her to the start.
\n\u201cSometimes it just seemed like everything was kind of destined towards it. For example, the first single-handing I did was on the South African coast, which was a fantastic experience because you have to stay close in shore and be able to survive on cat naps.
\n\u201cThen I had the privilege of doing a longer solo trip. It\u2019s hard to find owners that are willing to let you single-hand their boat, especially if the boat is dear to them. A friend allowed me to deliver his boat from Portugal down to East London. And it was a high maintenance boat: it had lots of issues and very little electronics, a handheld GPS maybe on board. We put AIS in as a minimum. But even that was an amazing experience towards preparing for the Golden Globe without knowing it at the time.\u201d
\nBy the time she entered the 2022 Golden Globe Race she had clocked up over 200,000 ocean miles.
\nIn a relaxed mood two days before the Golden Globe Race start. Photo: Sebastien Salom-Gomis\/AFP\/Getty
\nSouthern ocean prep
\nIn 2015 she began working with Skip Novak at Pelagic Expeditions. \u201cWorking down in places like South Georgia and Antarctica, that was just a dream come true.
\n\u201cIt was also a fantastic prep in every sense, firstly because it was Southern Ocean sailing and heavy weather sailing. But then Skip used to always involve the skippers and crew in the refits of the boats, whether it was changing out a ram for an autopilot or upgrading the systems, grinding steel, we all did it ourselves. Which meant that if we could do it in port, we could probably also do it when we were sitting at anchor in South Georgia or in the middle of the ocean.\u201d
\nNovak recalls: \u201cI think her most outstanding attribute is, as we say in South Africa, \u2018just getting on with things\u2019. Which means get the job done without being asked, being one step ahead and never turning your back on any task no matter how unpleasant or uncomfortable. These are all the things we look for in our operations in high latitudes. Obviously this skill and character set surely lends itself for solo sailing.\u201d
\nWhen she entered the second Golden Globe Race, the only thing she didn\u2019t have was racing experience, having only competed in a few relaxed coastal races on the Eastern Cape. Undeterred, Neusch\u00e4fer was confident it was a race she could excel at.
\nGolden Globe Race victory at Les Sables D\u2019Olonne and Neusch\u00e4fer enters the history books as the first woman to win a solo around the world race. Photo: Lo\u00efc Venance\/Getty
\n\u201cThis Golden Globe Race was completely different. More of an adventure race than a high performance race. A race where, first and foremost, you\u2019ve got to make it round, survive with your boat, and then after that, well, you need a whole lot of luck as well. I just felt confident that I\u2019d be able to take care of a boat on a race like that. I wanted to challenge myself to the max.\u201d
\nShe found a Cape George 36 for sale in Newfoundland, bought the boat, and flew home to South Africa for a holiday. Then the pandemic broke out. She spent seven months trying to negotiate her way through border restrictions to get back to her boat, finally reuniting with Minnehaha in November 2020. \u201cBy then the winter storms were sweeping across the Cabot Strait, ice was accumulating on the rig, and the boat needed major attention,\u201d she recalled.
\n16 skippers set off in 32-36ft yachts around the world via the three Great Capes. Photo: Sebastien Salom-Gomis\/AFP\/Getty
\nShe sailed across the Cabot Strait to Prince Edward Island in Nova Scotia, and went no further. Instead she hauled Minnehaha out and spent a year on the remote Canadian island refitting it, hands-on, with the help of a fascinated local community. Determined to visit home before the race start, but not wanting to risk being separated from her yacht again, she sailed single-handed from Nova Scotia to South Africa, then back up the Atlantic to France. The qualification requirements for the race were 2,000 miles solo. By the time Neusch\u00e4fer tied up in Les Sables d\u2019Olonne she had done over seven times that.
\nIt was only then that she started to feel daunted.
\n\u201cI must admit, the three weeks in Les Sables leading up to the race were, for me, incredibly stressful, because all I wanted to do was be on a private dock and completely anonymous, so that I could just focus.\u201d
\nBut while other competitors struggled to find their rhythm after the start \u2013 Abhilash Tomy revealed he had suffered PTSD symptoms after starting the race following his life-saving rescue in the 2018 edition; Guy de Boer grounded in Lanzarote; others retired \u2013 Neusch\u00e4fer was back in her happy place: alone at sea. On the south-bound Atlantic leg she chose not to chat to fellow competitors.
