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Speaker 1: Hey, it's Chloe here. I am so incredibly excited to

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Speaker 1: officially announce the Female Athlete Project Awards, a new chapter

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Speaker 1: in celebrating the achievements of athletes and key contributors in

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Speaker 1: women's sports. The TEFAPP Awards is more than just recognizing

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Speaker 1: athletic excellence. It's a campaign to elevate the achievements, voices

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Speaker 1: and stories of athletes, brassroots, administrators, coaches, and those who

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Speaker 1: foster a broader impact on and off the field. These

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Speaker 1: awards are open to all women and non binary people

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Speaker 1: who identify with and contribute to the women's sport community.

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Speaker 1: All key award dates, information and criteria can be found

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Speaker 1: at the Female Athleteproject dot com. Forward Slash Awards Get

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Speaker 1: online now and nominate.

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Speaker 2: When Lisa Blair was twenty five, she fell in love

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Speaker 2: with sailing, working as a hostess on a sailboat Fast Foward.

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Speaker 2: Only seven years later and she became the first woman

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Speaker 2: to sail solo around Antarctica with just one stop. But

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Speaker 2: it wasn't without complications, having a near death experience where

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Speaker 2: her yacht dismastered it. See Still, she kept sailing quickly,

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Speaker 2: becoming the fastest woman to sail solo around Australia and

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Speaker 2: then Antarctica as she crazily attempted her record.

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Speaker 3: Again and beat it by ten days. All these adventures.

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Speaker 2: Took place on board her yacht Climate Action Now, which

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Speaker 2: she hopes will inspire others to take action towards sustainability.

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Speaker 2: My name is Sophie and I'm the producer here at

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Speaker 2: the Female Athlete Project. Chloe caught up with Lisa for

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Speaker 2: one of the brief moments she had her land legs.

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Speaker 2: This chat proves that anything is possible if you put

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Speaker 2: your mind to it. Just ask Lisa, who's gearing up

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Speaker 2: to break another record by traveling the Arctic solo.

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Speaker 1: We hope you enjoyed it, Lisa, Welcome to the Female

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Speaker 1: Athlete Project. Thank you.

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Speaker 3: I'm so excited for this chat. No, it's gonna be fun.

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Speaker 1: It's going to be very, very fun. I cannot wait

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Speaker 1: to talk about. You've had some epic adventures so far

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Speaker 1: already in your life. You're planning another amazing one. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: But before we get to those, can you describe yourself

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Speaker 1: as a little kid.

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Speaker 3: Yeah.

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Speaker 4: I think myself and my mum have a different opinion of.

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Speaker 3: What I was like as a little kid, but I

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Speaker 3: grew up in.

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Speaker 4: The bush, so we were very independent, run around, play

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Speaker 4: build forts, jump across creek, like the rocks on the creek,

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Speaker 4: that kind of stuff. But in school I actually got

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Speaker 4: heavily bullied because of it. So I all through my

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Speaker 4: high school years, like I had the whole of like

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Speaker 4: year eleven and twelve like isolate me from the group.

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Speaker 4: Like I was just that little bit different because of

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Speaker 4: the childhood upbringing that we had in the bush, sol

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Speaker 4: the power, you know, we didn't have access to like

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Speaker 4: the Simpsons or neighbors or like you know, modern TV

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Speaker 4: and things like that, and so it just meant that

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Speaker 4: we were just that little bit more i don't know, independent,

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Speaker 4: creative out there, and that wasn't really absorbed very well.

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Speaker 3: So I like to say that I was a really bubbly.

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Speaker 4: Vibrant kid, but then when I went through that phase,

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Speaker 4: I was like very different to kind of who I

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Speaker 4: am now.

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Speaker 1: I'm sorry that you went through that. It's kids. It

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Speaker 1: can just be really.

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Speaker 4: Horrible, horrible yeah yeah, no filter, yeah.

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Speaker 1: No filter, and just that concept of someone being slightly

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Speaker 1: different than what's deemed normal.

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Speaker 4: Yeah, and that pack mentality as well, like oh, I'll

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Speaker 4: just do what they want to do because that makes

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Speaker 4: me cool.

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Speaker 3: Then like, yeah, that was.

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Speaker 1: A great I imagine what is celebrated about you and

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Speaker 1: your achievements now and what you're doing in the sustainability

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Speaker 1: space is something that's so celebrated and cherished by so

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Speaker 1: many people. So it's so weird that as an adult

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Speaker 1: it's something that's such a beautiful thing, but as a

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Speaker 1: young person people see it as a threat or whatever

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Speaker 1: that is.

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Speaker 4: But I'm so grateful for that childhood, even as hard

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Speaker 4: as it was a it gave me the resilience that

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Speaker 4: I've got now, and it showed me that you can

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Speaker 4: go through those bad moments and come out on top.

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Speaker 3: You've just got to keep moving forward.

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Speaker 4: The biggest lesson I think I took from all of

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Speaker 4: that was that attitude is everything. Like we can't control

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Speaker 4: what other people do to us, we can't control what

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Speaker 4: they say to us. We can only control how we

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Speaker 4: respond to that. And for me, I decided that I

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Speaker 4: wanted to be loud and proud and bubbly and go

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Speaker 4: out and have incredible adventures. And you know, a nine

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Speaker 4: to five job just wasn't on the cards for me,

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Speaker 4: and so I was able to do that.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, I love that. How did you first find a

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Speaker 1: love for being on the water.

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Speaker 4: Well, we grew up in the bush, so it was like,

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Speaker 4: you know, little bush kid running around bare feet, playing

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Speaker 4: with the dingos and stuff, and so it wasn't until

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Speaker 4: I randomly in my last year at university so studied

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Speaker 4: visual arts and education. So the intention was to be

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Speaker 4: a high school art teacher. Don't know why I wanted

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Speaker 4: to go back to school and put myself through more trauma.

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Speaker 3: But anyway, that was the intension, and my high.

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Speaker 4: School art teacher had been my inspiration had been the

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Speaker 4: rock through that period of time gave me a safe

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Speaker 4: haven and everything.

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Speaker 3: And then one summer.

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Speaker 4: Break it was meant to be a three month working

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Speaker 4: trip up in the with Sunday Islands, and I got

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Speaker 4: a job on a sailboat as the cook and the cleaner.

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Speaker 4: So I became a hostess on a sailboat, fell in

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Speaker 4: love with it, and we do these like two nights,

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Speaker 4: three day trips around the islands up there in the

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Speaker 4: Sundays and it was just an awesome adventure. And I

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Speaker 4: used to I used to pest in my deckhan and

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Speaker 4: skip us so hard.

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Speaker 3: And be like what's the name of that rope? What's

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Speaker 3: that do? What's this too? What do I do if

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Speaker 3: I pull this?

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Speaker 1: Like?

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Speaker 4: And I just peg them with questions and just asked

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Speaker 4: all the questions I could, and I just loved it,

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Speaker 4: and it really felt like freedom to me on the ocean.

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Speaker 1: Where do you think that idea of learning and asking

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Speaker 1: questions and wanting to know all of the things, was

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Speaker 1: that an inherent thing? Yeah?

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Speaker 4: I've never been a guess, particularly shy about asking for

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Speaker 4: something like, and I'm very conscious that if you don't

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Speaker 4: put yourself out there, you're not going to get anything

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Speaker 4: like if you never asked the question, you're never going

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Speaker 4: to know the answer, whether that be for sponsorship or

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Speaker 4: adventure or you know, learning literally the ropes on the boat.

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Speaker 3: Yeah. I also, I guess at the time when.

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Speaker 4: I first started on a sailboat, I would look at

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Speaker 4: the captain of the boat and be like, he's incredible.

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Speaker 4: He knows how to fix an engine, he can do wiring,

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Speaker 4: he can do plumbing, he can fix stales, he's managing

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Speaker 4: a boat. He can dock a seventy foot yacht. Like

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Speaker 4: this is insanity. I could never be that. But I

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Speaker 4: always sort of thought that if I wanted that adventure,

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Speaker 4: I needed to learn a little bit and be able

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Speaker 4: to be a valuable kind of crew member. And so

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Speaker 4: I guess that's that's where the question started.

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Speaker 1: And did it feel quite foreign being a kid from

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Speaker 1: the boys being on the water.

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Speaker 4: No, I guess, like dad was a dive master growing up,

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Speaker 4: so we'd spent a bit of time at sea, not

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Speaker 4: necessarily us at sea, but in and around stories of

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Speaker 4: the ocean and under the sea particularly.

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Speaker 3: But yeah, no, we.

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Speaker 4: Lived about thirty minutes from the beach, so it wasn't

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Speaker 4: something that we did a lot. And when my parents

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Speaker 4: got divorced, I ended up living with mum on the

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Speaker 4: beach for like two years through high school and just

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Speaker 4: loved it. And then we went back to the bush

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Speaker 4: property afterwards for a little while, a little while, but

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Speaker 4: so it wasn't like this new thing, but sailing. Sailing

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Speaker 4: had also been something we'd been a little bit exposed to.

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Speaker 4: So my mom's new partner after the divorce, he had

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Speaker 4: a sailboat, and so our Easter holidays would be on

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Speaker 4: his boat.

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Speaker 3: But I'm a teenage girl.

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Speaker 4: The last thing I wanted to do was learn about

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Speaker 4: ropes on a boat. From a dude who's not my father,

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Speaker 4: you know, like that whole like complicated divorce scenario, new partner,

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Speaker 4: teenage kid, really rebellious teenage kid. So yeah, so I

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Speaker 4: never really learned anything about sailing through that. I just

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Speaker 4: knew I enjoyed being on the ocean.

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Speaker 1: And so how did you go from cooking and cleaning

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Speaker 1: on the boat two? We won't go as far to

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Speaker 1: say to what you've achieved now, but what was the

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Speaker 1: next step from there?

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Speaker 3: Yeah?

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Speaker 4: I Well, as a story I don't tell often because

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Speaker 4: I don't think that there's anything different between guys and

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Speaker 4: girls on boats at all.

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Speaker 3: We're just sailors. We can both were both as capable.

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Speaker 4: But you know, given the theme of this podcast, I

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Speaker 4: think it's really relevant story, so I'll share it. But

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Speaker 4: so I had been working for this company for about

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Speaker 4: six to seven months, and I was trying to work

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Speaker 4: my way up to the point where I was out

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Speaker 4: of the kitchen and able to run the boat and

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Speaker 4: like the deckhand kind of roll and I could do

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Speaker 4: the jobs.

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Speaker 3: I knew all the ropes, I had gotten the.

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Speaker 4: Knowledge together to do that, had all the right licenses,

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Speaker 4: had notified HR that this was something that I really

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Speaker 4: wanted to do and at the time they said, yeah, yeah,

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Speaker 4: of course, when the next position comes up, you'd be perfect.

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Speaker 4: And so they had sort of almost half offered, not

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Speaker 4: really but sort of offered this next position. So it

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Speaker 4: was more of a waiting game for that opportunity. And

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Speaker 4: about seven or eight months into working for this job,

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Speaker 4: the opportunity came up and they ended up hiring a

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Speaker 4: guy who wrote in the back of a chocolate bar,

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Speaker 4: please hire me over someone who'd been with the company

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Speaker 4: for seven months, had all the skills, the equipment, had

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Speaker 4: the tickets, and he had no tickets, never been on

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Speaker 4: a sail boat, and they put him in that position.

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Speaker 4: So I actually quit the job the very next day,

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Speaker 4: and I had an opportunity a week later, and it

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Speaker 4: changed my life. I Mean, sometimes these things, as bad

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Speaker 4: as they are, open other doors. And I I had

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Speaker 4: an opportunity a week later to jump on a sailboat

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Speaker 4: from Samoa to Hawaii, and I took it, and I.

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Speaker 3: Sailed to Hawaii and just had this open ocean, incredible

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Speaker 3: journey with friends.

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Speaker 4: And it was a made of mine from Uni and

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Speaker 4: her father owned the boat, and so it was three

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Speaker 4: months completely off grid night watchers night, sailing whales around

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Speaker 4: us in the middle of the night with a perfectly clear,

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Speaker 4: starry night, like it was just the most magical experience.

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Speaker 3: And I just.

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Speaker 4: Fell absolutely in love with that idea of like sailing

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Speaker 4: to other countries, not just sailing around the harbor, but

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Speaker 4: to other countries, like across oceans. And it wasn't necessarily

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Speaker 4: the destinations that interested me. It was the time at

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Speaker 4: sea that I really enjoyed.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, how amazing. Yeah, And when did the idea of

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Speaker 1: doing that solo start to come into your mind?

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Speaker 3: Yeah? When did I go a little off the rails?

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Speaker 1: I say that, I guess.

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Speaker 3: Yeah.

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Speaker 4: I finished that trip and I came back to Australia

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Speaker 4: broke got the first job I could get, which was

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Speaker 4: selling costume dury in the mall, like five dollar pieces

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Speaker 4: of plassy and it was one of those little central

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Speaker 4: stalls that everyone looks at you as they walk past.

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Speaker 4: And so I was like, in this trappy job, hating

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Speaker 4: it under fluo LARTs, after just having this incredible adventure,

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Speaker 4: thinking I just.

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Speaker 3: Want to be out there. I don't want to be here.

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Speaker 3: How do I get to there?

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Speaker 4: And I started reading all these books and so my

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Speaker 4: mum's partner John he lent me all these books, and

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Speaker 4: the books were heavily themed on solo sailors.

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Speaker 3: Okay, so it was like.

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Speaker 4: Robin Knox, Johnson, k Cottie, Jesse Martin, like all these

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Speaker 4: incredible historical solo sailors world first.

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Speaker 3: And as I was.

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Speaker 4: Reading these, I was like, oh, I'd love to do

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Speaker 4: that like one day, thinking like thirty years because I

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Speaker 4: still hadn't got the enough experience. And in one of

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Speaker 4: the books they talked about this yacht race called the

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Speaker 4: Clipper around the World yacht race, which is a crude

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Speaker 4: yacht race where you sign up, you pay a birth fee,

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Speaker 4: and you race each.

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Speaker 3: Other around the planet.

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Speaker 4: And so I obviously got fixated on that idea, thinking

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Speaker 4: this is incredible.

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Speaker 1: Pause on the pay that you literally just said, just

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Speaker 1: race around the planet, like at like is that just

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Speaker 1: normal in your daily life that you just talk about

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Speaker 1: like racing around the planet, because it's kind of what

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Speaker 1: you do, Like.

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Speaker 3: Now it's now it is.

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Speaker 4: Then it was absolutely like my entire family thought I

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Speaker 4: was nuts trying to.

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Speaker 3: Even look at this.

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Speaker 4: Yeah, and the birthday at the time was eighty thousand

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Speaker 4: dollars well for pound, but the conversion rate at the time,

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Speaker 4: and I was earning twenty bucks an hour, no savings,

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Speaker 4: no options, no real idea of how I would do

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Speaker 4: something like that, and no one in my family had

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Speaker 4: ever really kind of done something like that. Mum had

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Speaker 4: done a fundraise of cancer where she rode her horse

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Speaker 4: to Byron Bay from the Sunshine Coast years and years

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Speaker 4: ago before we were born, but other than that, we

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Speaker 4: didn't really have that kind of mentality. And at the

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Speaker 4: same time, I was like trying to decide whether I

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Speaker 4: could do this race. Trust me, it gets to the

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Speaker 4: solo bit in a minute. But as I was trying

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Speaker 4: to do this race, Jessica Watson, who's like one of

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Speaker 4: Australia's most famous solo sailors. She became the youngest person

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Speaker 4: to sail solo, NonStop and unassisted around the world. And

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Speaker 4: she came into Malullaba on the Sunshine Coast and I

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Speaker 4: was on the Sunshine Coast working in this crappy more

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Speaker 4: and so I'd sort of followed the tail end of

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Speaker 4: her journey because I'd just come back to Australia. And

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Speaker 4: as she finished, I very clearly remember thinking to myself,

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Speaker 4: why am I hesitating? This is an incredible opportunity, like

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Speaker 4: if she can make it happen, she can get a boat.

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Speaker 4: When she started thirteen years old and she left when

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Speaker 4: she was sixteen to race this boat or sail this.

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Speaker 3: Boat around the world. Like what's stopping me, you know,

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Speaker 3: except me?

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Speaker 4: And so I really decided I would commit, and so

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Speaker 4: I signed up, and I signed the contract which locks

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Speaker 4: you in as like an all or nothing, So.

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Speaker 1: You are paying the eighty grand no matter what.

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Speaker 3: You're paying the eighty grand even if you don't go.

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Speaker 4: So if you don't raise that money by the deadline,

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Speaker 4: you don't get to sale around the world, but you

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Speaker 4: still owe the eighty grand. So it was a huge

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Speaker 4: like gamble personally. Yeah, and then I had twelve months

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Speaker 4: to raise the money and did absolutely anything I could.

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Speaker 4: I went to the local library, borrowed a book on

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Speaker 4: sports marketing, read about thin called proposals that you meant.

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Speaker 3: To write sponsorship proposals, and like.

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Speaker 4: Would send these ridiculously useless proposals out to people and

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Speaker 4: then try and get feedback from them, and just started

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Speaker 4: learning about that world and how to sort of build

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Speaker 4: it up. And I ended up doing a fundraiser where

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Speaker 4: I cycled my bike from Sydney to the Sunshine Coast.

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Speaker 3: I'd never ridden a road bike in my life.

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Speaker 1: I I didn't know how to ride a road bike

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Speaker 1: or anything.

