starters and with the help of hindsight we now know that he wasn’t nearly the worst off. However, his boat was far from ready and the ‘preparation’ work continued at sea. Only when passing the Cape of Good Hope did Tapio believe that Asteria was finally fit for the fight, just in time for the Southern Ocean. But while Tapio was thinking that it
was now time to start pushing harder against his surviving competitors, in the steadily worsening conditions he started getting worried about his performance… Asteriawas not moving as she should and
could. Well before the mandatory pitstop in Hobart he discovered that the entire bottom of his 36-footer was covered by barnacles. He was not able to remove these passengers and hence he was out of the race, dribbling along more slowly every day. Now he was focused on hanging on to finish the course – for Tapio, a matter of honour. At the end he was one of only five
entrants to cross the finish, 322 days after the race start and months after the prize- giving: 322 days – 10 days longer than Sir Robin Knox-Johnston on Suhaili in 1968. But with a long time onboard dragging
his underwater garden to Les Sables d’Olonne, he did have time to plan his future. As a result, he announced not only a comeback to the Golden Globe Race in 2022 but also an entry in the fully crewed Ocean Globe Race 2023. But for the latter he needed a new boat, and the choice was easy once again: another S&S classic, a 1970 Swan 55 yawl was available in England. Plans for financing and closing the deal were immediately underway.
GGR REMATCH (RESCUED AT SEA) Tapio is a racer – getting his boat to the finish after realising before half-distance that his race was over was mentally tough. Hence no one who really knows him was surprised when Tapio announced his return to the GGR in 2022. Asteria was further modified and equipment updated. But basically he still trusted his original philosophy and his choices. This time he would be ready from the
GGR start and he aimed at nothing less than winning the race. Everything was looking promising for Tapio on start day, his young OGR team onboard the Swan 55 Galiana were escorting Asteria and Tapio across the line when the start gun in Les Sables d’Olonne was fired on 4 September. But by the first sunset Tapio noticed he was not well. A previous Covid-infection prob- ably gave him a high fever. He was sleeping too deeply after taking heavy medication and so had set the boat up conservatively for those first days in the Bay of Biscay. He crossed busy shipping lanes without
incident… but also without being aware of it. Fast asleep and not really in control. Luckily, he came through unhurt and after a couple of days he started to feel better. At the same time the routeing plan devised by his son Lauri and his OGR team member Lassi Liimatainen worked out well and his
56 SEAHORSE
FLAG-BEARER OF THE RETRO WHITBREAD Straight after the rescue and his return home Tapio was fully occupied with the prepara- tions of Galiana and his young team for the Ocean Globe Race. Thousands of hours in the boatshed and endless meetings with suppliers and sponsor candidates kept not only Tapio but the entire team busy for months. The old lady was launched again in June 2023, renamed Galiana WithSecure and looking like new both inside and out. Major delays were caused by the French
Second time around sailing Lehtinen’s beloved Gaia 36 Asteria in the 2022/2023 Golden Globe. One of the last pictures of Asteria which a few days later suddenly started taking on water before sinking in under 20 minutes. The Finn was picked up by eventual winner Kirsten Neuschäfer
recovery from illness was accelerated by good news on the racecourse: Asteria was sailing in second place after the first 72 hours at sea. The good progress continued and Tapio
helmed Asteria to the mandatory Lanzarote film-drop still in second position, close behind race leader Simon Curwen. In the race across the Atlantic to the Brazilian coast and down to Cape Town he contin- ued to do well; it was all going according to plan and Asteria was still hanging on to second sailing a parallel course to South African solo sailor Kirsten Neuschäfer. No one could guess that the photos of
the pretty Asteria passing Cape Town were to be the last ones ever taken of her. Fortunately, they were not the last photos of Tapio. Only 10 days after the pitstop outside Cape Town news reached the fol- lowers of the race: ‘Distress signal received from Asteria. The onboard GGR tracker has stopped transmitting.’ Very soon it became clear that Asteria
had sunk and very probably sunk quickly. It took some painfully long hours to find out that Tapio was in a liferaft… where he was sending out cryptic messages having lost his reading glasses. But he was alive. However, he still had to pass another
24 hours on the raft on the doorstep of the Southern Ocean, 450nm southeast of Port Elizabeth. But this time Tapio had Lady Fortune on his side – the winds were light to moderate, swell reasonable, and there were two experienced competitors not far behind. Also, very soon, a Hong Kong-flagged freighter was turning for Tapio’s rescue, expected in his location within 15 hours. However, as in a well-written thriller, it
was Kirsten Neuschäfer who first came across Tapio’s raft and invited him onboard Minnehaha for a well-deserved shot of rum. Soon after this too good to be true reunion at sea, the freighter broke out of the horizon and the rescue was com- pleted as Tapio clambered aboard the bulk carrier Darya Gayatri. Tapio got home for a family Christmas and time spent with his grandchildren… And then speedily got going with preparations for the next challenge, the Ocean Globe Race 2023.
