35th but still in touch

British sailor David Rawlinson recounts his experience on leg one of the Mini Transat

I had been in La Rochelle for nearly a month preparing my boat for this epic race. This included wiring in some new gear, new grip paint for the deck and polishing the antifouling. As well as preparing the boat I had a vigorous fitness scheme of going to the gym most days and every morning swimming two or three thousand metres in the pool.

The start of the race was set for 16 September; however this was delayed at the last moment because of strong wind and large seas in the Bay of Biscay. So instead, on the 16th we had a prologue race, mainly for media purposes! After racing (drifting) a few hours the prologue was abandoned due to no wind and the whole fleet had to be towed back into harbour!

18th September 1238 was now set as the new departure time. The forecast was looking like it was going to be a fast leg, with fast downwind conditions from the corner of Spain to Madeira.

Below is the start line. 89 Competitors. The committee boat is the red hull motor boat (SSR).


The start was a usual Mini start - badly set line and total chaos!! It was a gusty 17 knot beat to the windward mark; this was in fact our only upwind sailing in the whole leg! Round the mark and fast reaching into the Bay of Biscay. The start was covered by three helicopters and countless media ribs. It makes the start much harder when all you can hear is the infernal noise of the choppers above your head!


After 24 hours of racing I was in 17th position

I managed to defend a top 25 position up until the corner of Spain, where it was very fast 25+ knot downwind racing with the medium kite and 1st reef main, regularly reaching speeds of 18 knots.

Unfortunately it was during the fast downwind racing where I started to lose places, due to having slightly less boat speed - the newer boats are much lighter, wider in the stern and have flare bows, and they don’t bury their bow so much and can surf longer than my vintage design! Most of the Mini sailors say that my boat belongs in a museum!!



The race itself was actually quite straightforward - just blast downwind as fast as you possibly can!!

I had some little problems, as seems to be quite normal for me! The first thing was just a minor thing - my generator had a big oil leak as it fell over in the fast conditions and all the oil leaked out! Luckily I was carrying some spare, just enough to get the thing running and charging my batteries. I just had the annoying problem of a mixture of oil and sea water sloshing around in my boat until I had time to bail it out!

The main problem I had was my outrigger jockey poles rammed themselves through the hull on the top sides during a particularly dramatic broach in a big gust of wind with the medium kite and 1st reef main. This meant that every time the rail buried in the water or there was lots of spray, which was all the time, water would come into my boat. This happened two days before the finish. So I had to not push so hard and slow down a little to decrease the amount of water coming into my boat!

Talking to the other Mini sailors in Madeira who did the Mini Transat last time and previous Transats, they say this Mini Transat is the most competitive yet. The top 10 or 15 is just like racing in the Figaro circuit!! And the cost of one of these wining boats would set you back around 100,000 euros!!

My final result for the leg was a slightly disappointing 35th. In a time of 6 days 18 hours 33 mins 51 seconds. However I finished just three and a half hours after my other British rival and 14 and a half hours outside the top ten. For the oldest boat in the fleet at 17 years old I seem to be doing alright! The Mini Transat is still far from over, with the second leg looking like it will take a few weeks to get to Brazil, anything could happen!!

I would like say a big thank you to my sponsors for their support and help in getting me to the Mini Transat race. In particular many thanks to my parents who have been totally supportive throughout my 2 year campaign and this race.

See David Rawlinson's website here