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Speaker 4: I had this lovely guy donate a couple of months

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Speaker 4: of time and he kicked me out of bed it

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Speaker 4: four in the morning before work and make me ride

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Speaker 4: up downhill so that I could get fit enough to

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Speaker 4: ride from Sydney up here. And yeah, and I ended

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Speaker 4: up not quite raising the money and I got half

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Speaker 4: of the funds and then called Mum absolutely in tears,

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Speaker 4: saying I can't do it. You know, I'm flying to

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Speaker 4: the UK to start my training for this race in

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Speaker 4: like a week. I've only got forty thousand raised. I

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Speaker 4: don't have enough. It's not going to happen. And Mum,

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Speaker 4: as you'll hear as we go through the rest of

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Speaker 4: the story, she very much has set me back on

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Speaker 4: the path when I get a little bit lost. And

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Speaker 4: this was one of those key moments, and she was like, well,

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Speaker 4: you've paid for the training. You want to become a

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Speaker 4: better sailor, Like, just go and do the training, and

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Speaker 4: so I did. And then eventually another crew member offered

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Speaker 4: a five thousand dollar donation, like pound sorry, And then

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Speaker 4: another one loaned me seven thousand pound and then we

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Speaker 4: refinanced against Dad's house and we were still two thousand

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Speaker 4: short after all of that, and I put an article

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Speaker 4: in the local paper on the Sunshine Coast that went online,

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Speaker 4: and this guy who wants holidayed on the Sunshine Coast

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Speaker 4: lives in China as an American citizen, read that article

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Speaker 4: online somehow still get some email to him, read the

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Speaker 4: article and thought, oh, yeah, I'll donate my fun money,

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Speaker 4: which was exactly two thousand dollars, and.

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Speaker 3: Like the next day I was racing around the planet.

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Speaker 1: Incredible. So it was like this whole.

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Speaker 4: Gamble of like if you don't just throw yourself into it,

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Speaker 4: you'll never find a way. But if you, but you

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00:16:29,560 --> 00:16:32,440
Speaker 4: have to give it literally everything you've got, like to

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00:16:32,520 --> 00:16:35,200
Speaker 4: make it to the start line. And so I went

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Speaker 4: from like someone who would say, oh, you know, Samoato,

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Speaker 4: Hawaii and done a year of sailing before that, to

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Speaker 4: a circumnavigator the year later, after sailing forty thousand miles

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Speaker 4: around the planet and spending a whole year at sea

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Speaker 4: on this boat, learning, working, loving it, but also looking

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Speaker 4: at it all from a solo perspective. And thinking, oh,

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Speaker 4: one day, what would I do if I got in

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Speaker 4: this situation?

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Speaker 3: What would I do in this storm?

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Speaker 4: I set the boat up for this, and so I

348
00:17:02,360 --> 00:17:04,800
Speaker 4: really use that as an opportunity to kind of, I guess,

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Speaker 4: soft test the idea of solo sailing and to gather skills.

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Speaker 4: And Yeah, when I got back from that, I was like, well,

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Speaker 4: what else can I do? I've done something I never

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Speaker 4: thought was possible, and so where.

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Speaker 3: Do I go from here?

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Speaker 1: I started to get a bit emotional when you talked

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Speaker 1: about your mom and Mom's always putting you back on

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Speaker 1: the right path. It's like it's such a powerful thing

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Speaker 1: having someone like that in your corner, isn't it?

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Speaker 4: Well, And like it doesn't have to be your mom,

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00:17:28,800 --> 00:17:32,160
Speaker 4: just has to be someone who sees your vision and

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Speaker 4: trust that you can make it happen, and then back

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00:17:34,880 --> 00:17:37,439
Speaker 4: to you one hundred percent, because you know, sometimes you

362
00:17:37,480 --> 00:17:41,600
Speaker 4: get overwhelmed. Sometimes life is just hard. And when you

363
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Speaker 4: run like a track like that that's off the beaten road,

364
00:17:45,880 --> 00:17:48,000
Speaker 4: like it's always going to be challenging. I mean you

365
00:17:48,040 --> 00:17:51,639
Speaker 4: would know from your sporting career like it's and you

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Speaker 4: need people in your corner that can give you that

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Speaker 4: motivation on the few days that you sometimes can't give

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Speaker 4: it for yourself. Yeah.

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Speaker 1: Absolutely. So you've gone around the world, you've started to

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Speaker 1: learn and think I could do this on my own

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Speaker 1: one day one day. When did the one day happen?

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Speaker 4: Well, then I got back to Australia and I was like, hmm,

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Speaker 4: I'm a little bit bored.

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Speaker 3: Now what am I going to do? I'm going to

375
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Speaker 3: try solo.

376
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Speaker 4: I honestly couldn't think of doing anything more challenging after

377
00:18:19,280 --> 00:18:22,119
Speaker 4: what I'd already done, because racing around the world is hard,

378
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Speaker 4: Like it's physically one of the hardest things you'll ever

379
00:18:26,320 --> 00:18:29,160
Speaker 4: do in your life. Like it's just mentally and physically

380
00:18:29,359 --> 00:18:33,639
Speaker 4: exhausting the whole time. And I like it to like

381
00:18:33,720 --> 00:18:35,920
Speaker 4: running a marathon, where you run the marathon and you're

382
00:18:36,160 --> 00:18:39,520
Speaker 4: that exhausted finish line state and then you stay in

383
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Speaker 4: that state for the entire year, and so that endurance

384
00:18:42,760 --> 00:18:46,640
Speaker 4: game that you play with that and that like, yeah,

385
00:18:46,840 --> 00:18:49,600
Speaker 4: it ruins people, but you can also find a way

386
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Speaker 4: through it. And so I got back and I got

387
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Speaker 4: a hit, funnily enough, a job as the captain of

388
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Speaker 4: the boat that wouldn't hire me as a decand.

389
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Speaker 3: No way yeah. So I came back two years later

390
00:19:01,480 --> 00:19:02,960
Speaker 3: and became the captain of that boat.

391
00:19:03,080 --> 00:19:03,520
Speaker 1: Wow.

392
00:19:03,600 --> 00:19:05,400
Speaker 3: And I was like full circle, yeap.

393
00:19:06,000 --> 00:19:08,800
Speaker 4: Just you know, when roadblocks happened, find another way around it,

394
00:19:09,640 --> 00:19:13,120
Speaker 4: and so I did. And then I was looking at

395
00:19:13,160 --> 00:19:16,919
Speaker 4: solo races and an option to try solo ceiling. I

396
00:19:16,960 --> 00:19:19,399
Speaker 4: didn't own a boat, I still had no money. I was,

397
00:19:19,720 --> 00:19:22,120
Speaker 4: you know, just figuring life out right. And I found

398
00:19:22,200 --> 00:19:24,720
Speaker 4: this yacht race called the Trans Tasman Yacht Race, which

399
00:19:24,840 --> 00:19:28,399
Speaker 4: runs from New Zealand to Australia every four years. And

400
00:19:28,440 --> 00:19:31,120
Speaker 4: I was like, oh, it's a year away. That's enough

401
00:19:31,160 --> 00:19:32,880
Speaker 4: time to get a boat.

402
00:19:32,680 --> 00:19:33,399
Speaker 1: Together for that.

403
00:19:33,600 --> 00:19:35,280
Speaker 3: I'll like sign up and do that.

404
00:19:35,920 --> 00:19:38,520
Speaker 4: And I remember calling the organizers and going, oh, hi,

405
00:19:38,840 --> 00:19:41,000
Speaker 4: you know there any other girls signed up and they're like, no, no,

406
00:19:41,040 --> 00:19:43,680
Speaker 4: we're for You're the last one to take a position.

407
00:19:44,600 --> 00:19:46,760
Speaker 4: You'll need to sign up now otherwise, you know, the

408
00:19:46,800 --> 00:19:49,760
Speaker 4: spot can go. And so I paid the entry fee

409
00:19:49,760 --> 00:19:51,200
Speaker 4: and then I was like, oh, by the way, what's

410
00:19:51,200 --> 00:19:52,760
Speaker 4: the latest date I can let you know I have

411
00:19:52,800 --> 00:19:54,560
Speaker 4: a boat by and they just.

412
00:19:54,760 --> 00:19:57,800
Speaker 3: Laughed just so hard. I was the only girl and

413
00:19:57,840 --> 00:19:58,960
Speaker 3: the only one without.

414
00:19:58,680 --> 00:20:02,080
Speaker 4: A boat to actually sign up for solo like see

415
00:20:02,400 --> 00:20:06,359
Speaker 4: yacht race and yeah, and then started another journey on that.

416
00:20:06,640 --> 00:20:09,280
Speaker 4: And it was while doing that I was trying to

417
00:20:09,280 --> 00:20:11,879
Speaker 4: convince a complete stranger to lend me a boat to

418
00:20:11,960 --> 00:20:14,960
Speaker 4: sail solo across the Tasman Sea, which obviously they're saying

419
00:20:15,000 --> 00:20:18,239
Speaker 4: no to. I'd think, so, yeah, yeah, smart people, right,

420
00:20:19,400 --> 00:20:22,480
Speaker 4: And he said, look, maybe if you combine this project

421
00:20:22,520 --> 00:20:25,560
Speaker 4: with something larger, you could buy the boat and do

422
00:20:25,680 --> 00:20:28,480
Speaker 4: both projects with it, and maybe you're then in a

423
00:20:28,480 --> 00:20:31,879
Speaker 4: position to raise the sponsorship. And so this one guy said,

424
00:20:32,359 --> 00:20:34,960
Speaker 4: I think that this boat is capable of this trip,

425
00:20:35,080 --> 00:20:38,760
Speaker 4: and he threw out this Antarctica record with this Russian

426
00:20:38,800 --> 00:20:41,520
Speaker 4: sailor fed Or Konyakov, had set in two thousand and eight,

427
00:20:41,720 --> 00:20:44,200
Speaker 4: and he's like, have a look at it. Google it online,

428
00:20:44,480 --> 00:20:46,919
Speaker 4: see what you think. And so I googled it and

429
00:20:46,960 --> 00:20:50,520
Speaker 4: I was like, this guy's insane. This is Southern Ocean.

430
00:20:50,760 --> 00:20:53,480
Speaker 4: Not only that, it's like, you know, waves the size

431
00:20:53,520 --> 00:20:56,000
Speaker 4: of a three story building on a normal day at sea,

432
00:20:56,280 --> 00:20:59,400
Speaker 4: it's storms stronger than hurricanes like every week.

433
00:21:00,040 --> 00:21:02,600
Speaker 3: And you're expecting someone who's.

434
00:21:02,320 --> 00:21:04,680
Speaker 4: You know, got three years sailing experience to go into

435
00:21:04,720 --> 00:21:07,000
Speaker 4: the Southern Ocean to go and do this kind of trip.

436
00:21:07,920 --> 00:21:11,080
Speaker 4: So I initially was like, yeah, not for me. That's

437
00:21:11,240 --> 00:21:13,760
Speaker 4: that's too far. That's like, you know, pushing the envelope

438
00:21:13,760 --> 00:21:18,440
Speaker 4: too far. And so I just focused on the trans Tasmin.

439
00:21:18,560 --> 00:21:20,920
Speaker 4: I got a boat lent to me like ten days

440
00:21:20,920 --> 00:21:23,200
Speaker 4: before I had to sail it to New Zealand. There's

441
00:21:23,240 --> 00:21:27,399
Speaker 4: a whole other set of stories there. And then I

442
00:21:27,480 --> 00:21:30,240
Speaker 4: raced it back to Australia and that was my first

443
00:21:30,280 --> 00:21:33,720
Speaker 4: solo crossing, was to New Zealand and back, and I

444
00:21:33,800 --> 00:21:36,240
Speaker 4: had no idea what I was doing. I messed up

445
00:21:36,280 --> 00:21:39,919
Speaker 4: a billion times. The autopilot had an issue, so I

446
00:21:39,960 --> 00:21:42,679
Speaker 4: set like, you know, there's little mechanical oven timers that

447
00:21:42,720 --> 00:21:44,800
Speaker 4: you kick them over, So I have one of those,

448
00:21:44,840 --> 00:21:46,919
Speaker 4: because every twenty minutes you have to look at the

449
00:21:46,920 --> 00:21:50,480
Speaker 4: horizon for ships, okay, and every twenty minutes you're waking

450
00:21:50,560 --> 00:21:53,160
Speaker 4: up the entire crossing. And the crossing was twelve days,

451
00:21:53,200 --> 00:21:55,480
Speaker 4: let's sea, So for twelve days.

452
00:21:55,240 --> 00:21:57,760
Speaker 1: You're sleeping twenty minutes every twenty.

453
00:21:57,600 --> 00:21:59,320
Speaker 3: Minutes, days every twenty minutes.

454
00:21:59,520 --> 00:22:03,000
Speaker 4: Oh yeah no, And then the autopilot would wig out

455
00:22:03,040 --> 00:22:05,600
Speaker 4: and the whole boat would do a little like pirouette

456
00:22:05,600 --> 00:22:07,359
Speaker 4: in the middle of the ocean, like just spin around

457
00:22:07,400 --> 00:22:09,879
Speaker 4: in a circle. And so I ended up sleeping at

458
00:22:09,920 --> 00:22:12,040
Speaker 4: the back of the boat by the wheel with my

459
00:22:12,080 --> 00:22:14,520
Speaker 4: little twenty minute oven time I buy my ear because

460
00:22:14,560 --> 00:22:16,640
Speaker 4: I was worried that I would sleep through it, and

461
00:22:17,040 --> 00:22:19,680
Speaker 4: like kipped on the back deck and got zero sleep

462
00:22:19,720 --> 00:22:20,760
Speaker 4: for like twelve days.

463
00:22:21,200 --> 00:22:22,520
Speaker 3: And yeah, arrived in.

464
00:22:22,440 --> 00:22:25,440
Speaker 4: New Zealand, like exhausted, turned the boat around and raced

465
00:22:25,440 --> 00:22:26,399
Speaker 4: it back to Australia.

466
00:22:26,960 --> 00:22:29,600
Speaker 1: So that so the twelve days, every twenty minutes was

467
00:22:29,880 --> 00:22:33,560
Speaker 1: on your way over. That wasn't even race both directions

468
00:22:33,720 --> 00:22:36,080
Speaker 1: both ways. You have to do that every time I.

469
00:22:36,040 --> 00:22:38,879
Speaker 4: Saw a solo close to land or no one has it,

470
00:22:39,000 --> 00:22:41,600
Speaker 4: so something like the Tasman C's got so many ships

471
00:22:41,600 --> 00:22:44,320
Speaker 4: and fishing boats and stuff. There's a lot of traffic

472
00:22:44,320 --> 00:22:47,520
Speaker 4: out there. I can't sleep more than twenty minutes at

473
00:22:47,520 --> 00:22:48,040
Speaker 4: a time.

474
00:22:48,080 --> 00:22:52,880
Speaker 1: Right on any record, any record, any record I've done,

475
00:22:53,440 --> 00:22:56,080
Speaker 1: even what I just came back frost for you, Oh

476
00:22:56,119 --> 00:22:58,480
Speaker 1: my gosh, that is so.

477
00:22:58,320 --> 00:23:00,800
Speaker 4: Full of just the stress to the body, the way

478
00:23:00,840 --> 00:23:04,160
Speaker 4: your hormone levels change, like it's yeah, it's quite intense.

479
00:23:04,560 --> 00:23:07,280
Speaker 1: Wow. Yeah, And so how did you go in the

480
00:23:07,359 --> 00:23:09,200
Speaker 1: race on the way back so.

481
00:23:09,359 --> 00:23:11,240
Speaker 4: I felt like I did pretty good given it was

482
00:23:11,280 --> 00:23:14,040
Speaker 4: a little home built aluminum boat, not a racing boat

483
00:23:14,080 --> 00:23:14,399
Speaker 4: at all.

484
00:23:14,440 --> 00:23:16,440
Speaker 3: It was just a boat. I'm like, I don't care,

485
00:23:16,560 --> 00:23:19,000
Speaker 3: I just need a boat. This boat was available. I

486
00:23:19,040 --> 00:23:19,480
Speaker 3: took it.

487
00:23:19,560 --> 00:23:21,359
Speaker 4: It was great and the guy who landed to me

488
00:23:21,440 --> 00:23:26,359
Speaker 4: is amazing, and so I came. I think it was

489
00:23:26,480 --> 00:23:30,159
Speaker 4: eleventh online honors out of thirteen boats that finished in

490
00:23:30,280 --> 00:23:34,680
Speaker 4: sixteen that entered the race, and I on the handicap,

491
00:23:34,720 --> 00:23:36,200
Speaker 4: I think it was eight position.

492
00:23:36,440 --> 00:23:36,720
Speaker 1: Wow.

493
00:23:36,960 --> 00:23:38,000
Speaker 3: So I felt pretty good about it.

494
00:23:38,320 --> 00:23:42,359
Speaker 4: Great first race ever ever, like so as the captain,

495
00:23:42,400 --> 00:23:43,399
Speaker 4: as the solo sailor.

496
00:23:43,640 --> 00:23:45,480
Speaker 3: Yeah, so I felt pretty good about it.

497
00:23:45,520 --> 00:23:48,040
Speaker 4: And just like you know, sailing the twelve hundred nautical

498
00:23:48,119 --> 00:23:49,600
Speaker 4: miles to Australia, I think it's a.

499
00:23:49,560 --> 00:23:50,520
Speaker 3: Pretty big achievement.

500
00:23:50,960 --> 00:23:56,600
Speaker 4: Absolutely out of instruments that I.

501
00:23:54,000 --> 00:23:57,480
Speaker 1: Had put the race aside. Actually just making it home

502
00:23:57,520 --> 00:23:58,920
Speaker 1: alive is quite incredible.

503
00:23:59,080 --> 00:23:59,560
Speaker 3: Yeah.

504
00:24:00,200 --> 00:24:03,240
Speaker 1: When you talked about the three story building waves, Yeah,

505
00:24:03,280 --> 00:24:05,880
Speaker 1: around Antarctica, I felt physically ill.

