For a boat to perform well in a regatta, a good job has to be done onshore, as well as on the race course. Far from the cameras and away from the fans’ eye view, shore crews have a tough duty to take care of, frequently at the most inconvenient times, from travel and hotel logistics, to sail repairs or boat cleaning. They will tell you that there is no such thing as a typical day behind the scenes, but here is how they tend to fall:
8:00 am. The pontoon seems calm and still nearly deserted, but it´s just
a false impression: underwater, wearing neoprene suits, the shore team
member in charge of cleaning the hull, keel and bulb and the rudder are at work.
For this essential, daily task they use cloths, thin sandpaper and suction pads.
“The cleaner the boat is, the faster we are, because it offers less resistance to
the water”, explains Diego Torrado, one of the maintenance responsibles for
Audi Sailing Team powered by ALL4ONE. “You might not tell the difference in
just 24 hours, but you definitely can in 48 hours. TP52s are not like cruising boats,
they don´t have a coat of antifouling that prevents the boat from having algae,
slime and crustaceans grow in it. The light and the warm temperatures
in the Mediterranean Sea really promote this growth. If you feel the hull with your
hand after just one day it feels like a three-day unshaven beard”, explains Torrado.
Over in the cold Atlantic waters, these divers get in the water with 5 milimiter thick
suits. “But the worst scenarios for us are those ports with little water movement.
In some cases they´ve been the cause of gastroenteritis or ear-infections for some
daily divers”.
13:00 pm. The fleet crosses the startline for the first race of the day. Far from
there, Container´s highly regarded Welsh Logistics Coordinator Sarah O´Kane,
who has experience in powerhouse Audi MedCup Circuit winning teams
including Mean Machine and Emirates Team New Zealand, faces a
hundred accumulated emails. After waking up at five in the morning to make
sure that the team´s breakfast is ready, then meet with the crew, weigh them,
pack their meals for the boat and check that it carries enough water
without surpassing the rule´s weight limit, Sarah finally finds time to sit in
front of her laptop.
It´s time to pay bills, to confirm flights and work through all
kinds of formalities regarding upcoming events, not to mention lost luggage
problems.
“Let´s just say that are like a mother for them, you have to keep your
eyes on everything”, says O´Kane,who has spent 24 of her 44 years of life
doing this job. When asked about the toughest part of her job, she answers
that “the worst nightmare for someone like me is probably food poisoning.
I have to control the food area because it could seriously affect the team´s
goals for the event or eventhe year”. O´Kane also proudly mentions that she has
seen a lot of the sailors that are on the circuit right grow in ability and maturity over
the years.
16:30 pm. Once the battle is over in the racecourse, Libby Tomlison, Quantum Racing´s Press Officer, deals with media requests from all over the world, interested in doing interviews, writing stories and recording TV footage. The team´s policy is simple: “Never just say ‘no’ as a first answer”, declares the 35 year old American. “Our attitude is to be open and available. As the circuit´s leaders we have more requests, of course, and that means that we have to adjust our agenda really well, this way we don´t have to deny anyone the chance to sail as a Crew + member or in our support boat. It´s tough, but we try to make everyone happy”.
Quantum Racing´s strategy is also driven across the social networks. “We try to be fresh,
show different things and also have general information about our crew. I work on this
but it´s Keith Brash, our Production Manager, who does most of the job, uploading
great videos and pictures, something new each day”, tells Tomlison.
18:00 pm. While most of the sailors are re-charging their energies in the Race Village
after a really long day, one of them, hanging by a safety harness, is hoisted 20 meters
by the pedestal winch as if he was a spinnaker up to the top of the mast. At a height
equivalent to a six-storey building, where the sails reach a tension of 7 or 8 tonnes on
the mast, this person works his way down cleaning and adjusting the carbon fiber fittings
of the mast, trusting his safety to his teammate´s judgement below. “Once you are up
there you feel good, the view is spectacular, but it can get pretty shifty and it´s easier
to feel dizzy”, says Greg Gendell, Quantum Racing´s bowman. “It´s a risky activity,
having someone up there is always dangerous, it´s not the most popular job, not
a lot of guys would want to do it”, he adds.
Pedro Mas, Bribón´s Bowman, feels that the daily climb is all part of his job
description: “because we are the ones who go up during the races, so we also
do it at the dock”. The Spanish sailor points out “it´s less dangerous at the port,
when you have to go up there during a race it´s probably because there´s an
emergency. The ropes hold up to 4000 kilos and I just weight 80, so I don´t
think that´s a problem. What´s dangerousis that when you are out to sea,
everyone is really careful about what´s going on. Onshore, when you spend
time up in the mast repairing something and everyoneis busy below, you
might end up being abandoned, and then someone might let your rope go.
In order to avoid this, we tie three knots in the halyard and we let the crew know".
This cleaning and repairing duty can be dangerous for the sailors below too.
“I know cases where a screwdriver has fallen down hitting someone. I know some
bad stories”.
3:00 am. In the middle of the night, the members of the crew who are responsible for
repairing the sails and maintaining the boat work against the clock in the containers.
In the Marseille Trophy, a port-starboard mistake move by RÁN left Gladiator with no
bowsprit and the Swedish team with a hole in their boat´s stern. To substitute the English
boat´s bowsprit was easy but repairing RÁN´s damaged area was a tougher issue.
When RÁN´s crew arrived in the port in the morning, Nipper, one of the builders,
was still finishing the job off.
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