Happy is Fast: My 2023 La Solitaire du Figaro.

Happy is Fast: My 2023 La Solitaire du Figaro.

Last time I wrote a blog was November 2021, but this time I’m going to keep writing them to do my best to document life in the world of Offshore sailing. Last entry I had just finished my 1st participation at La Solitaire du Figaro. And now in 2023 I’m writing again after finishing this race for a second time.

Dreaming

La Solitaire du Figaro you have my heart and soul, you take my all my spare time and energy. I lie awake at night thinking how to do this race. How to sail faster, how to sail smarter and communicate the adventure. I’d spent 18 months working late nights while at work; teaching myself French, trying to find the budget to compete at this incredible race ringing up and learning about marketing.

The magic started to come together in May of this year, when thanks to the support of Just a Drop, Sailing Point, Helm Watches and Sailproof, my amazing friends and family became possible to make it to the start line! It was a terrifyingly exciting moment renting my boat and paying the entry fee for La Solitaire, little did I know the hard work was just beginning.

Note to self: Happy is Fast

I’ll be truthful, I really doubted myself at the start of this great race. After the brutal knock of 2022 I had no self-belief, a very negative internal dialogue with myself, and a serious lack of speed in the one race I’d done prior.

3 days before the start, I’d written Happy is Fast on my boat, it was too myself to in an attempt change my internal talk to be kinder to myself, to always be positive in situations and remember the sailor I used to be. I had written down a process that I would follow, and once I’d finished the process, I’d just do it again

When I walked through the Pre-race village in Caen to my little boat with the oh so romantic name Sailing Point/Just a Drop, I was nervous to a point of being overwhelmed, I had been the same before my A level exams when I was 17. I failed those exams…..

Leg 1: the comeback

We started on a Sunny day in Caen, leaving the city behind us we slalomed our way upwind to the Saint-Marcouf Islands. To my horror I really struggled in this opening 40 miles. I was either high and slow or Low and fast, I could not find the sweet spot of speed.  Then it got worse. I found my rudders, foils and keel had seaweed wrapped around them. Costing me even more speed. I spent a good while going backward trying to clear it, all the while everyone else got further and further ahead. I put myself into last place by 6pm on the first evening. Not quite the clean, mistake free speed I dream of. I wasn’t the only one in this pain but knowing that didn’t help my morale.

I’d promised myself before the start that I’d be positive onboard and I knew that would be tested, but I’d didn’t release how quickly my mental strength would be tested.

The moment 3 sleepless weeks of racing began

I told myself, David its Sunday night and this leg won’t finish until Thursday morning so there’s plenty of time for an opportunity, the next section of the race is your favourite the reaching with the code 0 (non-sailing friends the sail we use when the wind arrives at 90degrees to the boats direction), at night that you prefer to sailing in the day and your sailing to the isle of Wright and unlike everyone in front of you are from the UK so you have will have your moment to come back.

3 days of near constant positive self-talk had worked and by the time Thursday rolled around and Ireland came into view, I finished in group with Ben Beasley and Sussan Beucke. I hadn’t broken a record, nor had I had a groundbreaking result on paper. But I had started to silence the spiraling negative thoughts in my head, I spent 4 days speaking louder than the negative voices in my head and I knew I was just beginning.

(25knots into Kinsale, Sanni I’m coming to catch you!!)

Leg 2: The rollercoaster

The route for Leg 2

The true test of the process I had developed would be in the second leg. 570 miles alone, in an unstable weather system that would create big gains and big losses, a real test of mental resolve.

My light blue spi: Start was okay, a little too cautious.