506
00:24:06,160 --> 00:24:08,000
Speaker 3: Yes, oh you will feel more.

507
00:24:08,400 --> 00:24:12,040
Speaker 1: There's plenty. There's plenty to come in that. But I think,

508
00:24:12,119 --> 00:24:15,760
Speaker 1: like with my sporting career, I've changed and thrown myself

509
00:24:15,760 --> 00:24:18,280
Speaker 1: in the deep ended in a sense, but there's an

510
00:24:18,280 --> 00:24:20,680
Speaker 1: element of safety where if I fail, it's on a

511
00:24:20,680 --> 00:24:24,200
Speaker 1: football pitch and I will survive. You throwing yourself in

512
00:24:24,240 --> 00:24:26,840
Speaker 1: the deep end is a very different story.

513
00:24:26,960 --> 00:24:30,000
Speaker 4: Yeah, you have to go into these projects with the

514
00:24:30,080 --> 00:24:34,600
Speaker 4: view that rescues never an option. So I look, it

515
00:24:35,000 --> 00:24:37,399
Speaker 4: doesn't really matter if you're close to land or not

516
00:24:38,040 --> 00:24:38,840
Speaker 4: on the project.

517
00:24:39,640 --> 00:24:41,520
Speaker 3: If you go into it with the idea that you have.

518
00:24:41,480 --> 00:24:44,560
Speaker 4: An exit strategy, then you'll probably never set the record

519
00:24:44,920 --> 00:24:47,520
Speaker 4: because you will give up at the first big hurdle

520
00:24:47,560 --> 00:24:51,199
Speaker 4: that you've got to face. Whereas for me, like for

521
00:24:51,280 --> 00:24:53,480
Speaker 4: something like Antarctica, and I'm sure we'll get into that

522
00:24:53,520 --> 00:24:56,119
Speaker 4: story in a minute. You know, I was more than

523
00:24:56,160 --> 00:24:59,880
Speaker 4: three days from help at at the average for most

524
00:25:00,119 --> 00:25:03,399
Speaker 4: that record, So even if I broke my leg, I

525
00:25:03,400 --> 00:25:05,960
Speaker 4: would have to triarge myself for a minimum of three days.

526
00:25:06,000 --> 00:25:07,040
Speaker 3: So I v fluids.

527
00:25:07,080 --> 00:25:09,719
Speaker 4: I have a bone injection gun on board so that

528
00:25:09,760 --> 00:25:12,160
Speaker 4: I can inject myself into the bone marrow to give

529
00:25:12,160 --> 00:25:15,080
Speaker 4: myself fluids. Like, I carry all this stuff because I

530
00:25:15,160 --> 00:25:18,000
Speaker 4: have to be prepared for all those scenarios that might

531
00:25:18,119 --> 00:25:21,440
Speaker 4: take place and hope, hope that none of them happen.

532
00:25:21,880 --> 00:25:24,119
Speaker 4: But you have to have that mentality going into it.

533
00:25:24,640 --> 00:25:26,720
Speaker 1: Okay, so how do you get to the point of

534
00:25:26,760 --> 00:25:30,000
Speaker 1: making the decision of I'm going to give it a crack.

535
00:25:30,760 --> 00:25:33,639
Speaker 3: Of sailing around antartigans like a mad person that.

536
00:25:35,400 --> 00:25:39,080
Speaker 4: So I had spoken to Mum, obviously she features quite

537
00:25:39,119 --> 00:25:40,760
Speaker 4: a lot, and I've spoken to the rest of my family,

538
00:25:40,840 --> 00:25:44,840
Speaker 4: my dad and my sister before I did the transtasment

539
00:25:44,920 --> 00:25:48,360
Speaker 4: and just sort of softly floated the idea because I

540
00:25:48,400 --> 00:25:51,520
Speaker 4: had the suggestion. I initially thought, yeah, I'm not capable

541
00:25:51,560 --> 00:25:53,800
Speaker 4: of that. I'm not strong enough. I've only got three

542
00:25:53,880 --> 00:25:57,199
Speaker 4: years sailing experience. I'm not that person, even though I

543
00:25:57,200 --> 00:26:00,760
Speaker 4: really wanted to. But then I couldn't stop thinking about

544
00:26:00,760 --> 00:26:03,359
Speaker 4: it for months. So as I kept building up the

545
00:26:03,359 --> 00:26:07,200
Speaker 4: preparation for the trans Tasmin, I started researching, like our

546
00:26:07,200 --> 00:26:10,480
Speaker 4: cold's cold, you know, where's the Iceberg line? Like what

547
00:26:10,480 --> 00:26:14,000
Speaker 4: what would the conditions actually be like in those latitudes?

548
00:26:14,400 --> 00:26:16,960
Speaker 4: And we'd sailed the southern Ocean with the clipper rays,

549
00:26:17,440 --> 00:26:21,440
Speaker 4: but a little bit higher in the in the planet,

550
00:26:21,480 --> 00:26:23,600
Speaker 4: I guess, in course, I love.

551
00:26:23,480 --> 00:26:24,560
Speaker 3: That bit further north.

552
00:26:24,800 --> 00:26:28,600
Speaker 4: Yeah, and so the conditions like were extremely rough in

553
00:26:28,640 --> 00:26:31,439
Speaker 4: one area we sailed to just off the bottom of

554
00:26:31,440 --> 00:26:34,439
Speaker 4: New Zealand. Actually we had a pretty major storm and

555
00:26:34,480 --> 00:26:36,600
Speaker 4: the waves were higher than the mask was tall and

556
00:26:36,640 --> 00:26:40,360
Speaker 4: the mass is twenty two meters, so the whole boat, yeah,

557
00:26:40,400 --> 00:26:44,119
Speaker 4: the whole boat would disappear in the trough like it was.

558
00:26:44,520 --> 00:26:46,640
Speaker 4: And I remember looking at the captain at the time,

559
00:26:46,680 --> 00:26:48,560
Speaker 4: going is there's something else we can do, and he's like,

560
00:26:49,000 --> 00:26:51,480
Speaker 4: keep driving the boat and we're hands seering down these

561
00:26:51,520 --> 00:26:54,679
Speaker 4: monster waves in the Southern Ocean, and like it was.

562
00:26:55,440 --> 00:26:57,399
Speaker 4: Everyone else was locked in the boat because it was

563
00:26:57,440 --> 00:26:59,760
Speaker 4: too dangerous on deck. And so I was looking to

564
00:26:59,840 --> 00:27:01,879
Speaker 4: do that on my own, not with a crew of

565
00:27:01,920 --> 00:27:06,640
Speaker 4: sixteen people, and so I just couldn't shake that idea though.

566
00:27:06,680 --> 00:27:09,200
Speaker 4: So I had sort of floated the idea past.

567
00:27:08,920 --> 00:27:12,960
Speaker 3: My family first, and this was pre ever sailing solo.

568
00:27:13,320 --> 00:27:15,320
Speaker 4: I said, oh, you know, what do you think about

569
00:27:15,320 --> 00:27:17,200
Speaker 4: me sailing solo around Antarctica?

570
00:27:17,240 --> 00:27:19,520
Speaker 3: Like what would you think to that?

571
00:27:19,800 --> 00:27:23,000
Speaker 4: And Mum was instantly like, ah, no, chance, You're.

572
00:27:22,800 --> 00:27:26,560
Speaker 3: Not doing it. That is crazy. No, like I'm putting

573
00:27:26,560 --> 00:27:27,080
Speaker 3: my foot down.

574
00:27:27,160 --> 00:27:29,040
Speaker 4: No. I supported you for new like you around the

575
00:27:29,040 --> 00:27:31,959
Speaker 4: World Crude race, but no, not solo around Antarctica. And

576
00:27:32,000 --> 00:27:34,520
Speaker 4: she knows enough about sailing to know, you know, the

577
00:27:34,640 --> 00:27:38,920
Speaker 4: risks with something like the Southern Ocean. And so then

578
00:27:39,080 --> 00:27:41,560
Speaker 4: after I did the transasment. So by that point I'd

579
00:27:41,560 --> 00:27:45,240
Speaker 4: sailed almost three thousandnautical miles solo, so I'd gone all

580
00:27:45,280 --> 00:27:45,760
Speaker 4: the way to New.

581
00:27:45,800 --> 00:27:46,560
Speaker 3: Zealand and back solo.

582
00:27:46,600 --> 00:27:48,400
Speaker 4: So I had at least proven that I could sail

583
00:27:48,600 --> 00:27:51,359
Speaker 4: solo and that I and I didn't even know until

584
00:27:51,359 --> 00:27:53,320
Speaker 4: that point that I would enjoy it or not. Maybe

585
00:27:53,320 --> 00:27:55,919
Speaker 4: i'd hate solo sailing like I had no idea, and

586
00:27:56,000 --> 00:27:59,920
Speaker 4: I just loved it. And so she saw all that,

587
00:28:00,600 --> 00:28:02,280
Speaker 4: and afterwards I was like, oh, so what do you

588
00:28:02,280 --> 00:28:04,360
Speaker 4: think about this Antarctic idea?

589
00:28:04,440 --> 00:28:07,879
Speaker 3: And she was like, hmm, I don't really want to.

590
00:28:07,880 --> 00:28:10,639
Speaker 4: Say yes, but I think you, you know, if you

591
00:28:10,800 --> 00:28:12,679
Speaker 4: trained a little bit more and got the skills up,

592
00:28:12,720 --> 00:28:16,119
Speaker 4: like you could do it. And so from then I

593
00:28:16,200 --> 00:28:19,680
Speaker 4: had my family support and I finished the trans Tasmin

594
00:28:20,160 --> 00:28:23,360
Speaker 4: and like a week later I started campaigning for Antarctica,

595
00:28:24,000 --> 00:28:24,520
Speaker 4: like it.

596
00:28:24,440 --> 00:28:26,280
Speaker 3: Was just like I just went straight into it.

597
00:28:26,400 --> 00:28:28,480
Speaker 4: I decided I needed to be in Sydney for that,

598
00:28:28,560 --> 00:28:30,760
Speaker 4: so I made the move to Sydney. I slept on

599
00:28:30,800 --> 00:28:32,919
Speaker 4: some lovely ladies couch. That was a friend of a

600
00:28:32,960 --> 00:28:35,200
Speaker 4: friend that I had only spoken to on the phone

601
00:28:35,200 --> 00:28:36,880
Speaker 4: who I was trying to convince to let me lend

602
00:28:36,880 --> 00:28:39,560
Speaker 4: their boat to race around Antarctica. And so I slept

603
00:28:39,560 --> 00:28:41,440
Speaker 4: on her couch and I cleaned her house for her

604
00:28:41,800 --> 00:28:45,719
Speaker 4: for like six months and sorry her spare bedroom, and

605
00:28:46,400 --> 00:28:48,640
Speaker 4: like finally got a job in Sydney working on a

606
00:28:48,680 --> 00:28:52,360
Speaker 4: sailing boat and teaching sailing, and yeah, just kind of

607
00:28:52,360 --> 00:28:54,640
Speaker 4: built it up from there. But I had this firm

608
00:28:54,680 --> 00:28:58,320
Speaker 4: idea that if I wasn't around where potential sponsors would be,

609
00:28:58,520 --> 00:29:00,640
Speaker 4: where I could have meetings in person and the like,

610
00:29:00,920 --> 00:29:03,640
Speaker 4: it would be almost impossible to do it. So working

611
00:29:03,640 --> 00:29:05,960
Speaker 4: in the sundays wasn't going to work. And the only

612
00:29:06,000 --> 00:29:08,760
Speaker 4: other place you can do sailing in really Australia as

613
00:29:08,800 --> 00:29:12,400
Speaker 4: a job is Sydney Harbor. So I got some jobs

614
00:29:12,440 --> 00:29:15,120
Speaker 4: down here. I worked five different companies, five different jobs,

615
00:29:15,160 --> 00:29:18,280
Speaker 4: all part time or casual, and just worked as much

616
00:29:18,320 --> 00:29:20,080
Speaker 4: as I could, and then worked full time on the

617
00:29:20,080 --> 00:29:22,440
Speaker 4: campaign for the next three and a half years.

618
00:29:23,040 --> 00:29:25,680
Speaker 3: Yeah, whoa, Yeah, it was a long time.

619
00:29:25,920 --> 00:29:28,880
Speaker 1: A long time and when did the boat come along?

620
00:29:29,840 --> 00:29:33,880
Speaker 4: So about two years in I'd postponed the following year before,

621
00:29:33,920 --> 00:29:36,360
Speaker 4: because I hadn't raised any sponsorship or had a boat,

622
00:29:36,640 --> 00:29:39,320
Speaker 4: and even though I'd put hundreds and hundreds of proposals

623
00:29:39,320 --> 00:29:42,040
Speaker 4: out and had negotiation conversations, they just hadn't come through.

624
00:29:43,080 --> 00:29:46,120
Speaker 3: I then remember talking.

625
00:29:45,800 --> 00:29:48,160
Speaker 4: To Mum and I was like, oh, you know, I

626
00:29:48,200 --> 00:29:51,400
Speaker 4: think maybe what I might do is postpone Antarctica for

627
00:29:51,440 --> 00:29:53,960
Speaker 4: a few years and I can fly to the UK

628
00:29:54,080 --> 00:29:56,560
Speaker 4: and become one of the captains of the Clipper Race.

629
00:29:57,040 --> 00:29:59,240
Speaker 4: And then that's like, got a lot of sponsorship, a

630
00:29:59,280 --> 00:30:01,840
Speaker 4: lot of media cover, It'll help build my profile, and

631
00:30:01,880 --> 00:30:04,040
Speaker 4: then I can come back to Antarctica when I get back.

632
00:30:04,480 --> 00:30:07,440
Speaker 4: And so I had this conversation and she's like, oh, yeah,

633
00:30:07,440 --> 00:30:08,160
Speaker 4: it sounds like an.

634
00:30:08,040 --> 00:30:09,680
Speaker 3: Okay idea, blah blah blah.

635
00:30:09,720 --> 00:30:11,880
Speaker 4: And then the next day she calls me and goes, hey,

636
00:30:11,960 --> 00:30:14,800
Speaker 4: I've been thinking I think I can refinance against the

637
00:30:14,840 --> 00:30:15,160
Speaker 4: house and.

638
00:30:15,160 --> 00:30:18,000
Speaker 3: Help you get the boat. And it was this chicken

639
00:30:18,040 --> 00:30:18,840
Speaker 3: and egg scenario.

640
00:30:18,880 --> 00:30:20,560
Speaker 4: If you didn't have the boat, you couldn't get the

641
00:30:20,560 --> 00:30:23,200
Speaker 4: sponsorship dollars, you couldn't buy the boat without the sponsorship dollars,

642
00:30:23,560 --> 00:30:25,760
Speaker 4: and like people didn't think you were leaving until he

643
00:30:25,800 --> 00:30:26,560
Speaker 4: actually had a boat.

644
00:30:26,560 --> 00:30:28,920
Speaker 3: To go with, like, so it was this mental kind

645
00:30:28,920 --> 00:30:29,800
Speaker 3: of thing for people.

646
00:30:30,560 --> 00:30:34,720
Speaker 4: And I instantly was like, no, Mom, don't don't finance,

647
00:30:34,840 --> 00:30:39,840
Speaker 4: like on my way out their goal against the family

648
00:30:39,920 --> 00:30:42,040
Speaker 4: home that you know, that's silly.

649
00:30:42,080 --> 00:30:42,600
Speaker 3: Don't do that.

650
00:30:42,960 --> 00:30:44,920
Speaker 4: And so I tried to convince her not to and

651
00:30:44,960 --> 00:30:47,160
Speaker 4: she's like, look, I'm just looking at it like an investment.

652
00:30:47,560 --> 00:30:48,840
Speaker 3: This is like a business investment.

653
00:30:48,880 --> 00:30:51,720
Speaker 4: You'll pay me back, you'll do interest, I'll make the

654
00:30:51,720 --> 00:30:53,680
Speaker 4: money off the interest, like, we'll just do it as

655
00:30:53,680 --> 00:30:56,960
Speaker 4: a structured loan. It'll be fine. And at the same

656
00:30:57,000 --> 00:30:59,600
Speaker 4: time I eventually said yes, so Mum lending me the

657
00:30:59,600 --> 00:31:02,480
Speaker 4: money for the boat. The Royal Commission came in for

658
00:31:02,760 --> 00:31:05,760
Speaker 4: lending rights and they changed it from I think it

659
00:31:05,800 --> 00:31:09,600
Speaker 4: was accountability to serviceability and Mum wasn't serviceable for the

660
00:31:09,600 --> 00:31:10,760
Speaker 4: amount were trying to go forward.

661
00:31:10,800 --> 00:31:14,239
Speaker 3: So we found the boat in Newcastle. I wanted it.

662
00:31:14,240 --> 00:31:15,080
Speaker 3: I put it to posit on.

663
00:31:15,160 --> 00:31:17,800
Speaker 4: We started the process and then like within a week,

664
00:31:17,840 --> 00:31:21,560
Speaker 4: all the laws changed and we weren't eligible anymore, and

665
00:31:22,320 --> 00:31:24,640
Speaker 4: so we were left without like a boat that we

666
00:31:24,800 --> 00:31:27,840
Speaker 4: wanted that was perfect that we couldn't buy, and it

667
00:31:27,960 --> 00:31:30,720
Speaker 4: ended up being an old crew member of mine that

668
00:31:30,960 --> 00:31:33,800
Speaker 4: sailed from. I delivered a boat from Western Australia to

669
00:31:33,840 --> 00:31:36,400
Speaker 4: New Zealand and he came for a section of the trip.

670
00:31:36,960 --> 00:31:39,040
Speaker 3: And I had emailed a.

671
00:31:39,000 --> 00:31:41,360
Speaker 4: Local reporter and said, hey, I'm looking for someone who

672
00:31:41,400 --> 00:31:43,560
Speaker 4: can privately invest in me for this project.

