Rivals’
eyes are on New Zealander Mike Sanderson, an America’s Cup and
Whitbread racer who has never done a solo ocean race before. Will
his talent skill show up the endurance racers, or will they be the
ones to show him how it’s done? Elaine Bunting talked to SandersonHe’s
not a solo sailor by habit or inclination, he’s never done a
single-handed ocean race and, as he admits himself, he is pitifully
short of sea miles in the Open 60 class. Yet New Zealander Mike Sanderson
is widely viewed the dark horse of the Transat, the man who just might
unseat some of the favourites.
The ingredients are all there. The 33-year-old is the racing helmsman
of Mari-Cha IV (which set a monohull transatlantic record last year).
He raced on BMW Oracle in the America’s Cup. Going back further,
he was part of Grant Dalton’s victorious Whitbread crew in New
Zealand Endeavour. In short, Sanderson is a is a prodigiously talented
and versatile sailor.
Then there’s his boat, Pindar. An Owen Clarke design, she was
built for fellow New Zealander Graham Dalton (yes, he is Grant’s
brother) to race in Around Alone. The consensus was that the boat
was very quick if not always raced very quickly. Since Pindar bought
her, they have funded no end of expensive work: new high modulus carbon
rig, new sails, new lightweight PBO standing rigging. The boat has
been greatly lightened. Again in short: probably one of the quickest
in the Transat fleet.
What many Open 60 experts are asking, however, is, can Sanderson bring
all these elements together on his own in such a relentless race as
this? His track record on Pindar raises some questions. On last year’s
Transat Jacques Vabre, he and girlfriend Emma Richards had to bail
out (literally) when the boat flooded a few days after the start.
It was Sanderson’s most high profile failure to date.
"We had a bad TJV and we spent a fair chunk of time analysing
and thinking about that. We'd put too much pressure on ourselves.
We'd never spent more than an hour going upwind in anger. But we've
gathered as much data as we can and we're going to build on that,"
he says.
One of the biggest changes Sanderson has made, and which has raised
eyebrows in the Open 60 class, is the change to a conventional but
larger mast and box-section boom on a gooseneck (a deck mounted boom
arrangement is universal in the class) and to a hanked on genoa and
jib to eliminate the weight of furling gear. Other skippers have looked
on and are wondering if he is making the boat unmanageably hard work
for one person to drive to anywhere near its reconfigured potential.
Sanderson argues that the trade-off is worth it, particularly on an
upwind race. "We're going to attempt to stay with a the theory.
I'm in the gym twice a day!" he laughs.
"It's very optimised to go upwind with the Solent," he explains.
"The genoa and jib top [reaching jib] are on hanks on the forestay;
the Solent is furled and on a lock so it can be dropped down into
a bag.
"We have made the mainsail bigger in the hope of bringing the
Solent down the range and most sailing will be done with that. We've
reconfigured the sail plan to give the genoa less range upwind and
the Solent more so that should be a tider package."
He has been spending the last couple of months trying it out and adds:
"If we're not absolutely comfortable, we can default back to
what everyone else has in an afternoon."
He and his team have made other changes to boost the boat’s
potential upwind. "We've changed from one daggerboard to twin
asymmetric foils and the only weight difference is the additional
case. Owen Clarke designed the foils, which should give it upwind
performance nearer Ecover's [Mike Golding’s new boat], but we
also used Nick Holroyd of Team New Zealand to do CFD testing of the
design. We know the boat's going to be faster.
"We're also looking at increasing the water ballast to get closer
in righting moment to the four new boats. At the end of the day, these
boats aren't 60-footers any more; people are trying to turn them into
maxis. They have a righting moment now more similar to Sayonara."
Weather routeing is another factor in this race, as the Open 60 class
aren’t allowed the luxury of on-shore expertise. "I haven't
done a huge amount of navigating in the past, so it's something I'm
taking on," says Sanderson. "But I am very comfortable with
the tactical side so that's business as usual."
Asked how he thinks he will rate alongside more experienced single-handers,
he admits: "I have absolutely no idea. It's my first single-handed
race. I'm very much going to be the new boy on the block so I'm going
to keep my head down and work hard. But I'm incredibly hungry for
a good result."
Photo: Jon Nash
Rivals’
eyes are on New Zealander Mike Sanderson, an America’s Cup and
Whitbread racer who has never done a solo ocean race before. Will
his talent skill show up the endurance racers, or will they be the
ones to show him how it’s done? Elaine Bunting talked to SandersonHe’s
not a solo sailor by habit or inclination, he’s never done a
single-handed ocean race and, as he admits himself, he is pitifully
short of sea miles in the Open 60 class. Yet New Zealander Mike Sanderson
is widely viewed the dark horse of the Transat, the man who just might
unseat some of the favourites. 