Less than 24 hours I went from being in a good position, to losing it all, after a collision with some ropes in the water had caused the boat to spin out of control, I’d gone flying across the boat, and sprained my ankle (not that I knew that at the time). I went from anger that my race had be ruined by the most stupid thing to sadness as the pain had rendered by almost unable to move. After 8 hours of agony, I rung the race doctor, I feared that he would tell me my ankle was broken and I had to stop, and after last year I couldn’t bear the thought of abandoning. To my surprise he didn’t ask me to pull into a port in Ireland, he instructed me to bandage my ankle and take some pain killers. So if could find a way to tolerate the immense pain and work around my lack on mobility on board I there was nothing stopping me.

My boat is named after a charity (Just a Drop) that aims to make clean water accessible to all, so that kids (especially girls) can stay in school and receive an education rather than having to walk miles to collect clean water and ultimately escape the poverty trap. I thought how I could possibly represent this cause if I gave up so easily.  

(My attempt to secure my ankle)

The challenge was now how to race for 3 days and make up for the huge amount of time I’d lost in this disaster. Rounding the Isle of Man, I was second last, and leaders were miles and miles up the road. I found myself staring at those words Happy is Fast, trying to be kind to myself, my weather forecaster Pep Costa’s final words were it’s not going to be over until you’ve crossed the line. So, I kept telling myself I would have my opportunity.

Passing the Isle of Man

Passing by the Snowdonia Mountain range, in North Wales where I’d been on all my childhood holidays. I chose to stay to the west as much as possible hoping to find more wind. I knew it would be easy to get trapped into going east, happily everyone in front had gone east and over the next 40 hours competitors approached over the horizon and I slipped past them. Second by second, I grew in confidence and self-belief. A truly magical moment. By the time we were 30 miles from the finish I’d gone from second last to be in the middle of the group of favourites.

I wish I was writing a Disney movie and that this was the end, but no this brutal leg, had one final twist. A high pressure had centred itself over the finish line in Morlaix, meaning there was no wind.

It took some 15 hours to do the final 15 miles, through the night. A truly brutal mental test, I never stressed so much about the boat speed difference of 1.3 vs 1.6knots for so long in my life. One by one the fleet trickled in, I finished within this amazing group with some of the pre-race favourites, but by now the time gaps were huge, as little gusts had carried people over the finish seemingly at random.

Before and after that most epic of races

I arrived Friday morning and left again Sunday, I can’t say I say much of Morlaix, I have just one photo of this lovely Breton town!

Leg 3: the last dance

With leg 2 I knew I had found something in myself, my process was working, and I had proof. I started leg 3 hell bent on showing the world David Paul!

Original course shorten to 470 miles because of a lack of wind

I did that thing, that had become my specialty in this race. I’d ruined my race on the first night again. I’d made a massive tactical blunder in passing the Island of Ouessant and for the third leg in a row I was starting on Monday morning looking at the words Happy is Fast. I was last, the next boat was 3 miles in front and the next 3 miles after that. There I was telling myself the I am a good sailor; the race is long and there will be an opportunity to come back.

Struggling for upwind speed, again

I’d planned before the start with Pep that as we made our way south down the Bay of Biscay, I’d try and hook into the sea breeze of the coast of the Vendee region. At some point on Monday night, I watched those in front of my gybe away from the coast. This was my moment. Just like the plan, I hooked into the thermal winds off the coast and rocketed south. I didn’t see anyone in front of me for the next 18 hours and then just before the southerly point offshore of Bordeaux, the group of 7 that was previously miles in front of me filtered in behind me. In the early hours of Wednesday 13th September, while the world was sleeping, we were dodging finishing ships and I think I was the happiest man in the Biscay! I’d stuck to the process and once again the process had worked, magic.

At 5am on Thursday 14th September I crossed the finish line of this amazing race, exhausted, but proud. 25th over the line. I’d found a new version of David that was more capable than he’d known and that I could dream a little bigger.

Passing the lighthouse off Les Sables D’Olonne

I would just like to say a massive thank you to Just a Drop for allowing me to carry their message, Sailing Point, SailProof, Expedition foods and Helm Watches. Pep Costa for doing my weather forecasting. Along with my long-suffering family and friends for picking me up at my low moments.