673
00:31:43,760 --> 00:31:46,920
Speaker 3: They'll make eight cent interest blah blah blah. Could we

674
00:31:46,920 --> 00:31:47,560
Speaker 3: do an article?

675
00:31:47,600 --> 00:31:50,320
Speaker 4: And it went up on a sailing platform called my

676
00:31:50,440 --> 00:31:54,120
Speaker 4: Sailing and he read it and he called me up

677
00:31:54,160 --> 00:31:55,440
Speaker 4: out of the blue and goes, tell me a bit

678
00:31:55,440 --> 00:31:57,560
Speaker 4: more about this boat loan because I was talking about

679
00:31:57,600 --> 00:32:01,800
Speaker 4: Antartica years earlier with him the boat, and so he

680
00:32:01,960 --> 00:32:05,360
Speaker 4: knew that I'd been working on this commultiple years. Yeah,

681
00:32:05,560 --> 00:32:07,520
Speaker 4: you know, obviously knew I could sail and do all

682
00:32:07,720 --> 00:32:10,960
Speaker 4: the physical stuff. And so he's like, tell me more

683
00:32:11,000 --> 00:32:13,880
Speaker 4: about it, and so me, Mum, him and his wife City.

684
00:32:14,120 --> 00:32:16,760
Speaker 4: We all sat down and had a big conversation around it,

685
00:32:16,960 --> 00:32:18,360
Speaker 4: and he said, right, let us chat.

686
00:32:18,240 --> 00:32:19,880
Speaker 3: And we'll get back to you. And then they ended

687
00:32:19,960 --> 00:32:23,240
Speaker 3: up financing the boat, and I still own a lot

688
00:32:23,280 --> 00:32:26,640
Speaker 3: of money. They call it the city.

689
00:32:27,480 --> 00:32:31,560
Speaker 4: Yeah and so, and then I ended up refinancing with

690
00:32:31,640 --> 00:32:34,840
Speaker 4: Dad to pay half the boat loan back, and then

691
00:32:35,080 --> 00:32:37,200
Speaker 4: got into the refit the following year, because I was

692
00:32:37,240 --> 00:32:42,040
Speaker 4: aiming for what would it have been twenty twenty, no,

693
00:32:42,280 --> 00:32:46,240
Speaker 4: twenty seventeen, and so this was twenty sixteen, and I

694
00:32:46,280 --> 00:32:50,160
Speaker 4: was aiming for a departure early twenty seventeen. But I

695
00:32:50,200 --> 00:32:52,400
Speaker 4: needed to raise enough money to fit the boat out now,

696
00:32:52,480 --> 00:32:54,600
Speaker 4: to get it safe enough to do the trip, and

697
00:32:54,600 --> 00:32:58,240
Speaker 4: that required a huge like, you know, three hundred thousand dollars.

698
00:32:58,880 --> 00:32:59,800
Speaker 3: I had one hundred and.

699
00:32:59,720 --> 00:33:03,520
Speaker 1: Fifty huge money here. That's just to fit the boat out.

700
00:33:03,520 --> 00:33:05,120
Speaker 1: You've already got to make the project run.

701
00:33:05,360 --> 00:33:07,640
Speaker 3: Yeah, wow, Yeah, I didn't raise.

702
00:33:07,480 --> 00:33:10,040
Speaker 1: That fair enough. It's a lot of money.

703
00:33:10,120 --> 00:33:13,680
Speaker 4: Yeah, But Dick Smith became an incredible sponsor of mine

704
00:33:13,720 --> 00:33:16,040
Speaker 4: and foundered half the refit, and then I was able

705
00:33:16,040 --> 00:33:19,400
Speaker 4: to reloan the sixty five back from this guy that

706
00:33:19,440 --> 00:33:22,400
Speaker 4: we'd paid off the boat loan and use that and

707
00:33:22,440 --> 00:33:25,040
Speaker 4: then I finished that record with nearly three hundred thousand

708
00:33:25,120 --> 00:33:30,960
Speaker 4: bills outstanding. It's been the next five years paying it off. Yeah,

709
00:33:30,440 --> 00:33:33,680
Speaker 4: it's not been an easy ride from a finance point

710
00:33:33,680 --> 00:33:34,520
Speaker 4: of view, that's for sure.

711
00:33:34,720 --> 00:33:39,000
Speaker 1: Wow. Okay, so let's let's actually look at this record attempt.

712
00:33:41,680 --> 00:33:43,760
Speaker 1: I don't actually know where to start to be honest,

713
00:33:44,320 --> 00:33:44,800
Speaker 1: what is it?

714
00:33:44,840 --> 00:33:45,480
Speaker 3: Where is it?

715
00:33:45,720 --> 00:33:47,000
Speaker 1: Yeah, that let's start with that.

716
00:33:49,320 --> 00:33:53,000
Speaker 4: So in two thousand and eight, this Russian adventurer, Federal Konyakov,

717
00:33:53,040 --> 00:33:56,400
Speaker 4: set the world record and he sailed solo, NonStop and

718
00:33:56,480 --> 00:33:59,960
Speaker 4: unassisted from Albany and Western Australia the Albany and Western

719
00:34:00,000 --> 00:34:02,600
Speaker 4: Australia and he did the troop in one hundred and

720
00:34:02,600 --> 00:34:05,960
Speaker 4: two days. So because he did it as part of

721
00:34:05,960 --> 00:34:09,520
Speaker 4: an organized event, which was called the Antarctica Cup Ocean Race,

722
00:34:10,400 --> 00:34:13,520
Speaker 4: then he raced on what they called the Antarctica Cup

723
00:34:13,600 --> 00:34:18,680
Speaker 4: Ocean Race track. Okay, and this racetracks just virtual waypoints

724
00:34:18,760 --> 00:34:21,720
Speaker 4: or gated entry zones that I have to stay within

725
00:34:22,000 --> 00:34:24,640
Speaker 4: or that he had to stay within on his record,

726
00:34:25,000 --> 00:34:27,759
Speaker 4: and so he could once he entered onto the racetrack,

727
00:34:28,080 --> 00:34:31,239
Speaker 4: he couldn't sail north of forty five degrees south, which

728
00:34:31,239 --> 00:34:34,520
Speaker 4: if you kind of imagine the bottom tip of News Tasmania,

729
00:34:34,880 --> 00:34:37,480
Speaker 4: kind of that section, and he couldn't go south of

730
00:34:37,520 --> 00:34:39,800
Speaker 4: sixty degrees south, which is kind of the tip of

731
00:34:39,840 --> 00:34:45,000
Speaker 4: the Antarctic Peninsula. So that gap of ocean, the Southern

732
00:34:45,000 --> 00:34:48,359
Speaker 4: Ocean storm belt, is the entirety of the record. So

733
00:34:48,400 --> 00:34:51,920
Speaker 4: he did it in a think it was an eighty

734
00:34:52,120 --> 00:34:56,040
Speaker 4: two meter aluminum boat. It was this incredible vessel and

735
00:34:56,080 --> 00:34:57,480
Speaker 4: he did it in two thousand and eight.

736
00:34:58,239 --> 00:34:59,320
Speaker 3: But Federal Konya cops.

737
00:34:59,320 --> 00:35:03,600
Speaker 4: This incre adventurer like amazing, Like I would love to

738
00:35:03,600 --> 00:35:05,440
Speaker 4: be him one day, or I'm working my way up

739
00:35:05,480 --> 00:35:06,279
Speaker 4: to being him one day.

740
00:35:06,360 --> 00:35:09,680
Speaker 3: Yeah, the female version. But he's like climbed Everest.

741
00:35:09,760 --> 00:35:12,160
Speaker 4: He's the first Protestant priest to go to the top

742
00:35:12,200 --> 00:35:14,560
Speaker 4: of El Forest. He sat around the world for solo

743
00:35:14,719 --> 00:35:17,279
Speaker 4: four times. He holds the world record for a hot

744
00:35:17,280 --> 00:35:21,080
Speaker 4: air balloon. So navigation of the planet. He's rowed from

745
00:35:21,200 --> 00:35:24,280
Speaker 4: Chile to Australia and then from New Zealand to Cape

746
00:35:24,280 --> 00:35:26,799
Speaker 4: Horn in an open rowboat like you know.

747
00:35:27,040 --> 00:35:29,320
Speaker 1: A physical robot robot.

748
00:35:28,880 --> 00:35:31,040
Speaker 3: Like, yeah, he's done dogs led teams to the North

749
00:35:31,040 --> 00:35:32,080
Speaker 3: Pole South Pole.

750
00:35:31,960 --> 00:35:35,400
Speaker 4: Like he's just always got another project, like incredible adventurer.

751
00:35:35,840 --> 00:35:38,200
Speaker 4: And I happened to meet him when I finished the

752
00:35:38,200 --> 00:35:41,600
Speaker 4: Transpasman Yacht Race. Okay, he was finishing his row and

753
00:35:41,640 --> 00:35:44,200
Speaker 4: he ended up changing the destination from Brisbane to the

754
00:35:44,200 --> 00:35:47,560
Speaker 4: Sunshine Coast and came into Malulaba and so I met

755
00:35:47,600 --> 00:35:51,120
Speaker 4: him and his son Oscar, and at that time I'd

756
00:35:51,120 --> 00:35:53,760
Speaker 4: committed to doing Antarctica, so they knew.

757
00:35:53,600 --> 00:35:55,719
Speaker 3: Who I was. And he's like, good luck, like I

758
00:35:55,719 --> 00:35:59,080
Speaker 3: support you. And he doesn't speak a lick.

759
00:35:58,960 --> 00:36:01,719
Speaker 4: At English, so his son enslates everything, and he said,

760
00:36:02,640 --> 00:36:04,120
Speaker 4: we had a cup of tea. And his bit of

761
00:36:04,160 --> 00:36:07,799
Speaker 4: advice was always past Iceberg's to the north, okay, because

762
00:36:07,840 --> 00:36:10,080
Speaker 4: all the debris ice is to the south of.

763
00:36:10,040 --> 00:36:11,480
Speaker 3: The burg because it's moving north.

764
00:36:12,440 --> 00:36:15,320
Speaker 4: So yeah, so I had his support to challenge the record.

765
00:36:15,800 --> 00:36:19,160
Speaker 4: And because he started and finished in Albany and Western Australia,

766
00:36:19,160 --> 00:36:21,480
Speaker 4: I would need to do the same destination and I

767
00:36:21,480 --> 00:36:24,560
Speaker 4: would also need to stick between forty five and sixty south.

768
00:36:25,719 --> 00:36:29,719
Speaker 4: So I expected three months at sea, hopefully three months

769
00:36:29,760 --> 00:36:33,440
Speaker 4: would break the record. And the distance to travel was

770
00:36:33,480 --> 00:36:37,479
Speaker 4: around fourteen thousand nautical miles, which is about twenty two

771
00:36:37,520 --> 00:36:38,480
Speaker 4: thousand kilometers.

772
00:36:38,520 --> 00:36:43,239
Speaker 5: Okay, yeah, it's a lot of kilometers, yes, yeah, yeah,

773
00:36:43,480 --> 00:36:46,120
Speaker 5: I guess the difference for those who don't understand, like

774
00:36:46,120 --> 00:36:48,600
Speaker 5: what that storm belt's like in the Southern Ocean as well.

775
00:36:49,000 --> 00:36:51,920
Speaker 4: If you imagine like a circumnavigation of the planet for

776
00:36:51,960 --> 00:36:55,880
Speaker 4: a sailor, most of their sailing is around the equatoral levels,

777
00:36:55,960 --> 00:36:59,799
Speaker 4: trade winds, quite calm conditions sea states probably two to

778
00:36:59,840 --> 00:37:04,040
Speaker 4: five I meet as maximum, and the most dangerous part

779
00:37:04,040 --> 00:37:07,040
Speaker 4: of their trip is rounding the Cape Horn, which is

780
00:37:07,040 --> 00:37:09,520
Speaker 4: the most southern tip of the South American coastline there

781
00:37:09,800 --> 00:37:13,719
Speaker 4: between sort of you've got the Antarctic Peninsula comes up,

782
00:37:13,719 --> 00:37:16,280
Speaker 4: and you've got that coastline that goes down off America,

783
00:37:16,400 --> 00:37:21,120
Speaker 4: and that's that's it, that that cape there, and basically

784
00:37:21,719 --> 00:37:24,360
Speaker 4: when they enter into that, they go into that storm

785
00:37:24,360 --> 00:37:26,439
Speaker 4: belt and they're in it for like maybe a week

786
00:37:26,440 --> 00:37:28,400
Speaker 4: and a half, two weeks, depending on how fast their

787
00:37:28,400 --> 00:37:33,719
Speaker 4: boat is, and most people's trips become undone at that point. Okay,

788
00:37:33,840 --> 00:37:36,759
Speaker 4: So for me to then do this record, I would

789
00:37:36,800 --> 00:37:40,080
Speaker 4: be in those conditions, those storm conditions that break every

790
00:37:40,080 --> 00:37:44,799
Speaker 4: other boat for the entire three months. Not Able to

791
00:37:44,840 --> 00:37:46,959
Speaker 4: get north of the storms, not able to get away

792
00:37:46,960 --> 00:37:47,359
Speaker 4: from them.

793
00:37:47,640 --> 00:37:49,560
Speaker 3: I'm just in them. I have to go through them.

794
00:37:50,440 --> 00:37:55,359
Speaker 1: And so at what point when you're in these storms, Well,

795
00:37:55,480 --> 00:37:59,319
Speaker 1: I don't think there's one point. I imagine there's multiple points. Yeah,

796
00:37:59,640 --> 00:38:02,120
Speaker 1: But where was it that you started to realize that

797
00:38:02,200 --> 00:38:04,719
Speaker 1: something was going pretty significantly wrong.

798
00:38:05,120 --> 00:38:09,359
Speaker 4: Yeah, So seventy two days into the record, so I'd

799
00:38:09,400 --> 00:38:13,960
Speaker 4: sailed Cape Horn obviously is considered the Mount Everest of sailine,

800
00:38:14,000 --> 00:38:17,840
Speaker 4: so it's the same sort of accolades as somebody in

801
00:38:17,880 --> 00:38:22,239
Speaker 4: Mount Everest, the sailors. And so for me, I was

802
00:38:22,880 --> 00:38:25,279
Speaker 4: i'd sailed from Albany, went directly south to.

803
00:38:25,320 --> 00:38:26,200
Speaker 3: Forty five south.

804
00:38:26,320 --> 00:38:30,320
Speaker 4: I'd the whole South Pacific Ocean rounded Cape Horn, sailed

805
00:38:30,360 --> 00:38:34,279
Speaker 4: the whole South Atlantic Ocean, and literally four weeks from

806
00:38:34,280 --> 00:38:37,959
Speaker 4: my destination of Western Australia, I just had the South

807
00:38:38,000 --> 00:38:41,640
Speaker 4: Indian Ocean, which was around three and a half thousand miles,

808
00:38:41,640 --> 00:38:44,520
Speaker 4: still quite a long way still the Southern Ocean, but

809
00:38:44,719 --> 00:38:47,799
Speaker 4: like I was on the home stretch, and these sort

810
00:38:47,840 --> 00:38:49,799
Speaker 4: of storms coming through. Once a week you would have

811
00:38:49,880 --> 00:38:53,120
Speaker 4: a storm the size of a cyclone or hurricane, and

812
00:38:53,200 --> 00:38:56,720
Speaker 4: you'd have waves. Generally a calm day was about five meters,

813
00:38:58,400 --> 00:39:01,440
Speaker 4: and then you get the knock days and the not

814
00:39:01,560 --> 00:39:04,440
Speaker 4: calm days. At the most I think I saw in

815
00:39:04,480 --> 00:39:09,040
Speaker 4: wave height on that particular record was about twelve meters.

816
00:39:09,560 --> 00:39:13,600
Speaker 4: But then I yeah, day seventy two, I was one

817
00:39:13,640 --> 00:39:17,440
Speaker 4: thousand miles from land. I was just passing below like

818
00:39:17,560 --> 00:39:21,560
Speaker 4: the southern tip of South Africa there, and it was

819
00:39:21,760 --> 00:39:24,719
Speaker 4: just going on sunset, so as you do. None of

820
00:39:24,719 --> 00:39:27,960
Speaker 4: these disasters happened in daylight. They always happened at nighttime.

821
00:39:29,120 --> 00:39:32,640
Speaker 4: And a piece of rigging wire snapped, and I'd been

822
00:39:32,680 --> 00:39:34,280
Speaker 4: on deck about twenty minutes earlier.

823
00:39:34,480 --> 00:39:36,279
Speaker 3: I had looked around. Everything looked good.

824
00:39:36,360 --> 00:39:38,680
Speaker 4: The boat was in sort of six to eight meter c's,

825
00:39:39,120 --> 00:39:41,399
Speaker 4: so if you imagine like a three story building as

826
00:39:41,400 --> 00:39:44,120
Speaker 4: a wave, that was kind of the conditions. But we've

827
00:39:44,160 --> 00:39:47,400
Speaker 4: been in those conditions for seventy days, Like it wasn't

828
00:39:47,680 --> 00:39:50,279
Speaker 4: new to us. There was just another day at sea.

829
00:39:51,239 --> 00:39:53,080
Speaker 4: The boat felt really good, she fell ow. She was

830
00:39:53,120 --> 00:39:55,479
Speaker 4: handling the conditions well, like we weren't getting shoved around

831
00:39:55,560 --> 00:39:58,440
Speaker 4: too much. But I was going into a new storm

832
00:39:58,440 --> 00:40:00,840
Speaker 4: that night, so the conditions were going to curiate throughout

833
00:40:00,840 --> 00:40:03,880
Speaker 4: the night and get worse. And the wind was about

834
00:40:03,920 --> 00:40:06,200
Speaker 4: thirty five to forty five knots of wind, which is

835
00:40:06,320 --> 00:40:10,000
Speaker 4: kind of around sixty kilometer hour winds roughly, to give

836
00:40:10,040 --> 00:40:13,080
Speaker 4: people an idea, Yeah, generally you lose the roof off

837
00:40:13,080 --> 00:40:14,959
Speaker 4: your house at sixty kilometers, So.