rigging company; they not only missed all their deadlines but they also delivered wrongly measured standing rigging and with the wrong fittings on the end! Hence it was little surprise after all when Galiana WithSecure lost its brand new main mast in the stormy opening night of the 2023 Fastnet Race, only weeks before the start of OGR itself. One more test was being thrown at Tapio and his team. After some quick decision-making and a
series of heroic operations, not least by the local Marine Rigging Services in Gosport, the rig was standing again and passed sea-trials just in time. Galiana WithSecure started in the OGR fleet of 14 yachts to sail around the world in retro style, following the first ever Whitbread race in 1973. So far there are no more confirmed
future plans, but it is not too difficult to guess what Tapio might be thinking of next. Another lap of the globe perhaps?
THE LATER YEARS – Tapio Lehtinen After starting offshore racing during my exchange student year in Newport Beach, CA and continuing during my high school and college years in Finland, I ended up sailing the 1981 Whitbread Race as a 23-year-old watch captain on Skopbank of Finland. I then continued with a few summers of double-handed racing with my late friend Kai Granholm, on his S&S Avance 40 Mobira sailing the Round Britain, TwoStar and AZAB races. However, getting married and then
widowed with two small kids ended my ocean racing for 30 years – although I did manage to occasionally race our lovely family 1936 Six Metre May Be IV. For decades I used to say that I had a bright ocean racing future behind me. Come Don McIntyre and everything
was changed. In 2017 my then 30-year-old son Lauri, who had finished his active racing career at the London Olympics, seventh in the 49er class, asked me whether I had noticed in Scuttlebutt news of the retro Golden Globe Race. I hadn’t, but after reading it I remembered having always taught my kids that life is a series of opportunities going past you – I soon realised that this was one not to let go. I studied the NoR and especially the list
of boats Don had made that would be eligi- ble for the race. As a fanatic Olin Stephens fan I found two of his designs on the list, the slightly bigger and more modern example
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52 |
Page 53 |
Page 54 |
Page 55 |
Page 56 |
Page 57 |
Page 58 |
Page 59 |
Page 60 |
Page 61 |
Page 62 |
Page 63 |
Page 64 |
Page 65 |
Page 66 |
Page 67 |
Page 68 |
Page 69 |
Page 70 |
Page 71 |
Page 72 |
Page 73 |
Page 74 |
Page 75 |
Page 76 |
Page 77 |
Page 78 |
Page 79 |
Page 80 |
Page 81 |
Page 82 |
Page 83 |
Page 84 |
Page 85 |
Page 86 |
Page 87 |
Page 88 |
Page 89 |
Page 90 |
Page 91 |
Page 92 |
Page 93 |
Page 94 |
Page 95 |
Page 96 |
Page 97 |
Page 98 |
Page 99 |
Page 100 |
Page 101 |
Page 102 |
Page 103 |
Page 104 |
Page 105 |
Page 106 |
Page 107 |
Page 108 |
Page 109 |
Page 110 |
Page 111 |
Page 112 |
Page 113 |
Page 114 |
Page 115 |
Page 116 |
Page 117 |
Page 118 |
Page 119 |
Page 120 |
Page 121 |
Page 122 |
Page 123 |
Page 124
