Vendee Globe Preview - Ellen MacArthur

Ed Gorman reflects on the rise and rise ...

Four years ago I met Ellen MacArthur at a cafe just off Sloane Square in London. Like everyone on her rapidly expanding list of contacts, I had been phoned and persuaded - by her - that I needed to meet this 19-year-old who's claim to fame was that she had two years previously become the youngest person to sail around Britain single-handedly.

Over coffee she talked about her dream of racing an Open 60 around the world which, in the context of Sloane Square and in the context of her limited sailing experience, seemed a distant and unreachable goal. Yet just four years later the girl from Whatstandwell in Derbyshire has become a formidable young woman. Not only is she about to set sail as the youngest ever competitor in the Vendee Globe, but she does so in a state-of-the-art racing machine and as a respected sailor with a major title to her name - the 2000 Europe1 New Man Star single-handed trans-Atlantic race.

It is easy to forget that in winning the mono-hull division in that race, MacArthur achieved far more than many others who have spent 10 or 15 years in single-handed racing ever managed. She could retire now. Yet her ultimate goal has always been the Vendee and who's to say that she may not spring another amazing surprise in this, the toughest race of all, which sets off from Les Sables D'Olonne on November 5th.

Looking back on her rise and rise, you think of her energy and determination as she fought to get hold of boats and sponsorship, first to compete in the Mini class - she was 17th in the 1997 Mini-Transat in Le Poisson - then in the Route du Rhum the following year, in which she won her class in the Open 50 Aqua Quorum/Kingfisher when she beat several 60s in the process.

But a key ingredient, which was not obvious at first, was that this girl who had once planned to become a vet but then never went to university, proved herself to be more than just a dreamer but someone with the technical mind to really understand the sport of sailing at this highest level. MacArthur has been learning and learning about boat and rig design, short course racing tactics, weather routing and the increasingly sophisticated software involved in a modern Open 60, and there is no sign yet that she has hit her limit. This, together with her drive and competitive ambition, has made her a far more formidable competitor than was foreseeable just four years ago.

But no account of her success is complete without mention of Mark Turner - her manager and general guru - who accounts for about half of everything she has achieved. Like her, Turner is a workaholic and like her, his ambition is boundless. Together they have wrestled sponsors into place and then organised model programmes for her development. Since Kingfisher plc signed up for the Vendee campaign two years ago, Turner and MacArthur have between them come up with some brilliant ideas aimed at bringing MacArthur up to speed as fast as possible. She has raced in all sorts of boats - Laser 4000s with Paul Brotherton, 32ft Figaro Beneteaus with Gael Le Cleac'h and the Open 60 Aquitaine Innovations with Yves Parlier for example. She has completed a virtual round-the-world race with the French weather router Jean Yves Bernot, and she has overseen the build of Kingfisher in New Zealand and then sailed her home, the latter part of it single-handedly.

So what of her chances in the Vendee? Turner, as is his wont, is telling anyone who will listen that she is aiming to finish - no more and no less. "I just want her to get home", he said. He prepared us for a similar performance in the trans-Atlantic when MacArthur was "supposed" to finish seventh or eighth but then forgot to read the script and won it. However, Turner's prediction for the Vendee looks more realistic when taking into account MacArthur's lack of experience on a round-the-world course, plus Kingfisher's possible but so far unproven slight lack of pace downwind, a function of her narrow hull form and smaller sail area than many of her rivals.

However, in her favour is MacArthur's youth and inexhaustible energy and the confidence she has gained from her win in the Atlantic. She knows her boat - she's sailed 23,000 miles in it already - its reliability is proven and since the trans-Atlantic MacArthur has worked with a sports psychologist to help her pace herself and learn to relax on board, even if she's winning. A victory in her first round-the-world race and as the youngest ever competitor is surely too much to ask, but a podium finish is certainly possible.

Turner believes that if she can get Kingfisher past Cape Horn, then she may be able to take places on the final stage going north and mainly to windward through the Atlantic. "Her way of doing well in the race will be to manage the boat well and her well in the first couple of months and have something left to push and make some places in the final beat, whereas others who are going to go all-out to win can't afford to do that and will have to go really hard down the Atlantic to avoid allowing someone to get ahead into a depression first."

Somehow it's hard to see MacArthur suppressing her competitive instincts to that degree and my guess is that she'll race hard with the rest of them all the way - and then we'll see what happens at the end.