838
00:40:15,280 --> 00:40:18,600
Speaker 1: So okay, that's a good analogy. So strong, okay, but not.

839
00:40:18,840 --> 00:40:20,439
Speaker 3: Like the worst i'd seen that.

840
00:40:20,400 --> 00:40:23,600
Speaker 1: Trip, pretty strong, too strong.

841
00:40:23,680 --> 00:40:27,440
Speaker 4: Yeah, I'd had a lot stronger, okay, But so for

842
00:40:27,520 --> 00:40:28,560
Speaker 4: me it was like a normal day.

843
00:40:28,600 --> 00:40:31,200
Speaker 3: And literally the last two weeks had been conditions like that.

844
00:40:31,600 --> 00:40:34,400
Speaker 4: They'd degrade just slightly or they'd go slightly stronger, but

845
00:40:34,520 --> 00:40:37,920
Speaker 4: on average the conditions were like that. But I was

846
00:40:37,960 --> 00:40:39,880
Speaker 4: in my bunk trying to get one of those lovely

847
00:40:39,960 --> 00:40:44,160
Speaker 4: twenty minute sleeps and just had a bang and it

848
00:40:44,360 --> 00:40:48,640
Speaker 4: was so loud, like it was like a gunshot going off,

849
00:40:48,960 --> 00:40:51,359
Speaker 4: Like it was just this bang, and it was like

850
00:40:51,360 --> 00:40:54,200
Speaker 4: this metallic sound. So it rang in my ears like

851
00:40:54,239 --> 00:40:56,600
Speaker 4: almost like a yeah, like a bomb or something going

852
00:40:56,640 --> 00:40:59,840
Speaker 4: off near your head. And so I jumped out of

853
00:40:59,880 --> 00:41:03,120
Speaker 4: my onto my engine box, and above my engine box

854
00:41:03,200 --> 00:41:06,120
Speaker 4: I have like a clear perspects dome and it allows

855
00:41:06,160 --> 00:41:08,840
Speaker 4: me to see out without physically going ever into the

856
00:41:08,840 --> 00:41:11,560
Speaker 4: bad weather, which is awesome, yeah, and it means I

857
00:41:11,560 --> 00:41:13,319
Speaker 4: don't then have to get all my kit on, a

858
00:41:13,520 --> 00:41:15,200
Speaker 4: life jacket and all of that, but I can assess

859
00:41:15,280 --> 00:41:17,960
Speaker 4: the situation. And so I jumped up on that, and

860
00:41:18,000 --> 00:41:20,239
Speaker 4: I initially thought it was a rope that broke at

861
00:41:20,280 --> 00:41:21,920
Speaker 4: the back of the boat. So I looked at the

862
00:41:21,960 --> 00:41:24,759
Speaker 4: back of the boat and everything looked normal, and it

863
00:41:24,800 --> 00:41:28,160
Speaker 4: was like that sinking, twisting guts kind of feeling like,

864
00:41:28,239 --> 00:41:29,360
Speaker 4: you know, if something really.

865
00:41:29,239 --> 00:41:29,920
Speaker 1: Bad has happened.

866
00:41:30,320 --> 00:41:32,279
Speaker 4: And I looked to the front of the boat and

867
00:41:32,360 --> 00:41:35,520
Speaker 4: my master is twenty two meters and aluminium, and it

868
00:41:35,600 --> 00:41:38,720
Speaker 4: was just bending like a hula girl shaking her hips,

869
00:41:38,719 --> 00:41:41,360
Speaker 4: like just flexing as the boat's ceiling over these ways.

870
00:41:41,640 --> 00:41:44,440
Speaker 3: The master is just like about to snap.

871
00:41:44,960 --> 00:41:48,319
Speaker 4: And so I launched for my life jacket, just in

872
00:41:48,360 --> 00:41:50,360
Speaker 4: my bass layers, I don't have wet weather gear on,

873
00:41:50,840 --> 00:41:54,040
Speaker 4: launched for my life jacket, threw it on, just clipped

874
00:41:54,080 --> 00:41:56,479
Speaker 4: myself to the outside of the hatch to climb onto

875
00:41:56,520 --> 00:41:59,279
Speaker 4: the deck and go and maneuver the boat, which is

876
00:41:59,320 --> 00:42:02,520
Speaker 4: a technique call tacking where we changed the angle of

877
00:42:02,560 --> 00:42:04,480
Speaker 4: the boat and we put the wind on the other

878
00:42:04,560 --> 00:42:06,520
Speaker 4: side of the mast, and the other side of the

879
00:42:06,560 --> 00:42:09,760
Speaker 4: mask isn't broken. So in theory, I could have tucked

880
00:42:09,760 --> 00:42:13,200
Speaker 4: the boat and saved the mast and then dropped sails,

881
00:42:13,280 --> 00:42:14,919
Speaker 4: gone through the storm and when I had a lull,

882
00:42:15,280 --> 00:42:16,279
Speaker 4: run repairs and.

883
00:42:16,200 --> 00:42:16,759
Speaker 3: Fixed it all.

884
00:42:17,200 --> 00:42:21,120
Speaker 4: And so I am running up on deck and I

885
00:42:21,360 --> 00:42:24,520
Speaker 4: just hear it all come crashing down, and so my

886
00:42:24,680 --> 00:42:28,880
Speaker 4: mask snapped at deck level like there was nothing standing

887
00:42:28,960 --> 00:42:31,120
Speaker 4: up out of the boat, and like it snapped at

888
00:42:31,120 --> 00:42:34,080
Speaker 4: deck level, and I then had this It was just

889
00:42:34,160 --> 00:42:37,160
Speaker 4: the most violent sequence of noise, like.

890
00:42:37,040 --> 00:42:38,520
Speaker 3: If you've ever heard of like a.

891
00:42:38,520 --> 00:42:42,200
Speaker 4: Car yard crushing cars, that metal on metal, like grinding

892
00:42:42,239 --> 00:42:45,960
Speaker 4: and twisting noise. It was that, but I'm inside the boats.

893
00:42:45,960 --> 00:42:50,160
Speaker 4: That's amplified through the hull of the boat really incredibly loudly,

894
00:42:50,719 --> 00:42:53,640
Speaker 4: and because everything's tensioned on you're rigging. As soon as

895
00:42:53,640 --> 00:42:58,520
Speaker 4: that tension's released, the whole boat's hull just like flexed

896
00:42:58,520 --> 00:43:01,840
Speaker 4: and wobbled and twisted. And I had no idea what

897
00:43:02,080 --> 00:43:05,240
Speaker 4: was you know, because these things can be incredibly violent.

898
00:43:05,920 --> 00:43:07,440
Speaker 3: It could have been a wave, could have been anything.

899
00:43:07,480 --> 00:43:10,759
Speaker 4: But the mask just snapped and it fell to the

900
00:43:10,840 --> 00:43:13,080
Speaker 4: right hand side, the starboard side, into the ocean.

901
00:43:13,640 --> 00:43:16,160
Speaker 3: But I still had sails up, okay.

902
00:43:15,840 --> 00:43:19,480
Speaker 4: And so they all became drag in the water, and

903
00:43:19,520 --> 00:43:22,480
Speaker 4: it turned the boat one hundred and eighty degrees and

904
00:43:22,520 --> 00:43:24,520
Speaker 4: there was about this sort of two to three meters

905
00:43:24,600 --> 00:43:27,200
Speaker 4: section at the base of the mast where it had broken,

906
00:43:27,520 --> 00:43:29,720
Speaker 4: that was still trapped on the deck of the boat,

907
00:43:30,040 --> 00:43:32,439
Speaker 4: and all my safety rails on the right hand side

908
00:43:32,440 --> 00:43:35,160
Speaker 4: were torn off and crushed by the rigging coming down,

909
00:43:36,160 --> 00:43:39,200
Speaker 4: but this jagged bit of rigging that was still stuck

910
00:43:39,280 --> 00:43:41,399
Speaker 4: on the boat by all the ropes and other bits

911
00:43:41,440 --> 00:43:45,399
Speaker 4: of rigging wire and stuff that now as the boat

912
00:43:45,520 --> 00:43:49,080
Speaker 4: turned around, was getting pushed and pulled by these waves

913
00:43:49,080 --> 00:43:51,520
Speaker 4: coming through. But it was getting pushed and pulled so

914
00:43:51,680 --> 00:43:55,279
Speaker 4: incredibly violently. It was like a saw cutting the boat

915
00:43:55,280 --> 00:43:58,560
Speaker 4: in half. And the mask started to soar through the

916
00:43:58,640 --> 00:44:02,880
Speaker 4: deck of the boat. So I had in my mind,

917
00:44:03,040 --> 00:44:05,920
Speaker 4: like incredibly limited time to try and save the boat.

918
00:44:06,280 --> 00:44:08,839
Speaker 4: And I'm one thousand miles from land, three days from

919
00:44:08,880 --> 00:44:12,560
Speaker 4: help at a minimum freezing temperatures like you just before

920
00:44:12,640 --> 00:44:16,960
Speaker 4: snowstorms kind of temperature in a new storm coming through

921
00:44:16,960 --> 00:44:17,319
Speaker 4: that night.

922
00:44:18,560 --> 00:44:21,280
Speaker 1: Yeah, fun times, And how on earth did you save

923
00:44:21,320 --> 00:44:21,680
Speaker 1: the boat?

924
00:44:23,080 --> 00:44:27,640
Speaker 4: It took me hours and hours, and it was honestly

925
00:44:27,680 --> 00:44:30,959
Speaker 4: one of the most terrifying experiences that I've ever gone through.

926
00:44:31,000 --> 00:44:33,239
Speaker 4: I wrote the book Facing Fear on it, and we've

927
00:44:33,239 --> 00:44:35,279
Speaker 4: got a film coming out called Ice Maiden.

928
00:44:35,000 --> 00:44:35,920
Speaker 3: Which is this story.

929
00:44:36,840 --> 00:44:41,080
Speaker 4: But about three hours into the emergency, I started going hypothermic,

930
00:44:41,960 --> 00:44:45,200
Speaker 4: and so I had been completely dosed in my base layers.

931
00:44:45,280 --> 00:44:47,680
Speaker 4: I put wet weather gear on top, but I was

932
00:44:47,680 --> 00:44:51,080
Speaker 4: then crawling around on the deck in freezing conditions, in

933
00:44:51,200 --> 00:44:55,680
Speaker 4: strong winds, soaking wet for hours, and so I started

934
00:44:55,719 --> 00:44:58,680
Speaker 4: to lose the ability to kind of bend my hand.

935
00:44:58,760 --> 00:45:00,680
Speaker 3: I had to look at my hand to tools to

936
00:45:00,719 --> 00:45:01,600
Speaker 3: know that it was shut.

937
00:45:01,840 --> 00:45:05,279
Speaker 4: Like I had no sensations left, and I started going

938
00:45:05,280 --> 00:45:07,640
Speaker 4: into brain fog, quite heavy brain fog. And a lot

939
00:45:07,640 --> 00:45:11,200
Speaker 4: of my preparation had been risk management and identifying signs

940
00:45:11,200 --> 00:45:13,960
Speaker 4: and symptoms, things like hypothermia, how to treat it, and

941
00:45:13,960 --> 00:45:14,400
Speaker 4: all of that.

942
00:45:15,960 --> 00:45:17,439
Speaker 3: So I knew I was running out of time.

943
00:45:17,560 --> 00:45:20,280
Speaker 4: And at this point, that soaring effect of the mass

944
00:45:20,360 --> 00:45:23,919
Speaker 4: with these six to eight meter waves coming through, had

945
00:45:23,960 --> 00:45:28,440
Speaker 4: cut like a pretty large kind of dinner plate size

946
00:45:28,880 --> 00:45:32,000
Speaker 4: platter size hole in the boat, and it had gone

947
00:45:32,080 --> 00:45:33,880
Speaker 4: all the way through the deck now and it was

948
00:45:33,960 --> 00:45:35,920
Speaker 4: just working on the hull, which meant it was going

949
00:45:36,000 --> 00:45:38,360
Speaker 4: to speed up because it was much easier section to

950
00:45:38,640 --> 00:45:39,359
Speaker 4: kind of cut through.

951
00:45:40,800 --> 00:45:41,520
Speaker 3: And so I.

952
00:45:43,040 --> 00:45:46,279
Speaker 4: Knew that time was incredibly limited. I had disconnected the

953
00:45:46,320 --> 00:45:49,400
Speaker 4: back piece of rigging and one of the forward pieces,

954
00:45:49,440 --> 00:45:51,799
Speaker 4: but the next piece was the very very front piece

955
00:45:51,840 --> 00:45:55,000
Speaker 4: of rigging, and I had tried bolt cutters, I'd tried

956
00:45:55,040 --> 00:45:57,880
Speaker 4: all the other tools. The easiest solution to me in

957
00:45:57,880 --> 00:46:00,760
Speaker 4: that scenario was to physically knock it out the joining

958
00:46:00,800 --> 00:46:04,120
Speaker 4: pins and separate the mast manually rather than trying to

959
00:46:04,120 --> 00:46:06,960
Speaker 4: cut it because it was just too thick and the

960
00:46:07,000 --> 00:46:08,360
Speaker 4: gear I had wasn't working.

961
00:46:08,960 --> 00:46:11,480
Speaker 3: And also like you're not on a stable platform.

962
00:46:11,719 --> 00:46:14,680
Speaker 4: The boat's like getting tossed left and right, left and right,

963
00:46:14,760 --> 00:46:17,200
Speaker 4: like you know, and every time these waves break, because

964
00:46:17,239 --> 00:46:20,080
Speaker 4: I'm now an anchored vessel in these storms.

965
00:46:19,960 --> 00:46:21,759
Speaker 3: The wave will hit the hull of the boat, throw

966
00:46:21,800 --> 00:46:22,280
Speaker 3: the boat.

967
00:46:22,080 --> 00:46:25,000
Speaker 4: About fifty meters sideways, and then all that white water

968
00:46:25,080 --> 00:46:28,120
Speaker 4: goes right over the boat. So I'm submerged up to

969
00:46:28,160 --> 00:46:31,759
Speaker 4: my neck in whitewater like every thirty seconds with these impacts,

970
00:46:32,000 --> 00:46:34,040
Speaker 4: trying to hold onto tools, trying not to get ripped

971
00:46:34,040 --> 00:46:35,719
Speaker 4: off the boat, and it's dark.

972
00:46:35,760 --> 00:46:37,480
Speaker 3: You go only got your head torched. Like it's just

973
00:46:37,520 --> 00:46:39,000
Speaker 3: an impossible.

974
00:46:38,680 --> 00:46:42,960
Speaker 4: Kind of scenario and something, Yeah, I wouldn't want my

975
00:46:43,000 --> 00:46:44,000
Speaker 4: worst enemy.

976
00:46:43,760 --> 00:46:45,640
Speaker 1: To go through. Did you think that you were going

977
00:46:45,719 --> 00:46:46,040
Speaker 1: to die?

978
00:46:46,280 --> 00:46:46,440
Speaker 5: Oh?

979
00:46:46,520 --> 00:46:50,400
Speaker 3: Yes, yeah I had to. When I looked at the

980
00:46:50,440 --> 00:46:51,719
Speaker 3: four stay wire, which is that.

981
00:46:51,760 --> 00:46:54,279
Speaker 4: Forward one that I was talking about the way it

982
00:46:54,280 --> 00:46:58,080
Speaker 4: had broken, or the way the mast had broken. It

983
00:46:58,080 --> 00:47:00,840
Speaker 4: had bent over and it had this thing called a

984
00:47:00,920 --> 00:47:03,560
Speaker 4: furling drum on the bottom of it, and that drum

985
00:47:03,680 --> 00:47:07,799
Speaker 4: was blocking my access to this wire. And I had

986
00:47:07,840 --> 00:47:10,799
Speaker 4: two options at the time. One was to take my screwdriver,

987
00:47:11,160 --> 00:47:13,759
Speaker 4: wedge my arm like kind of under the drum, put

988
00:47:13,800 --> 00:47:15,719
Speaker 4: the fitting in, and then like hug it and like

989
00:47:15,760 --> 00:47:17,480
Speaker 4: wrap my arm around the other side and bash it

990
00:47:17,480 --> 00:47:20,480
Speaker 4: out that way. But the minute I let that go,

991
00:47:20,719 --> 00:47:22,960
Speaker 4: it's gonna whip around the boat like a snake like

992
00:47:23,000 --> 00:47:23,799
Speaker 4: it's gonna.

993
00:47:23,520 --> 00:47:27,080
Speaker 3: Be and it's heavy metal, so it will crack a rib.

994
00:47:27,000 --> 00:47:30,560
Speaker 4: Break an arm otherwise injure me to a point where

995
00:47:30,560 --> 00:47:33,200
Speaker 4: I couldn't save the rest of the boat. The only

996
00:47:33,239 --> 00:47:36,239
Speaker 4: other choice I could see at that time was to

997
00:47:36,239 --> 00:47:39,719
Speaker 4: physically climb over the bow rails and sit down on

998
00:47:39,800 --> 00:47:43,399
Speaker 4: something called the bow sprit. These racing yachts you often

999
00:47:43,400 --> 00:47:44,440
Speaker 4: see that the.

