The reluctant hero - pt2

Neal McDonald talks to James Boyd about his plans and what to do with the Volvo Ocean Ocean

To read part one of this article.... click here

While McDonald clearly struggled with some aspects of his new role as skipper - he says he hates the stopovers - now he is getting to grips with it. "I find the on the water stuff much more normal than the onshore stuff. I've been very lucky with Assa as they've been particularly supportive. When we changed in Cape Town I was pretty nervous about it all. It was not a thing I'd relished whatsoever. At the time I would have been a lot happier if it hadn't gone the way it had. But as time's got on, I've felt a lot more comfortable about it. Magnus [Olsson] has been incredibly useful and been a very good colleague in the change and you couldn't have a beeter man with that sort of experience. He's put me right a few times and supported some of the decisions and Rudi's [Mark Rudiger] been good. If I'd been in another boat and had to take that role on I think it would have found it a lot more difficult".

Now that he has made the plunge into skipperdom he hopes to do more, although this may take some rearrangement of the way he operates. "I miss out on opportunities before because I don't spend a lot of time thinking about what I'm going to do next. To me June 9th is my only goal. I find this whole email fiasco where people finish a leg and then spend their whole time writing off to America's Cup syndicates or to get sponsors for this, that or the other, detrimental to the sport. In fact I rarely look at more than one leg at a time".

McDonald coming on to the scene in this role can only be good for British offshore sailing, filling the gap left by Lawrie Smith, albeit in a slightly different manner. "But there's no money to do it, so it's not really that important, is it? Here I am on a Swedish boat," he argues, squirming at this prospect ('phew, luckily there's no money, so I won't have to do it...'). Yet he is a hugely respected and capable individual and if his arm is twisted behind his back to near breaking point he is quite capable of handling the ordeal shoreside.

So what is next for Hamble's most modest 38 year old? "I haven't got any strong feelings. Of course it depends upon what Lisa does. I've kind of half got an inkling that if it suited both me and the GBR Challenge people there is a spot there for me, but I haven't got a good handle on that. If I did go back there I'd have to be honest with myself that I'm so far behind on the sailing it probably wouldn't be as a sailing team member, it would be shore crew advisory type role and that would suit me just fine. I've got some great friends on that team and I really enjoyed being with it. In New Zealand I got some good vibes from it. I has got a lot of drive. Walker is doing a fantastic job and he's got some great people around him".

And their prospects for the Cup? "It depends upon how the new boat comes out. They've got a lot of talent and raw sailing expertise. I believe with the likes of Standbridge and Danby they are getting the whole routine worked out which is half the problem with those programmes - to have a happy atmosphere. Someone from another team said to me that they are the only team that actually go out together in the evening and I wholly expect that to carry on throughout the programme. That was quite obvious to me - I went into a couple of restaurants and there would be 10 or 12 people from the campaign sitting down having dinner and you don't see that in other campaigns. There is a solidarity which is attractive and full marks to them. I think they will do better than most people said they'd do a year and a half ago and if the boat is good I think they could really surprise people".

Continued on page 2...