Route du Rhum - Destination Guadeloupe - A Finnish skipper’s view
October 31, 2018 10:54 UTC
October 31, 2018 10:54 UTC
A Finnish skipper’s view of the Route du Rhum Destination Guadeloupe
Finnish skipper Ari Huusela, 56, views his second participation in the Route du Rhum-Destination Guadeloupe as an essential step along his course to the 2020 Vendee Globe.
Flying is his first love - Huusela is a full time long haul Airbus A350 pilot with FinnAir mainly flying from Europe to Asia. But since he discovered sailing at the age of 24 he has ticked off the sport's trans-ocean challenges including the Mini Transat twice and the Route du Rhum-Destination Guadeloupe and is now heading for the ultimate solo round-the-world race.
His boat, Ariel II, is a 2007-vintage Owen Clarke-designed IMOCA which started life as Dee Caffari's Aviva and has two circumnavigations under its keel. Since taking it to Finland in the spring, Huusela has completed his solo Route du Rhum qualifying passage in the Baltic and then relocated to Gosport on the English south coast, the home base of his good friend Alex Thomson.
With just six days to go before the start of the Route du Rhum-Destination Guadeloupe Huusela has his very experienced boat captain Joff Brown on board, waiting to complete final scrutineering. Meanwhile the Finnish skipper remains relatively calm, well used to the pre-start hubbub in Saint Malo.
This is what he has to say…
How do you feel at this stage pre-start; you look quite relaxed?
"I have such good people around me, I am totally relaxed. This boat has been so thoroughly checked and refitted last winter. We did four months of work in England and the boat was stripped back with all the fittings taken off and rebuilt."
Have you done enough sailing with the boat?
"I have done 6,000 miles including the qualifying 1,200 miles solo in the Baltic which was in June. I had lots of variable conditions, mostly more than 20kts and sometimes 30 or more. And of course the Baltic is quite small and so we had steep seas and lots of manouevres."
So the preparation has gone well and what will be your approach to this course?
"I feel I have done OK. I know the boat very well but I still don't have a main sponsor for the Vendee Globe and so I have to take it quite carefully not to break anything. And I need to finish and have the miles to qualify for the Vendee Globe."
Your experience from last time has been useful?
"I learned then how big the whole thing is. With one-and-a-half million people here like this, it is very easy to let it affect you. You have to keep calm and not be carried away by all the hassle around you. That is one big thing. So you have to stay focused and sometimes be away from the boat."
And so what have you been doing?
"I have been staying mostly on the boat!"
How much does your 'day job' as an airline captain compromise your sailing programme?
"It is compromised of course. But at the moment the job feels like the hobby and this feels like work. Mostly it is relaxing and nice to go to work and to fly somewhere – just to get your mind out of the boat stuff and this work and to fly and go places and have some good food."
Do you enjoy the similarities between flying and sailing?
"There are some parallels. You have great views from the cockpit, great for the Northern Lights when we fly so far north. But of course we have thick, thick glass on the plane whereas we can feel nature on the boat.”
So which do you prefer, flying or sailing?
"My first love was planes and flying. I started sailing quite late, not ‘til I was 24. I flew gliders and then small cargo planes. I started my aviation at 15 as a maintenance engineer. I went to school as an aviation engineer and for the first 10 years I was an aviation engineer. I love engineering. I love the technical stuff in the IMOCA class, the heavy engineering and the little bits. It is great to do the problem solving and repair things."
What are your hopes and expectations?
"I am a finisher. My last Rhum was quite slow; 24 days and I was prepared for 20 days but I was happy to get through the big storm at the beginning when 26 boats abandoned. I was pleased to get through it with no problems at all. It was just uncomfortable. I go into this with the confidence that I will do OK and survive. That was the case in the Mini Transat in 1999 when I lost my rudder but half the fleet did not finish. We lost 10 boats in the Bay of Biscay on the first day. I will try to be a finisher. It is such a long way to get to the startline from Finland, so I have to be a bit careful. I have a good boat and it is all about preparation as my friend Alex Thomson keeps telling me."
What has Alex helped you with?
"Alex has been great. He has been really helpful with practical things like boat handling, stacking…offering good hints. We stayed there in England for two weeks for final preparations and then had breakfast and he came and checked the boat which was quite nice.
"My objective is to finish. I don't want to be last. I want to concentrate on being safe. The race is to finish."
Thanks Ari and good luck!
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