1000
00:47:44,160 --> 00:47:46,840
Speaker 3: Stick out the front that fly the big sails off. Yeah,

1001
00:47:46,920 --> 00:47:49,000
Speaker 3: and it's I had to climb over the rails and

1002
00:47:49,040 --> 00:47:51,920
Speaker 3: sit down on that again six to eight meters ways.

1003
00:47:52,360 --> 00:47:55,239
Speaker 4: I'm not even holding on like well on the boat

1004
00:47:55,560 --> 00:47:58,279
Speaker 4: inside the safety rails that are still existing, like let

1005
00:47:58,320 --> 00:48:00,440
Speaker 4: alone being out there with nothing to hold on to,

1006
00:48:01,640 --> 00:48:04,040
Speaker 4: ripping on a stick out the front of a boat

1007
00:48:04,080 --> 00:48:07,319
Speaker 4: in six a sas like it's just insanity. And so

1008
00:48:07,560 --> 00:48:09,560
Speaker 4: I knew if I was going to do that that

1009
00:48:09,640 --> 00:48:11,920
Speaker 4: I had to tell somebody, And so I called my

1010
00:48:12,000 --> 00:48:14,840
Speaker 4: shore manager up, Jeff, and he's this amazing volunteer of

1011
00:48:14,880 --> 00:48:17,319
Speaker 4: mine and almost part like, you know, part of the

1012
00:48:17,320 --> 00:48:20,759
Speaker 4: family now. And it was three am at the time

1013
00:48:20,800 --> 00:48:23,360
Speaker 4: I issued the call to just let people know that I

1014
00:48:23,400 --> 00:48:26,560
Speaker 4: had dismastered and that I was in a pampan situation,

1015
00:48:26,960 --> 00:48:29,920
Speaker 4: and a pampan's one step below a may day. So

1016
00:48:29,960 --> 00:48:31,880
Speaker 4: he was all on high alert. The whole team was

1017
00:48:31,920 --> 00:48:34,279
Speaker 4: on high alert. Mum was away, everyone knew about it,

1018
00:48:35,080 --> 00:48:37,439
Speaker 4: but they were waiting for updates. And so I called

1019
00:48:37,480 --> 00:48:40,880
Speaker 4: Jeff up and I said, I've disconnected the backstay and

1020
00:48:40,920 --> 00:48:43,200
Speaker 4: the inner force day, but I have to climb out

1021
00:48:43,200 --> 00:48:46,280
Speaker 4: on the bowsprit to disconnect the force A wire.

1022
00:48:46,640 --> 00:48:49,719
Speaker 3: And he's like, oh, oh okay, because initially he was

1023
00:48:49,760 --> 00:48:51,920
Speaker 3: all very much like keep going, like all of us

1024
00:48:51,960 --> 00:48:53,799
Speaker 3: Chelia's behind you, like, just keep at it, He'll be.

1025
00:48:53,760 --> 00:48:56,920
Speaker 4: Fine, like, you know, very positive, and as soon as

1026
00:48:56,920 --> 00:48:58,759
Speaker 4: I said I had to climb over that safety rail,

1027
00:48:58,840 --> 00:49:02,800
Speaker 4: he was like, ah, okay, I understand, wow, And then

1028
00:49:02,920 --> 00:49:04,759
Speaker 4: I had to say to him, I still tear up

1029
00:49:04,760 --> 00:49:07,760
Speaker 4: telling this. I had to say to him, if my PLB,

1030
00:49:08,160 --> 00:49:11,400
Speaker 4: my personal location beacon on my life jacket is activated,

1031
00:49:11,680 --> 00:49:12,720
Speaker 4: is because I'm washed.

1032
00:49:12,520 --> 00:49:14,040
Speaker 3: Off the boat and I'm in the ocean.

1033
00:49:14,440 --> 00:49:17,360
Speaker 4: Don't come and get me like It's the only way

1034
00:49:17,560 --> 00:49:19,480
Speaker 4: I could say goodbye or give them some kind of

1035
00:49:19,520 --> 00:49:22,319
Speaker 4: answer as to what happened that night and to why

1036
00:49:22,360 --> 00:49:23,279
Speaker 4: I wasn't coming home.

1037
00:49:24,120 --> 00:49:26,600
Speaker 3: So yeah, fun times?

1038
00:49:26,800 --> 00:49:29,080
Speaker 1: What did so much more? What did he say back

1039
00:49:29,080 --> 00:49:29,399
Speaker 1: to that?

1040
00:49:30,239 --> 00:49:30,560
Speaker 3: Pat it?

1041
00:49:30,880 --> 00:49:32,840
Speaker 1: What did What was his response when you said that

1042
00:49:32,880 --> 00:49:33,239
Speaker 1: to him?

1043
00:49:33,400 --> 00:49:37,640
Speaker 4: He said, Okay, I understand, I understand, and then he

1044
00:49:37,719 --> 00:49:40,239
Speaker 4: started trying to ask another question to get more situational

1045
00:49:40,280 --> 00:49:42,560
Speaker 4: awareness of the scenario, and out instead, I've.

1046
00:49:42,400 --> 00:49:43,799
Speaker 3: Got no time. I've got no time. And I hung

1047
00:49:43,880 --> 00:49:44,879
Speaker 3: up and I.

1048
00:49:44,880 --> 00:49:50,000
Speaker 4: Left, and I at that point was getting blackouts. I

1049
00:49:50,200 --> 00:49:54,640
Speaker 4: was shaking uncontroller it had been shaking uncontrollably for hours,

1050
00:49:55,600 --> 00:49:59,200
Speaker 4: and I physically was losing that ability to save myself.

1051
00:49:59,560 --> 00:50:02,719
Speaker 4: And I knew if I abandoned the boat because it

1052
00:50:02,840 --> 00:50:05,239
Speaker 4: sank and I hopped in a life raft that night,

1053
00:50:05,320 --> 00:50:08,120
Speaker 4: I wasn't coming home, that a life rafter was never

1054
00:50:08,160 --> 00:50:08,719
Speaker 4: going to save me.

1055
00:50:08,719 --> 00:50:11,239
Speaker 3: In those conditions. It's not strong enough to save me

1056
00:50:11,280 --> 00:50:14,960
Speaker 3: in those conditions. And so I crawled back out and

1057
00:50:15,000 --> 00:50:16,640
Speaker 3: I got to the bow of the boat, and I

1058
00:50:16,680 --> 00:50:17,560
Speaker 3: got about.

1059
00:50:17,280 --> 00:50:20,320
Speaker 4: Two meters from the front of the boat, and I

1060
00:50:20,480 --> 00:50:25,040
Speaker 4: just froze. I froze for like twenty minutes out there,

1061
00:50:25,080 --> 00:50:28,799
Speaker 4: Like I couldn't force myself to make that conscious choice

1062
00:50:29,160 --> 00:50:32,360
Speaker 4: to kill myself to give myself half a shot of surviving.

1063
00:50:33,360 --> 00:50:35,720
Speaker 4: Does that make sense? Like I knew if I stayed,

1064
00:50:35,760 --> 00:50:37,120
Speaker 4: if I didn't go out there, the boat.

1065
00:50:36,920 --> 00:50:39,320
Speaker 3: Would sink and I would die. But if I went out.

1066
00:50:39,120 --> 00:50:42,360
Speaker 4: There, instead of it being maybe sometime tonight, it was

1067
00:50:42,400 --> 00:50:44,280
Speaker 4: in the next five minutes, I might not be alive.

1068
00:50:45,239 --> 00:50:48,880
Speaker 3: Like it's just that severity of like it hitting home

1069
00:50:49,560 --> 00:50:51,239
Speaker 3: that I might not come back from this.

1070
00:50:55,400 --> 00:50:58,960
Speaker 1: How did you get how did you unfreeze? How did

1071
00:50:59,000 --> 00:51:00,000
Speaker 1: you get yourself moved?

1072
00:51:00,760 --> 00:51:04,960
Speaker 4: I you know, we've had lots of conversations with family

1073
00:51:05,000 --> 00:51:08,960
Speaker 4: and stuff before this around you know, maybe I won't

1074
00:51:08,960 --> 00:51:11,600
Speaker 4: come home because the nature of the type of record

1075
00:51:11,640 --> 00:51:15,160
Speaker 4: it was is huge, and there is that risk that that.

1076
00:51:14,920 --> 00:51:17,520
Speaker 3: That one percent you can't control, that you can't plan for.

1077
00:51:18,160 --> 00:51:20,520
Speaker 4: And so we'd had those chats, but like the reality

1078
00:51:20,560 --> 00:51:25,760
Speaker 4: of living it is like entirely different. And I spend

1079
00:51:25,800 --> 00:51:28,160
Speaker 4: that time like every time these waves would hit, it

1080
00:51:28,200 --> 00:51:30,120
Speaker 4: would rip your legs out, drag you down the deck.

1081
00:51:30,200 --> 00:51:32,160
Speaker 3: You're hooking arms in the safety.

1082
00:51:31,920 --> 00:51:34,160
Speaker 4: Rails trying to stay on, and then you crawl forward

1083
00:51:34,200 --> 00:51:37,040
Speaker 4: again and I'd try and like slack myself up to go,

1084
00:51:37,960 --> 00:51:40,960
Speaker 4: and it was constantly this this like shouting in my

1085
00:51:41,040 --> 00:51:44,759
Speaker 4: head of just like just do it, like you don't

1086
00:51:44,840 --> 00:51:45,680
Speaker 4: have a choice, like.

1087
00:51:45,680 --> 00:51:48,480
Speaker 3: This is the choice, this is the only option.

1088
00:51:49,680 --> 00:51:54,120
Speaker 4: And I remember thinking through all the tools, the equipment,

1089
00:51:54,560 --> 00:51:58,080
Speaker 4: the scenario in its entirety, and going, Okay, is there

1090
00:51:58,120 --> 00:51:58,880
Speaker 4: something I haven't.

1091
00:51:58,640 --> 00:52:00,759
Speaker 3: Thought of yet? There are a piece of equipment I haven't

1092
00:52:00,800 --> 00:52:03,200
Speaker 3: tried yet. Is there a better or a safer way.

1093
00:52:03,040 --> 00:52:05,520
Speaker 4: To do this that I'm not thinking of because I'm

1094
00:52:05,520 --> 00:52:08,640
Speaker 4: too involved in it. And so I really did take

1095
00:52:08,640 --> 00:52:11,600
Speaker 4: that time to try and look at the scenario, and

1096
00:52:11,719 --> 00:52:13,920
Speaker 4: after that I couldn't think of any other way to

1097
00:52:14,000 --> 00:52:16,120
Speaker 4: deal with it except going out there.

1098
00:52:16,120 --> 00:52:20,279
Speaker 3: That was the safest available option at the time. And

1099
00:52:21,920 --> 00:52:24,759
Speaker 3: after about twenty minutes, I just went I'm going to

1100
00:52:24,800 --> 00:52:25,000
Speaker 3: do it.

1101
00:52:25,000 --> 00:52:27,520
Speaker 4: I've just got to do it, Like there's staying here

1102
00:52:27,600 --> 00:52:29,440
Speaker 4: is just making it harder to do because I'm getting

1103
00:52:29,480 --> 00:52:32,840
Speaker 4: older and I'm you know, I'm going further in hypothermia.

1104
00:52:32,880 --> 00:52:36,399
Speaker 4: And so I just screamed at myself, just do it,

1105
00:52:36,760 --> 00:52:38,440
Speaker 4: and I jumped up, and I.

1106
00:52:38,160 --> 00:52:39,879
Speaker 3: Had bretethered over the.

1107
00:52:39,880 --> 00:52:42,120
Speaker 4: Rails in a way that if the railing was torn

1108
00:52:42,160 --> 00:52:43,960
Speaker 4: off when this piece of rigging went, because it was

1109
00:52:44,040 --> 00:52:47,680
Speaker 4: very likely it would rip the rails off, that it

1110
00:52:47,719 --> 00:52:50,239
Speaker 4: wouldn't take my tether with it and take me with it.

1111
00:52:51,280 --> 00:52:53,959
Speaker 4: But it also meant that if the rails were ripped off,

1112
00:52:54,000 --> 00:52:55,879
Speaker 4: I'd have nothing to hang on to out there. I'd

1113
00:52:55,920 --> 00:52:58,279
Speaker 4: be on a boat with nothing to hold on to.

1114
00:52:59,480 --> 00:53:01,920
Speaker 4: And climbed out and I sat down, and I initially

1115
00:53:01,920 --> 00:53:04,680
Speaker 4: thought that I could kind of lock my ankles under

1116
00:53:05,320 --> 00:53:06,560
Speaker 4: the bow of the boat.

1117
00:53:07,360 --> 00:53:10,319
Speaker 3: I'm really sure my legs weren't quite long enough.

1118
00:53:10,560 --> 00:53:12,480
Speaker 4: I wish I knew this before I climbed out there,

1119
00:53:12,480 --> 00:53:13,880
Speaker 4: but it was too late by that and I was

1120
00:53:13,880 --> 00:53:15,799
Speaker 4: committed and I sat down and I was there.

1121
00:53:15,920 --> 00:53:16,439
Speaker 3: That was it.

1122
00:53:17,560 --> 00:53:20,560
Speaker 4: So I was just holding on with my thighs, pinching

1123
00:53:20,640 --> 00:53:23,120
Speaker 4: up as much as I could. My left hand I

1124
00:53:23,160 --> 00:53:25,360
Speaker 4: held the screwdriver and the safety rail.

1125
00:53:25,560 --> 00:53:29,080
Speaker 3: That was like kind of buckled and twisted to the side, and.

1126
00:53:29,200 --> 00:53:31,640
Speaker 4: The railing itself was only held on with four bolts

1127
00:53:31,640 --> 00:53:34,040
Speaker 4: that were half ripped through the deck. The other bits

1128
00:53:34,080 --> 00:53:37,960
Speaker 4: of rail have already torn off with the dismasting. And

1129
00:53:38,000 --> 00:53:40,719
Speaker 4: then my right hand I held the hammer, but the

1130
00:53:40,760 --> 00:53:42,759
Speaker 4: hammer was so thick that I couldn't get my hands

1131
00:53:42,800 --> 00:53:44,799
Speaker 4: around the rail at the same time. So I have

1132
00:53:44,920 --> 00:53:48,000
Speaker 4: one hand holding the boat, one hand holding the hammer,

1133
00:53:48,400 --> 00:53:52,480
Speaker 4: and these waves like you can't you can't see them

1134
00:53:52,680 --> 00:53:54,400
Speaker 4: coming because it's nighttime right.

1135
00:53:54,640 --> 00:53:58,040
Speaker 1: Like pitch pretty much. You got your head torch, carst.

1136
00:53:57,840 --> 00:53:59,839
Speaker 3: Stormy night, you got your glow of your swag.

1137
00:54:00,080 --> 00:54:02,160
Speaker 4: You've got so much water gett whipped around you that

1138
00:54:02,160 --> 00:54:04,800
Speaker 4: your torch is giving you maybe a meter of visibility.

1139
00:54:04,840 --> 00:54:06,520
Speaker 4: You can't even see past that because you just it's

1140
00:54:06,560 --> 00:54:08,200
Speaker 4: reflecting on all the light of the water.

1141
00:54:09,480 --> 00:54:11,480
Speaker 3: But you hear the break of the wave. You can

1142
00:54:11,480 --> 00:54:12,520
Speaker 3: hear it, and you.

1143
00:54:12,480 --> 00:54:15,040
Speaker 4: Can feel the boat start to climb as it goes

1144
00:54:15,160 --> 00:54:17,400
Speaker 4: up a wave, and it'll climb for a few seconds.

1145
00:54:17,480 --> 00:54:18,960
Speaker 3: This is yeah, I know, it's terrifying.

1146
00:54:19,840 --> 00:54:23,000
Speaker 4: And so we sort of climbed up the first wave.

1147
00:54:23,160 --> 00:54:25,839
Speaker 4: I heard the wave break, and as it breaks, like

1148
00:54:26,280 --> 00:54:28,799
Speaker 4: one square meter of white water is one ton of

1149
00:54:28,800 --> 00:54:30,280
Speaker 4: pressure being applied.

1150
00:54:31,239 --> 00:54:32,840
Speaker 1: That's a huge amount.

1151
00:54:33,080 --> 00:54:36,760
Speaker 4: Yes, So a sort of eight meter wave when it breaks,

1152
00:54:36,880 --> 00:54:39,720
Speaker 4: only the sort of top two meters or so will break.

1153
00:54:39,920 --> 00:54:41,839
Speaker 4: But then you have a wall of like a meter

1154
00:54:41,920 --> 00:54:43,960
Speaker 4: and a half white water running down the face of

1155
00:54:44,000 --> 00:54:46,840
Speaker 4: this mountain of a wave, and it'll hit the boat.

1156
00:54:47,120 --> 00:54:48,640
Speaker 4: And then when it hits the hull of the boat,

1157
00:54:48,840 --> 00:54:52,040
Speaker 4: it will throw my ten ton boat fifty.

1158
00:54:51,680 --> 00:54:53,640
Speaker 3: Meters sideway to the trough of the wave.

1159
00:54:53,920 --> 00:54:57,000
Speaker 4: And sometimes you get almost fully airborne when this happens,

1160
00:54:57,040 --> 00:54:59,680
Speaker 4: like the whole boat slam like a map truck kind

1161
00:54:59,680 --> 00:55:01,640
Speaker 4: of hit you slams.

1162
00:55:01,200 --> 00:55:03,960
Speaker 3: Into the hull, throws the whole boat sideways.

1163
00:55:04,360 --> 00:55:07,840
Speaker 4: I had gripped the rail and I'd hooked my elbow

1164
00:55:08,160 --> 00:55:11,439
Speaker 4: with the hammer, and I'd hugged the boat as tight

1165
00:55:11,520 --> 00:55:14,600
Speaker 4: as i could, making myself as small as possible. And

1166
00:55:14,640 --> 00:55:17,240
Speaker 4: then when you hit the bottom of the wave, the trough,

1167
00:55:17,600 --> 00:55:20,719
Speaker 4: it's like that cement, like it's that unbroken surface of water.

