Around the world in 80 days ?

Every few years, around this time of year, a group of intrepid souls set off on one of the two Around The World yacht races. There's two of these, one of which is a group event with the other being single handed.

That's right - single handed sailing around the world, non-stop in yachts designed for a full crew. This is the event that made Ellen MacArthur famous and its name is the Vendée Globe and I'll be keeping a sharp eye on it over the next few months. It's gotten off to a fairly bruising start too, with heavy storms in the Bay Of Biscay causing a fair bit of carnage amongst the fleet. There's been 4 retirements so far, possibly more to come.

I'm following 3 of the skippers in particular this time around. They're Mike Golding skippering Ecover, Sam Davies of Roxy and Dee Caffari of Aviva. One characteristic of the Vendee Globe is how closely you can keep in touch with the skippers of the boats. The website linked above has a newswire service, which publishes regular notes from the skippers, along with the more regular news stories. It's far more intimate than the connection you get with most sports and it really makes a difference. And the yachtsmen and women are great people too, without the bad attitude that taints many sports with footballers being the worst. It's an attitude that extends into skippers being only too willing to help out in emergencies, where their help literally means the difference between life and death. And they'll give that help without a second thought.

This story about the rescue of Alex Thomson is why I'd like Mike Golding to do well in this race. These people aren't sportsmen, they're heroes.

I started following Sam Davies and Dee Caffari because they're Brits and I like to support the home team. However, after reading some of the logs from the girls (Sam and Dee), I've been caught by the tone. They're out there in the oggin doing something they love, they're having fun amongst all the work and that shines out in the Girls Wanna Have Fun logs that come over the newswires.

I'm hoping the fun continues so we can keep seeing those entries in the newswires. They're a great read.

I know I'll be keeping an eye on this race over the next few months, hopefully it will be as captivating as Ellen MacArthur's race :-)