Shipping solid green water in the Southern Ocean on the ultra-low freeboard Murnikov-designed Russian entry Fazisi in the 1989/90 race. In some respects Fazisi was ahead of its time, a lighter, offshore-oriented interpretation of the IOR rule. Ironically that race was won by probably the biggest, heaviest IOR boat ever, Peter Blake’s ketch Steinlager – a medium-air machine. In spite of big setbacks, including a vanishing sponsor and the suicide of the boat’s original Russian co-skipper, Fazisi finished 11th overall out of 23 starters
Year’s Eve 1989 and a New Zealand radio interviewer asked Grant Dalton, the hard- driving skipper of Fisher & Paykel, what the crew were going to do to celebrate. Dalton answered tersely, ‘Nothing, we will celebrate when we get to Auckland.’ Dalton meant business, the stakes were
high, and Peter Blake and the red-hulled Steinlager were just a couple of miles ahead. There would be no time for frivo- lity, only time for trimming and tweaking. And the event was for ever changed. Aside from the living conditions and the
attitude toward racing there are many stark differences between the early races and the one taking place right now. I have not sailed a VO65 (I did get in the virtual one at the race village in Alicante but I don’t think that counts) so I don’t have any first-hand experience of just how brutal and tough those boats are to sail. From the amazing onboard footage
piped back via satellite it’s clear that life onboard is harsh, wet, full on and frighten- ing. The sailors are very different animals. These are hardened professionals whose livelihood depends upon how well they perform. There is a gym routine during the layovers, strict clothing requirements and a mental focus that is all about winning. Long gone are the days when thick black coffee and a couple of Gauloises would be a good way to start a watch. Despite the amenities we enjoyed (like
a freezer) we were sailing in relatively uncharted waters. The boats were OK,
38 SEAHORSE
most of them, but the gear and the engi- neering were not. Winches were routinely pulled off the deck, halyards snapped at will and the sails were heavy and brutal to deal with. The race was raced under the old IOR
rule which originally permitted an unlim- ited number of sails. We had dozens of headsails, spinnakers, bloopers and stay- sails which had to be moved from side to side each time we tacked. Working sails were Dacron, many of them two-ply, and when wet (which they were most of the time) they were even heavier and more unwieldy. On Alaska Eagle we opted for a foil on
the headstay and luff tape on the headsails for the up and down legs, but for the two Southern Ocean legs it was hanks; brass hanks which I sewed on to each sail in Cape Town and removed in Punte del Este. Luff tape was such a new idea that we didn’t trust it for the southern legs, opt- ing instead for hanks which at times were so cold that your fingers stuck to them like the kid licking the lamppost in mid-winter. To unhank the sail you had to remove
your gloves and the cold was brutal. I guess the most terrifying thing that modern VOR sailors don’t have to deal with is the wire sheets. There was no fancy light and flexible Dyneema; it was wire and the after-guys on Drumwere half-inch wire stretched bar tight. To ease the sheet you had to get a firm hand on the wire on the drum, loosen it slightly and coax the
wire which in many cases had creased the drums from being under so much load, and then brace yourself as the boat shuddered as the sheet was eased. If your bunk happened to be directly under one of the primary winches you were treated to a sound no less frightening than the screech of a demented pig being slaughtered. The races back then were four legs and
each leg took around six weeks. The lay- overs in Cape Town, Auckland and South America were long, four weeks or so, and they were a lot of fun. There was time for a safari or a beach holiday. By contrast the course of the modern-
day Volvo Ocean Race is almost twice as long and is a series of frantic sprints, both on the water and on land. It’s business 24/7 with very little time for R&R. In other words, it’s a brutal schedule dictated in part by the high demands of the sponsors who have invested a lot of money. Money in, return out, or you are off the boat. I am almost certain that the 23-year-old
version of me, or even the 27 or 31-year-old version of me would not willingly subject myself to that kind of rigour. But then again these VOR sailors are actually getting paid for their efforts. We were doing it for room and board and the adventure. I am certain that knowing there was a pay cheque would make dragging a tired and battered body out of a warm bunk a little easier. One other thing about the course. In the
early races there were no restrictions on how far south you could go on the
SKIP NOVAK/PPL
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