1168
00:55:20,800 --> 00:55:24,200
Speaker 4: So the whole boat will hit hard, go from you know,

1169
00:55:24,280 --> 00:55:27,799
Speaker 4: from the throw to nothing, and it's like slamming.

1170
00:55:27,480 --> 00:55:28,480
Speaker 3: Into that brick wall.

1171
00:55:28,920 --> 00:55:32,120
Speaker 4: And then the whitewater hits the boat and rolls over

1172
00:55:32,160 --> 00:55:35,480
Speaker 4: the top and so it'll hit us, throw us impact

1173
00:55:35,560 --> 00:55:38,480
Speaker 4: the bottom of the wave, and then you're submerged. And

1174
00:55:38,920 --> 00:55:41,080
Speaker 4: I was on the front of the boat, fully submerged,

1175
00:55:41,480 --> 00:55:44,560
Speaker 4: and I would just hang on and on the back

1176
00:55:44,600 --> 00:55:46,719
Speaker 4: of that wave. I would then have to let go,

1177
00:55:47,120 --> 00:55:49,960
Speaker 4: put my screwdriver in the fitting, get my hammer and

1178
00:55:50,080 --> 00:55:51,479
Speaker 4: try and knock that fitting out.

1179
00:55:51,800 --> 00:55:53,719
Speaker 3: And I honestly, I don't know how long I was

1180
00:55:53,719 --> 00:55:54,160
Speaker 3: out there for.

1181
00:55:54,520 --> 00:55:57,400
Speaker 4: I felt like a lifetime, but it was probably maybe

1182
00:55:57,400 --> 00:56:00,920
Speaker 4: ten minutes or something. But everyone of those waves was

1183
00:56:01,040 --> 00:56:04,279
Speaker 4: just that moment of unknown, like, am I going to

1184
00:56:04,280 --> 00:56:05,239
Speaker 4: get through this next wave?

1185
00:56:06,200 --> 00:56:08,360
Speaker 1: And you are sitting with us here.

1186
00:56:08,280 --> 00:56:09,440
Speaker 3: Yes, get through it.

1187
00:56:10,200 --> 00:56:14,200
Speaker 1: You got through it, and you obviously was successful when

1188
00:56:14,200 --> 00:56:16,399
Speaker 1: you went out there and you ended up back in

1189
00:56:16,480 --> 00:56:19,000
Speaker 1: South Africa. You eventually made your way back to South Africa?

1190
00:56:19,080 --> 00:56:19,600
Speaker 1: Is that correct?

1191
00:56:19,760 --> 00:56:22,080
Speaker 4: Yes? I ended up runevoring with the container ship for

1192
00:56:22,200 --> 00:56:25,520
Speaker 4: fuel transfer. They collided with me, nearly sunk me a

1193
00:56:25,560 --> 00:56:26,080
Speaker 4: second time.

1194
00:56:26,600 --> 00:56:26,920
Speaker 1: With you.

1195
00:56:27,360 --> 00:56:30,120
Speaker 4: Yes, a whole nother, big involved story, but yeah, they

1196
00:56:30,320 --> 00:56:33,000
Speaker 4: that was actually probably more traumatic to me than the dismasting.

1197
00:56:33,000 --> 00:56:36,080
Speaker 3: The dismasting was very reactive. Yeah, you didn't have.

1198
00:56:36,000 --> 00:56:38,319
Speaker 4: Time to deal with the emotional elements of it. At

1199
00:56:38,360 --> 00:56:40,800
Speaker 4: the time, you just had to survive it. Whereas the

1200
00:56:41,239 --> 00:56:45,000
Speaker 4: container ship collision, my poor boat had already suffered so much.

1201
00:56:45,360 --> 00:56:48,280
Speaker 4: And then there's eighty six thousand ton container ships landing

1202
00:56:48,760 --> 00:56:51,880
Speaker 4: against the hull of the boat and the whole holes flexing.

1203
00:56:51,480 --> 00:56:52,120
Speaker 3: The wrong way.

1204
00:56:52,480 --> 00:56:54,080
Speaker 4: And there's this one moment where I was trying to

1205
00:56:54,120 --> 00:56:55,839
Speaker 4: get out from under the ship and the whole bow

1206
00:56:55,920 --> 00:56:58,480
Speaker 4: of my boat was sucked under the back of the

1207
00:56:58,560 --> 00:57:01,240
Speaker 4: ship as it lifted on way with half the propeller

1208
00:57:01,280 --> 00:57:03,080
Speaker 4: out of the water. And it was just like one

1209
00:57:03,120 --> 00:57:06,520
Speaker 4: of those moments where you're watching disaster but you can't

1210
00:57:06,560 --> 00:57:09,360
Speaker 4: control it. It's like slow motion and I'm just watching

1211
00:57:09,360 --> 00:57:13,000
Speaker 4: this shit just slowly fall towards my boat and I

1212
00:57:13,320 --> 00:57:16,800
Speaker 4: got clear by like millimeters. But yeah, that was a

1213
00:57:16,800 --> 00:57:20,920
Speaker 4: whole nother twelve hour emergency scenario. And then when I

1214
00:57:20,960 --> 00:57:24,120
Speaker 4: finally got fuel off this ship because they didn't speak

1215
00:57:24,120 --> 00:57:26,320
Speaker 4: any English, which was one of the big problems with

1216
00:57:26,360 --> 00:57:30,840
Speaker 4: that scenario, I ended up opening the gerring cans that

1217
00:57:30,840 --> 00:57:32,720
Speaker 4: they gave me and the fuel was black in color,

1218
00:57:33,160 --> 00:57:36,000
Speaker 4: as I didn't know if it would work in the engine.

1219
00:57:36,040 --> 00:57:39,040
Speaker 4: After you know, the now extensive damage to the other

1220
00:57:39,080 --> 00:57:43,120
Speaker 4: side of the boat that wasn't already damaged before, and

1221
00:57:44,000 --> 00:57:46,560
Speaker 4: so I ended up building a new mast with the boom.

1222
00:57:47,040 --> 00:57:50,320
Speaker 4: So I lost in the dismassing my mast itself, all

1223
00:57:50,320 --> 00:57:51,920
Speaker 4: the sails that were attached to it and all the

1224
00:57:52,000 --> 00:57:54,680
Speaker 4: rigging wire attached to it were lost in the Southern Ocean.

1225
00:57:55,040 --> 00:57:56,960
Speaker 4: But the only thing I'd been able to salvage was

1226
00:57:56,960 --> 00:57:59,360
Speaker 4: the boom, which is the horizontal piece of rigging that

1227
00:57:59,440 --> 00:58:04,120
Speaker 4: the mainstyle flies off. And so I spent two days

1228
00:58:04,160 --> 00:58:06,080
Speaker 4: and I built a new mast with that with the

1229
00:58:06,080 --> 00:58:08,760
Speaker 4: debris on the boat, and then motorsailed to Cape Town.

1230
00:58:10,400 --> 00:58:15,000
Speaker 1: Ho no, okay, And I'm because I'm conscious of time,

1231
00:58:15,080 --> 00:58:15,840
Speaker 1: because there's.

1232
00:58:15,680 --> 00:58:17,520
Speaker 3: So many more elements of that.

1233
00:58:17,960 --> 00:58:20,680
Speaker 1: You got there and repaired it.

1234
00:58:21,520 --> 00:58:26,560
Speaker 4: I got to Cape Town pretty broken and was able

1235
00:58:26,680 --> 00:58:32,600
Speaker 4: with a combination of sponsors, some insurance money, and donations

1236
00:58:32,640 --> 00:58:34,880
Speaker 4: from the public. I had about forty thousand in donations

1237
00:58:34,920 --> 00:58:38,160
Speaker 4: from just general people that wanted to support. And I

1238
00:58:38,200 --> 00:58:40,120
Speaker 4: found a secondhand mask that had been sitting in a

1239
00:58:40,160 --> 00:58:43,120
Speaker 4: shed in Capetown for fifteen years that was two meters

1240
00:58:43,120 --> 00:58:44,920
Speaker 4: shorter than my old masks, and I bought it for

1241
00:58:44,960 --> 00:58:47,760
Speaker 4: five thousand Australian whacked it in the boat, did a

1242
00:58:47,800 --> 00:58:50,200
Speaker 4: three hour test sale, and two months later I left

1243
00:58:50,640 --> 00:58:51,240
Speaker 4: to go again.

1244
00:58:52,160 --> 00:58:56,960
Speaker 1: I yeah, how did you conquer the fear of going again?

1245
00:58:57,120 --> 00:59:01,240
Speaker 1: After that level of trauma out there on multiple occasions, I.

1246
00:59:01,200 --> 00:59:05,440
Speaker 4: Didn't realize that I was traumatized, right, I didn't have

1247
00:59:05,480 --> 00:59:09,760
Speaker 4: time to process that, and I hadn't processed it. I

1248
00:59:10,320 --> 00:59:16,320
Speaker 4: reached Cape Town absolutely lost and just feeling like depressed

1249
00:59:16,440 --> 00:59:20,000
Speaker 4: and like not motivated to do anything. And it wasn't

1250
00:59:20,080 --> 00:59:23,680
Speaker 4: until the idea of sailing back to where I dismastered,

1251
00:59:24,080 --> 00:59:27,440
Speaker 4: crossing back onto the track and then finishing the record

1252
00:59:27,520 --> 00:59:30,200
Speaker 4: but doing it with one stop came into play that

1253
00:59:30,280 --> 00:59:33,240
Speaker 4: I actually started to feel motivated and excited.

1254
00:59:34,040 --> 00:59:35,880
Speaker 3: And I guess, like, you've got to kind of.

1255
00:59:35,880 --> 00:59:38,680
Speaker 4: Put it in perspective to in the sense of the

1256
00:59:38,720 --> 00:59:42,120
Speaker 4: playing field, being a female at like sportsperson in this

1257
00:59:42,640 --> 00:59:44,440
Speaker 4: zone compared to a male.

1258
00:59:44,320 --> 00:59:45,760
Speaker 3: Sportsperson in the zone.

1259
00:59:46,400 --> 00:59:49,720
Speaker 4: As my first big project, if I go out and fail,

1260
00:59:49,960 --> 00:59:52,960
Speaker 4: I will never have another project, simple as that, you

1261
00:59:53,000 --> 00:59:54,200
Speaker 4: won't get the funding again.

1262
00:59:54,400 --> 00:59:55,760
Speaker 3: Guys can fail multiple times.

1263
00:59:55,800 --> 00:59:58,400
Speaker 4: Girls we don't get the choice, especially at the beginning,

1264
01:00:00,080 --> 01:00:02,400
Speaker 4: and so I felt like I'd lost any chance of

1265
01:00:02,520 --> 01:00:05,800
Speaker 4: future adventure. Like I felt like the entire world of

1266
01:00:06,040 --> 01:00:08,600
Speaker 4: Ocean Saltine was gone to me in that moment because

1267
01:00:08,600 --> 01:00:12,120
Speaker 4: of the dismassing. But once I decided that I would

1268
01:00:12,160 --> 01:00:14,960
Speaker 4: go back and finish it with one stop, I just

1269
01:00:15,160 --> 01:00:17,600
Speaker 4: was solely focused on that. And it wasn't until I

1270
01:00:17,840 --> 01:00:22,280
Speaker 4: left that the realities of you know, post traumatic stress

1271
01:00:22,320 --> 01:00:24,200
Speaker 4: and all of that like came into play.

1272
01:00:25,080 --> 01:00:29,240
Speaker 1: Whoa, yeah, it's yeah, wow, Okay, so you were and

1273
01:00:29,280 --> 01:00:32,120
Speaker 1: you were able to do it, and then you actually

1274
01:00:32,200 --> 01:00:32,760
Speaker 1: did it again.

1275
01:00:33,320 --> 01:00:35,520
Speaker 3: Yeah, because I'm glutton for punishment, and.

1276
01:00:35,600 --> 01:00:37,960
Speaker 1: That time you did it with no stops.

1277
01:00:38,400 --> 01:00:38,680
Speaker 3: Yeah.

1278
01:00:38,720 --> 01:00:42,080
Speaker 4: So I officially in twenty seventeen became the first woman

1279
01:00:42,160 --> 01:00:47,160
Speaker 4: with one stop m hmm. And I then knew I

1280
01:00:47,200 --> 01:00:49,919
Speaker 4: needed time and I always knew i'd do that record again.

1281
01:00:50,000 --> 01:00:52,120
Speaker 3: I had there was It was never a question for me.

1282
01:00:52,360 --> 01:00:52,920
Speaker 3: I hadn't.

1283
01:00:53,280 --> 01:00:55,200
Speaker 4: I had never gone into it with the intention of

1284
01:00:55,200 --> 01:00:57,320
Speaker 4: setting a women's record. I'd gone into it with the

1285
01:00:57,360 --> 01:00:59,960
Speaker 4: intention of becoming the best, yeah, and the fastest person.

1286
01:01:00,160 --> 01:01:03,280
Speaker 4: And I think that that's needed in this day and age.

1287
01:01:03,960 --> 01:01:06,000
Speaker 4: Even though I did get a women's record and that's

1288
01:01:06,040 --> 01:01:07,760
Speaker 4: still achieved like a great achievement.

1289
01:01:07,840 --> 01:01:09,160
Speaker 3: It wasn't my goal.

1290
01:01:09,360 --> 01:01:13,720
Speaker 4: And so I actually the whole project was celebrated by people,

1291
01:01:13,720 --> 01:01:15,400
Speaker 4: but I felt like I'd failed.

1292
01:01:16,000 --> 01:01:18,760
Speaker 3: And so I knew I needed time to process.

1293
01:01:18,800 --> 01:01:21,400
Speaker 4: It was the writing of the book that actually really

1294
01:01:21,480 --> 01:01:23,920
Speaker 4: helped me, because I came back with like three hundred

1295
01:01:23,920 --> 01:01:27,280
Speaker 4: thousand bills and debt debt collectors chasing me, like so

1296
01:01:27,520 --> 01:01:31,960
Speaker 4: much financial stress from that project and no real way

1297
01:01:32,000 --> 01:01:36,840
Speaker 4: out that I just had to knuckle down, work hard

1298
01:01:37,000 --> 01:01:39,760
Speaker 4: do speaking to us. I didn't get any rest, recovery,

1299
01:01:39,800 --> 01:01:42,760
Speaker 4: any time for reflection until COVID hit and I had

1300
01:01:43,120 --> 01:01:44,040
Speaker 4: enough space.

1301
01:01:43,800 --> 01:01:47,240
Speaker 3: To write the book. Yeah, and it was so I

1302
01:01:47,280 --> 01:01:48,400
Speaker 3: did go and do other records.

1303
01:01:48,400 --> 01:01:50,760
Speaker 4: So I ran the first all female team in sixteen

1304
01:01:50,800 --> 01:01:53,320
Speaker 4: years to race the Sydney to hober Ran, a mental

1305
01:01:53,360 --> 01:01:57,960
Speaker 4: program for women in sailing. I did the Australia circumnavigation record,

1306
01:01:58,040 --> 01:01:59,440
Speaker 4: So that was twenty minutes sleep for.

1307
01:01:59,440 --> 01:02:03,360
Speaker 3: Fifty eight around Australia. Not okay, yeap, not okay exactly.

1308
01:02:03,440 --> 01:02:04,160
Speaker 3: It was really bad.

1309
01:02:05,040 --> 01:02:09,720
Speaker 4: And then COVID hit, So I had postponed a year.

1310
01:02:09,760 --> 01:02:12,400
Speaker 4: I'd already decided I was doing Antarctica again, but I

1311
01:02:12,480 --> 01:02:15,080
Speaker 4: postponed one year. At the beginning of COVID, and then

1312
01:02:15,080 --> 01:02:17,200
Speaker 4: in twenty twenty one, I thought, no, I'm just going

1313
01:02:17,280 --> 01:02:18,760
Speaker 4: to give it a go. I'll just start trying to

1314
01:02:18,800 --> 01:02:22,240
Speaker 4: raise sponsorship and Canva came on as a sporter really

1315
01:02:22,280 --> 01:02:25,040
Speaker 4: early and they were incredible and they funded quite a

1316
01:02:25,080 --> 01:02:29,280
Speaker 4: big chunk of the budget, and so I took the

1317
01:02:29,280 --> 01:02:31,560
Speaker 4: boat to Brisbane. We had a two week gap where

1318
01:02:31,560 --> 01:02:35,760
Speaker 4: the borders were opened between Sydney and Queensland, and I

1319
01:02:35,840 --> 01:02:37,720
Speaker 4: happened to sell the boat up and then the borders

1320
01:02:37,720 --> 01:02:40,040
Speaker 4: shut again and the second wave of COVID went through,

1321
01:02:40,560 --> 01:02:43,960
Speaker 4: and so I went into refit in Brisbane with the vessel,

1322
01:02:44,160 --> 01:02:47,919
Speaker 4: and the beginning of twenty twenty two I set off

1323
01:02:47,960 --> 01:02:52,000
Speaker 4: for the second record and broke the existing record by

1324
01:02:52,080 --> 01:02:55,520
Speaker 4: ten days and did it without stops. But it wasn't

1325
01:02:55,560 --> 01:02:56,880
Speaker 4: without challenges and effort.

1326
01:02:57,320 --> 01:02:58,120
Speaker 1: Absolutely. Yeah.

1327
01:02:58,160 --> 01:03:00,160
Speaker 3: The boat was slipped upside down three times on the

1328
01:03:00,240 --> 01:03:00,800
Speaker 3: last record.

1329
01:03:00,920 --> 01:03:02,560
Speaker 1: Whoa, whoa.