\n\u201cI didn\u2019t really feel like speaking to other people because I just wanted to be alone. And also I realised I was going to be frustrated trying to figure out where they were and if they were ahead of me or behind me. I thought, \u2018Don\u2019t concentrate on it. It\u2019s early days, you just sail, do your best\u2019.\u201d
\nRescue drama
\nThings changed dramatically on 18 November when fellow competitor Tapio Lehtinen\u2019s boat sank beneath him 450 miles off South Africa. Neusch\u00e4fer already knew that Briton Simon Curwen was ahead, Tomy behind, and she was likely closest to Lehtinen when she got the message that he was in a liferaft. \u201cFrom that moment on I forgot about the race. It was just about getting to Tapio as quickly as possible, so I got up as much sail as I could. I spent the whole night at the helm, I didn\u2019t leave it once.\u201d
\nShe executed a smooth rescue \u2013 locating Lehtinen in his tiny raft and retrieving him onto Minnehaha, before a tricky transfer to a cargo ship. Then Neusch\u00e4fer was on the ocean alone again, coursing with adrenaline. \u201cI had to debrief myself after that. I had to process the fact that his boat had sunk within minutes, because you don\u2019t think about it.
\n\u201cBut otherwise I went straight back into my normal sailing mode. The very first thing I did was seal up the [emergency] GPS again. It didn\u2019t fit into the picture at all.\u201d
\nNeusch\u00e4fer raced on, holding 2nd place through the Indian Ocean, trading places with Tomy in the Pacific. All the while more and more competitors dropped out.
\nShe avoided the worst of the Southern Ocean storms, skirting a low on the approach to Cape Horn. \u201cIt was fine. I knew that I had enough time to get to the north so that I wouldn\u2019t be in the dangerous quadrant of the storm. For the first time, I was doing what I said I would, and that was to deploy a warp. Even though it was storm conditions, I had absolute confidence in the boat and when I realised she\u2019s actually handling really well, it was kind of fun.\u201d
\nNeusch\u00e4fer sailed to the rescue of fellow competitor Tapio Lehtinien when his boat sank beneath him. Photo: Kirsten Neusch\u00e4fer\/GGR2022
\nThen race leader Curwen had to pull into Chile to make windvane repairs, dropping him to Chichester class. The race was on for the win. She began to push.
\n\u201cI had a week of fantastic sailing where Minnehaha was just flying. The wind was strong, and there was a decent swell running, but it wasn\u2019t an aggressive swell, the kind of waves that you could surf. I know I had moments where Minnehaha was over-canvassed \u2013 I was using just the twin foresails, no main up. One wing pulled out to either side and she was flying along shooting a rooster tail out of her stern. I\u2019d never seen this on a 12-tonne 36ft boat. It was absolutely exhilarating but I knew I was really pushing things on the edge of what\u2019s acceptable.\u201d
\nRace to the finish
\nNeusch\u00e4fer rounded Cape Horn in the lead (which she confirmed after hailing the lighthouse keeper on VHF). The race would be decided in the Atlantic. With limited weather information available, deciding how to negotiate the doldrums and St Helena High was an exercise in frustration knowing that Tomy\u2019s Rustler 36 Bayanat was likely faster in light winds.
\n\u201cWhere [the weather] did become really difficult was after the Falkland Islands, where I just didn\u2019t really know anymore. There was no information to be had.\u201d She relied mainly on a 1978 edition of Ocean Passages for the World, which sent her on an easterly course. Tomy stayed west.
\nNeusch\u00e4fer gets a hug from mother, Annette. Photo: Kirsten Neusch\u00e4fer\/GGR2022
\nIt wasn\u2019t until the first spectator fleet boats greeted her off Les Sables d\u2019Olonne that Neusch\u00e4fer knew for sure that she was about to win. She ghosted over the line on 27 April, becoming the second winner of the modern Golden Globe Race and the first woman to ever win a solo around the world race. It\u2019s a distinction she has never focussed on.
\n\u201cI never really thought about being the first woman. I was very proud to cross the finish line and wave the South African flag. And if it\u2019s also to wave the flag for women, then great. It\u2019s a good feeling, it really is.\u201d
\nGround-breaking female sailors celebrated her achievement: Sam Davies came to congratulate her in person, Tracy Edwards sent a video message, Catherine Chabaud (first female sailor to race solo non-stop around the world) stood beside her on the prizegiving stage \u201cI think that\u2019s when it sank in. Maybe it is an historical thing, maybe it\u2019s not, but I was just incredibly honoured that these legendary sailors were congratulating me.\u201d
\nAs for what next? Minnehaha will likely have to be sold. \u201cI don\u2019t even want to think of the moment of getting rid of her yet because she\u2019s been such a big part of my life. I think only once I\u2019ve done that will I be ready to start thinking of the next big adventure. What it is, I really don\u2019t know, but it will be something\u2026\u201d<\/p>\n
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The post Lone star: Kirsten Neusch\u00e4fer the Golden Globe Race winner appeared first on Yachting World.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
As winner of the Golden Globe Race, Kirsten Neusch\u00e4fer is the first woman to win a solo around the world race. Helen Fretter finds out what drives her\u201cSometimes in the tropics, if it\u2019s nice and calm, I\u2019ll drop sail and … <\/p>\n