Man Readies for Solo Race ‘Round the World

In a brick building on the waterfront that once housed a 19th century locomotive foundry, a 43-year-old sailing enthusiast races against the clock to get ready for what might arguably be the 21st century’s ultimate extreme sport.

Bruce Schwab is preparing his 60-foot sailboat Ocean Planet to compete in the Vendee Globe, a brutal around-the-world race for solo sailors who must complete the 25,000-mile course nonstop and without assistance.

In the months leading up to the race’s Nov. 7 start in southwestern France, Schwab divides his time between raising money and getting his sleek blue-and-white sloop as ready as he can.

When he’s not scrambling aboard the wood-and-carbon-fiber boat to complete a slew of refinements and modifications, Schwab works the phone and Internet to line up contributors and sponsors to help finance a venture that will cost at least $500,000, and perhaps twice that.

His goal is to be the first U.S. entrant to complete the Vendee Globe, a quadrennial race that has a limited following in the United States but is watched closely by millions of television and Internet viewers worldwide. Boats from France, Great Britain, Australia, Italy and other countries line up corporate sponsors whose logos are displayed NASCAR-style on the hull, deck and sails.

Though he cannot match that financial clout, Schwab hopes simply finishing the race can pave the way for a future U.S. entrant to get the sponsorship that could lead to victory.

For Schwab, a lifelong sailor from the West Coast who has spent much of his career as a rigger and in other boatyard jobs, the Vendee Globe would be his second around-the-world solo race. He sailed Ocean Planet in the 2002 Around Alone race, finishing fifth among the seven entrants in the 60-foot Open class.

The Around Alone is a five-leg race with stops along the route. The Vendee Globe is more challenging because there is no opportunity for sailors to catch a breather or repair their boats while waiting for the next leg to begin. They grab catnaps when they can.

Brad Van Liew of Charleston, S.C., who has twice completed the Around Alone, said the races draw an elite group of competitors who possess a wide range of skills: “The skipper needs to be a meteorologist, a mechanic and an extraordinarily good sailor.”

Solo racers are attracted by the challenge, he said.

“It’s the ultimate sense of fulfillment, of being able to accomplish the impossible,” he said. “It’s probably the most extreme of the extreme sports.”

By way of comparison, more than 1,200 people have reached the summit of Mt. Everest. Only 150 or so have sailed solo around the world, according to British adventurer Sir Robin Knox-Johnston, who completed a nonstop solo circumnavigation in 1969 and maintains a list of other mariners who do the same.

Ocean Planet, launched three years ago at a boatyard in Portland, Ore., was built specifically to compete in the Vendee Globe. Its unconventional design includes a narrow beam and an unstayed rig.

“In the Vendee, where the emphasis is on finishing, we opted for a simpler boat with fewer things to break,” Schwab said.

Since the boat arrived at Portland Yacht Services in Maine in November, Schwab has been making modifications and struggling to reduce its 19,800-pound weight. While all boats must carry mandatory safety equipment such as flares, a life raft and emergency water, it’s up to the skipper to decide what supplies and spare parts to take along.

“It’s that proverbial trade-off between redundancy and keeping it lightweight,” he said.

While competing boats with corporate sponsors can afford to hire professionals to help prepare their vessels for the race, Schwab makes do with a small corps of volunteers.

Friends from Oregon, Wisconsin, Ontario and Rhode Island traveled to Maine to work on the project. They hope to get the boat in the water in May or June for trial runs and to depart at the end of August for Les Sables d’Olonne, France, where a crowd of 300,000 is expected to watch the start of the race.

The competitors will sail south before reaching the Cape of Good Hope and heading into the Southern Ocean, known for its five-story waves, icebergs and hurricane-force winds. From there, they will sail south of Australia, then pass within a few hundred miles of Antarctica before rounding Cape Horn for the final run back to France.

The current round-the-world record of 93 days was set by French yachtsman Michel Desjoyeaux in 2000-01. By contrast, the Around Alone took 8 1/2 months, of which Schwab spent about 135 days at sea.

Schwab is aware of the potential dangers -- two yachtsmen perished since the inaugural event in 1989 -- but does not regard his attempt as foolhardy. He believes preparation is the key to success.

“The race is 80% preparation and 20% execution, and even the execution is a result of preparation,” he said. “Your experience and training in preparing yourself with weather analysis, navigation skills and tactical ability -- that’s all preparation. You shouldn’t be learning it out there.”

For now, Schwab is working on the little things: replacing hoses, checking the wiring, refining storage space, shortening the boom and struggling to reduce 500 pounds of the boat’s weight, a pound or two at a time.

“The devil’s in the details,” he said. “It’s a whole host of little things, and it seems that it will take forever to get them done.”