1330
01:03:02,640 --> 01:03:05,240
Speaker 4: The peak of the waves were fifteen meters on that project.

1331
01:03:05,440 --> 01:03:08,960
Speaker 4: So yeah, it's its own story or set of stories.

1332
01:03:09,080 --> 01:03:09,440
Speaker 3: Yeah.

1333
01:03:09,600 --> 01:03:12,320
Speaker 1: Yeah, I'd love to chat about your boat being called

1334
01:03:12,360 --> 01:03:16,760
Speaker 1: climate action. Now, yes, where did that? I imagine there's an

1335
01:03:16,800 --> 01:03:19,600
Speaker 1: element you talked about as a little kid. Sol the power.

1336
01:03:19,640 --> 01:03:21,480
Speaker 1: I imagine there's part of it from your upbringing. But

1337
01:03:21,480 --> 01:03:22,320
Speaker 1: where did that come from?

1338
01:03:22,560 --> 01:03:23,320
Speaker 3: Yeah, definitely.

1339
01:03:23,400 --> 01:03:25,600
Speaker 4: I mean we were always taught to be respectful of

1340
01:03:25,680 --> 01:03:26,320
Speaker 4: the environment.

1341
01:03:27,520 --> 01:03:31,720
Speaker 3: I guess I didn't really understand.

1342
01:03:33,160 --> 01:03:36,480
Speaker 4: How bad it was, or at least when I started

1343
01:03:36,680 --> 01:03:43,120
Speaker 4: self educating around climate change and environmental impacts, I felt

1344
01:03:43,160 --> 01:03:47,640
Speaker 4: so overwhelmed by it that I did nothing. Yeah, and

1345
01:03:47,800 --> 01:03:51,000
Speaker 4: so I constantly had the idea of just one plastic bag,

1346
01:03:51,040 --> 01:03:52,200
Speaker 4: It's just one straw, it's.

1347
01:03:52,080 --> 01:03:54,280
Speaker 3: Just one this. And then I raced around the world.

1348
01:03:54,160 --> 01:03:57,240
Speaker 4: With the Clipper Race, and we saw so much pollution,

1349
01:03:57,480 --> 01:04:02,200
Speaker 4: like so much forty eight degrees south halfway from Cape

1350
01:04:02,240 --> 01:04:06,320
Speaker 4: Town to Australia, and styrophone boxes floating past in the

1351
01:04:06,360 --> 01:04:09,320
Speaker 4: middle of nowhere, so far from land, Like what's it

1352
01:04:09,400 --> 01:04:13,040
Speaker 4: doing out there? And we went up, you know, past

1353
01:04:13,120 --> 01:04:14,160
Speaker 4: China and.

1354
01:04:14,080 --> 01:04:16,080
Speaker 3: A lot of the islands there and across the North Pacific.

1355
01:04:16,480 --> 01:04:19,160
Speaker 4: There were sections of that voyage where we had to

1356
01:04:19,160 --> 01:04:20,560
Speaker 4: have a crew member on the bow of the boat

1357
01:04:20,560 --> 01:04:22,920
Speaker 4: physically pushing the rubbish out of the way of the

1358
01:04:22,920 --> 01:04:24,920
Speaker 4: boat so we could sail through because it was so

1359
01:04:25,000 --> 01:04:28,920
Speaker 4: much surface pollution. And so I started thinking, well, what

1360
01:04:28,920 --> 01:04:33,840
Speaker 4: can I do about it and why, you know, I

1361
01:04:33,920 --> 01:04:36,480
Speaker 4: was so overwhelmed, and I sort of always had that

1362
01:04:36,560 --> 01:04:39,080
Speaker 4: idea that I couldn't change things. Then I was like,

1363
01:04:39,120 --> 01:04:41,840
Speaker 4: but there's probably eight million people that have that idea

1364
01:04:41,960 --> 01:04:44,520
Speaker 4: that they can't change things, or eight billion people now.

1365
01:04:45,800 --> 01:04:48,000
Speaker 4: But if we can change that mindset and show people

1366
01:04:48,040 --> 01:04:51,880
Speaker 4: that every action matters, the little ones count to just

1367
01:04:51,960 --> 01:04:54,400
Speaker 4: as much as the big ones, and that everyone has

1368
01:04:54,400 --> 01:04:57,000
Speaker 4: the power to create change if they just take one action,

1369
01:04:57,520 --> 01:05:00,919
Speaker 4: then maybe collectively we can create this impact. And it's

1370
01:05:00,960 --> 01:05:05,720
Speaker 4: not necessarily global warming and climate change. It's not decarbonization conversations.

1371
01:05:05,760 --> 01:05:10,280
Speaker 4: It's the accumulation of everything. It's how we use plastic,

1372
01:05:10,360 --> 01:05:13,320
Speaker 4: how we have a throwaway society, how we spend our dollar,

1373
01:05:13,400 --> 01:05:15,480
Speaker 4: how we vote with our dollar. Every time we go

1374
01:05:15,560 --> 01:05:18,680
Speaker 4: to the shops and we buy something, we're choosing the

1375
01:05:18,720 --> 01:05:21,040
Speaker 4: sustainable option or the not and so we're.

1376
01:05:20,920 --> 01:05:24,240
Speaker 3: Choosing our future that we want. And so I launched.

1377
01:05:25,120 --> 01:05:27,240
Speaker 4: When I first bought the boat, were renamed her Climate

1378
01:05:27,280 --> 01:05:30,520
Speaker 4: Action Now, And that was in two thousand and sixteen.

1379
01:05:30,680 --> 01:05:31,080
Speaker 1: Wow.

1380
01:05:31,160 --> 01:05:32,880
Speaker 3: And that was back when you were still considered a

1381
01:05:32,920 --> 01:05:34,280
Speaker 3: tree hugger. If you had the word.

1382
01:05:34,120 --> 01:05:36,640
Speaker 4: Climate inedithic and all the deniers were out there in

1383
01:05:36,720 --> 01:05:39,320
Speaker 4: the world, was like, you know, saying climate change isn't real,

1384
01:05:40,560 --> 01:05:44,720
Speaker 4: and so I forcibly, I've intentionally changed the name to

1385
01:05:44,720 --> 01:05:47,920
Speaker 4: Climate Action Now to make the media use the words

1386
01:05:47,960 --> 01:05:52,320
Speaker 4: Climate Action Now clever. And every time I would do

1387
01:05:52,400 --> 01:05:56,360
Speaker 4: interviews around the record, it was hilarious because they would

1388
01:05:56,360 --> 01:05:59,240
Speaker 4: do everything possible to avoid saying the name of the boat.

1389
01:05:59,240 --> 01:06:01,240
Speaker 3: They'd be like, oh, you and your boat did it, and.

1390
01:06:01,280 --> 01:06:03,760
Speaker 4: I'd be like, yeah, Climate Action Now and they're like, yeah, no,

1391
01:06:03,920 --> 01:06:06,840
Speaker 4: the boat like and that edits it out in the

1392
01:06:06,880 --> 01:06:08,200
Speaker 4: final cup for a lot of it.

1393
01:06:09,080 --> 01:06:10,600
Speaker 3: If they asked me, like anything.

1394
01:06:10,280 --> 01:06:11,760
Speaker 4: Else you'd like to add, I'd be like, yes, the

1395
01:06:11,760 --> 01:06:14,120
Speaker 4: boat's called Climate Action Now and they'd be like, going,

1396
01:06:14,120 --> 01:06:15,640
Speaker 4: why does a she going hop This was what we

1397
01:06:15,640 --> 01:06:17,680
Speaker 4: were told not to talk about, like it was this

1398
01:06:17,760 --> 01:06:20,360
Speaker 4: whole to They're all focused on the female athlete side

1399
01:06:20,400 --> 01:06:22,360
Speaker 4: of things and not the sustainability.

1400
01:06:22,720 --> 01:06:25,640
Speaker 3: But the whole boat's covered in post it note messages.

1401
01:06:25,320 --> 01:06:27,160
Speaker 1: Yes, tell me about the post Yes.

1402
01:06:27,440 --> 01:06:33,000
Speaker 3: So she's multi colored. If anyone sees a photo somewhere, yeah, gorgeous. Yeah.

1403
01:06:33,280 --> 01:06:35,600
Speaker 4: And my sister Shelly and me designed that and Shelley

1404
01:06:35,640 --> 01:06:38,720
Speaker 4: made it up in the graphics sign program, and it's

1405
01:06:38,960 --> 01:06:42,440
Speaker 4: each one is a climate action initiative that someone in

1406
01:06:42,480 --> 01:06:45,160
Speaker 4: the world is already doing. So we physically went out

1407
01:06:45,200 --> 01:06:46,520
Speaker 4: and said, hey, can you give me a post it

1408
01:06:46,560 --> 01:06:48,520
Speaker 4: note of something you're doing to help the planet. And

1409
01:06:48,560 --> 01:06:50,160
Speaker 4: it's like I pick up rubbish, or I turn the

1410
01:06:50,200 --> 01:06:51,560
Speaker 4: lights off when I leave the room, or I turn

1411
01:06:51,600 --> 01:06:53,120
Speaker 4: the tap off when I brush my teeth, or it's

1412
01:06:53,920 --> 01:06:55,720
Speaker 4: you know, there's this one little girl and she's like,

1413
01:06:55,760 --> 01:06:58,280
Speaker 4: I pick up litter in the playground, and she was

1414
01:06:58,320 --> 01:06:59,840
Speaker 4: like six years old writing this as home.

1415
01:07:00,960 --> 01:07:03,040
Speaker 3: And so we then wrapped the whole hull of.

1416
01:07:03,000 --> 01:07:06,760
Speaker 4: The boat in thousands and thousands of communities actions, and

1417
01:07:06,840 --> 01:07:09,600
Speaker 4: it became a lot less about this solo girl sailing

1418
01:07:09,600 --> 01:07:13,400
Speaker 4: around Antarctica and more about me carrying that voice of change,

1419
01:07:13,520 --> 01:07:18,000
Speaker 4: voice of inspiration, voice of movement, and using the media

1420
01:07:18,080 --> 01:07:21,000
Speaker 4: coverage of the record to at night change and that

1421
01:07:21,080 --> 01:07:23,920
Speaker 4: for me, is what it's all about. And on the

1422
01:07:23,960 --> 01:07:27,280
Speaker 4: second record, I took it another step further and we

1423
01:07:27,360 --> 01:07:30,560
Speaker 4: converted the sale locker of the boat into a laboratory

1424
01:07:30,560 --> 01:07:33,520
Speaker 4: at sea, and I did ocean health research the whole

1425
01:07:33,560 --> 01:07:38,080
Speaker 4: way around Antarctica, including microplastic sampling the entire way around

1426
01:07:38,520 --> 01:07:42,840
Speaker 4: and shockingly we found plastic in every single sample the

1427
01:07:43,040 --> 01:07:46,600
Speaker 4: entire way around Antarctica. Like it's in my mind, I'm like,

1428
01:07:46,680 --> 01:07:47,320
Speaker 4: how is that.

1429
01:07:47,160 --> 01:07:47,840
Speaker 1: It should not be?

1430
01:07:47,920 --> 01:07:50,120
Speaker 4: There's places like Point and the Emo where I'm closer

1431
01:07:50,160 --> 01:07:52,919
Speaker 4: to the astronauts in space than any human on any

1432
01:07:52,920 --> 01:07:56,120
Speaker 4: piece of land, and we stampled plastic out of the water.

1433
01:07:56,680 --> 01:08:01,680
Speaker 3: Like it's scary. It's terrifying. Yeah. So for me now it's.

1434
01:08:01,520 --> 01:08:05,600
Speaker 4: Around how can I continue to do projects that ignite

1435
01:08:05,720 --> 01:08:08,960
Speaker 4: and drive change. How can I make the world that

1436
01:08:09,000 --> 01:08:11,720
Speaker 4: I live in more impactful? And how can I leave

1437
01:08:11,760 --> 01:08:14,240
Speaker 4: a lasting effect that's going to really help our oceans?

1438
01:08:14,680 --> 01:08:17,040
Speaker 4: And so that's why I do something like the New

1439
01:08:17,120 --> 01:08:20,200
Speaker 4: Zealand Records, which I just did, and that's why I'm

1440
01:08:20,240 --> 01:08:21,840
Speaker 4: working on the next one, which is in the Arctic.

1441
01:08:22,080 --> 01:08:24,559
Speaker 1: Yes, can you give us? Can you give us a

1442
01:08:24,640 --> 01:08:28,519
Speaker 1: ninety second rundown of your next challenge?

1443
01:08:29,760 --> 01:08:33,120
Speaker 4: All right? Short version is I'm setting off or I'm

1444
01:08:33,320 --> 01:08:35,120
Speaker 4: just launching the project at the moment because I just

1445
01:08:35,120 --> 01:08:36,080
Speaker 4: finished the last one.

1446
01:08:36,240 --> 01:08:38,040
Speaker 3: But the goal is to become the.

1447
01:08:38,000 --> 01:08:41,360
Speaker 4: First person, not male or female, as a person in

1448
01:08:41,400 --> 01:08:44,800
Speaker 4: the world to sell solo NonStop and honestood around the

1449
01:08:44,880 --> 01:08:48,400
Speaker 4: Arctic Circle. It's something that's only possible because of climate change.

1450
01:08:48,439 --> 01:08:51,960
Speaker 4: It's also something that requires a very unique style vessel

1451
01:08:52,040 --> 01:08:55,200
Speaker 4: to be successful. And I didn't want to build another

1452
01:08:55,240 --> 01:08:58,880
Speaker 4: boat just to throw away boat. And so I've gone

1453
01:08:58,880 --> 01:09:01,120
Speaker 4: down the rabbit hole with my mind macroplastic research and

1454
01:09:01,160 --> 01:09:05,000
Speaker 4: ocean health research, and I've learned that we now have

1455
01:09:05,520 --> 01:09:09,920
Speaker 4: thirty five to forty million fiberglass boats worldwide reaching their.

1456
01:09:09,880 --> 01:09:10,960
Speaker 3: End of life now.

1457
01:09:12,320 --> 01:09:15,280
Speaker 4: For the last fifty years in productions, yet huge amount

1458
01:09:15,280 --> 01:09:17,920
Speaker 4: of boats, and on average, just out of Europe alone,

1459
01:09:18,040 --> 01:09:20,920
Speaker 4: one hundred thousand of those boats are anticipated that they're

1460
01:09:20,960 --> 01:09:24,880
Speaker 4: sunk or purposely abandoned up riverways in s trees every year.

1461
01:09:25,680 --> 01:09:28,400
Speaker 4: And so if you add that, multiply that around the world,

1462
01:09:28,760 --> 01:09:32,640
Speaker 4: how much pollution is entering the waterways. Fiberglass and epoxy

1463
01:09:32,920 --> 01:09:35,360
Speaker 4: is liquid plastic, that's all it is, So it all

1464
01:09:35,400 --> 01:09:38,160
Speaker 4: becomes microplastics in the end, it all becomes ocean pollutions.

1465
01:09:39,200 --> 01:09:42,880
Speaker 4: So there's another material called volcanic fiber. And so the

1466
01:09:42,920 --> 01:09:45,719
Speaker 4: goal is to raise enough money to fund the commercial

1467
01:09:45,760 --> 01:09:49,080
Speaker 4: required research to get volcanic fiber and bio rees and

1468
01:09:49,160 --> 01:09:53,080
Speaker 4: as a mainstream widely globally available material for boat construction,

1469
01:09:53,439 --> 01:09:55,639
Speaker 4: build a boat out of it, seal around the Arctic Circle,

1470
01:09:56,000 --> 01:09:59,640
Speaker 4: use the Arctic Record as the education platform the y

1471
01:10:00,200 --> 01:10:03,759
Speaker 4: and the storytell of that going out, and then lobby,

1472
01:10:04,560 --> 01:10:07,280
Speaker 4: you know, for policy changes across the globe in different countries.

1473
01:10:07,680 --> 01:10:09,439
Speaker 3: So that's the next few years of mother.

1474
01:10:09,680 --> 01:10:15,559
Speaker 1: Bah my goodness, you are insane, incredibly insane, but in

1475
01:10:15,640 --> 01:10:18,599
Speaker 1: that great way, all in all the good ways. Oh

1476
01:10:18,680 --> 01:10:22,400
Speaker 1: my goodness, that's absolutely amazing. Thank you so much for

1477
01:10:22,439 --> 01:10:25,599
Speaker 1: your time today. It's been incredible to hear your story

1478
01:10:25,680 --> 01:10:29,599
Speaker 1: and the way that you have just really thrown yourself

1479
01:10:29,680 --> 01:10:32,680
Speaker 1: at these challenges. It's yeah, it's it's quite amazing, and

1480
01:10:32,720 --> 01:10:35,400
Speaker 1: I'm really thankful for your time and for your vulnerability today.

1481
01:10:35,520 --> 01:10:37,320
Speaker 3: Thank you, Thanks for having me on the show.

1482
01:10:38,200 --> 01:10:40,599
Speaker 1: Thanks so much for listening. If you got something out

1483
01:10:40,640 --> 01:10:43,080
Speaker 1: of this episode, I would absolutely love it if you

1484
01:10:43,080 --> 01:10:45,160
Speaker 1: could send it on to one person who you think

1485
01:10:45,320 --> 01:10:49,160
Speaker 1: might enjoy it. Otherwise, subscribe, give us a review, and

1486
01:10:49,200 --> 01:10:51,519
Speaker 1: make sure you follow us on Instagram at the Female

1487
01:10:51,560 --> 01:10:54,600
Speaker 1: Athlete Project to stay up to date with podcast episodes,

1488
01:10:54,680 --> 01:10:58,160
Speaker 1: merch drops, and of course news and stories about epic

1489
01:10:58,240 --> 01:12:46,920
Speaker 1: female athletes.