Durban - Gqebera (Port Elizabeth) homegirl Kirsten Neuschafer, who became the first woman to win a solo round-the-world yacht race and breaking records, didn’t know she was the winner as she approached the finishing line of the Golden Globe Race at Sables d’Olonne, France.
That’s because the retro race, a non-stop event in the footsteps of the first-ever non-stop solo circumnavigator, Sir Robin Knox-Johnston, forbids the use of any technology that was not around when he completed his feat in 1968.
However, the world, including her pals at the Knysna Yacht Club, knew of her victory ahead of her crossing the line. They paraded outside their building for a photo with a congratulatory banner.
“All the ‘dronkgatte’ came out of the pub. We knew she was the winner and we took the photo while it was still light,” said commodore Mike Jacobs.
She crossed the line under the cover of darkness last Thursday. Seventeen solo skippers started the race on September 4 last year, at Sables d’Olonne, and only three remained.
She took 233 days, 20 hours, 43 minutes and 47 seconds, alone and never calling in on terra firma, covering 30 290 nautical miles.
Yesterday, the Knysna club’s photo cropped up on her Facebook page with a message: “Thanks for the great photo from Knysna, South Africa.”
Neuschafer is also the first South African sailor to win a round-the-world event
The race’s route included rounding the three “great capes” in South America, Africa and Australia.
Neuschafer, 39, turned to career sailing 17 years ago after arriving in Cape Town, having cycled across Africa, and deciding to take up another childhood dream.
Waterfront boat builder Manuel Mendez, who helped her equip her vessel, 36-foot Minnehaha, for the race, described Neuschafer as “one determined woman”.
“She knew that boat like a glove. She prepared herself properly for that race. I think she has actually given women in the world a reason to ‘be’ again.”
He said she had got to know Minnehaha intimately, having lived on it for a year, alone, first when she fetched it from Canada to Cape Town and on to the start of the race in France.
Mendez said Neuschafer gave herself the perfect training for the Golden Globe by delivering yachts to people in the high latitudes, including the Antarctic.
“That’s a really big pedigree to get into racing ‒ the ability to sail in the high latitudes ‒ it’s a good platform.”
Neil Gregory, Commodore of Royal Cape Yacht Club, where Neuschafer is an honorary member, said a victory such as hers required immense stamina and endurance.
“You are a winner if you just finish a race of this magnitude, but to finish a race non-stop round the world, and rescue a fellow competitor along the way, keeping it together with limited navigational equipment, it is just incredible.
“This is a different league altogether. Our heartfelt congratulations this amazing lady sailor.”
During the race, she rescued fellow sailor Tapio Lehtinen, from Finland, when his boat sank south of Cape of Good Hope.
Scuttlebutt Sailing News reported: “The rescue of Lehtinen happened last November, some 450 miles south-east of South Africa in the southern Indian Ocean, when his 36-foot Gaia, Asteria, sank in a gale.
“Neuschafer was the closest sailor to him, 95 miles away, and was able to reach him in fewer than 24 hours, taking him aboard Minnehaha from his life raft and later transferring him to a merchant ship that had been diverted to the scene. (For this rescue, she earned the 2022 Cruising Club of America’s Rod Stephens Seamanship Trophy.)”
Now, Neuschafer has a new challenge. To pay $80 000 (R1.4 million) for her voyage and supporters have set up a page on gofundme.com Donors have showered her with praise as, by the time of going to press, the page had raised $68 683.
“Kirsten has been an inspiration in my life for a very long time. My parents know her personally and they always told me of her adventures,” read one comment below a $50 donation.
“It is because of her that I was not afraid to follow my dreams.”
Another read: “You have been a constant inspiration for all us women sailors!”
People can buy Kirsten memorabilia through her Facebook page to support her efforts so she isn’t too bankrupt from her adventure.
The Independent on Saturday