Atlantic Challenge: four Brits win rowing race from Canary Islands to Antigua, experiencing magical combination of ‘twisted, sadistic’ moments
- Oliver Palmer, Tom Foley, Hugh Gilum and Max Breet cross the Atlantic by oar in just 32 days, despite capsizing repeatedly in the final few days
A team of four Brits have won the Talisker Whisky Atlantic Challenge (TWAC), the rowing race from the Canary Islands to Antigua, in 32 days, 12 hours and 35 minutes. Oliver Palmer, Tom Foley, Hugh Gilum and Max Breet, of team Fortitude IV, were repeatedly capsizing as they approached the finish line, but asked the race organisers not to tell their families in case it worried them.
“The sum of all the parts is unbelievable – from seeing the shooting stars, to the arrival, to the support you feel from family and friends, to the buzz of following the tracker,” Gilum said on arrival at the finish on Monday night, Antigua time.
“There are tough times, there are times you perhaps wish away, it's easy to say now. We saw whales, turtles and dolphins. It’s a magical combination in a slightly twisted, sadistic way, but it seems to work somehow.”
Thirty-five teams set off from La Gomera, in the Canary Islands, on December 12. There are solo, pairs, trios, fours and five person teams rowing. They row for two hours, and sleep for two hours, in continuous shifts, all day and night. They have no support boats with them, so each team carry their own food and make their water with a solar-powered desalinator.
Foley lost 14kg, Palmer 13.5kg, Breet 13.5kg and Gilum 14.8kg during the crossing.
“We spoke about this while we were out there and agreed to do it again you'd have to pay us about two million quid [British pounds],” said Gilum.
Breet said he was looking forward to “food, shower, mattress, not waking up every 40 minutes. Not getting flipped when you're asleep in the cabin. The little things you leave when you're on the ocean. Being able to walk around and not having to crawl from a seated position to a lying position.”
Palmer’s highlight was seeing a train of stars: “There must have been about 200 of them moving [across the sky]. It might not have been stars, but it was awesome.”
The team were trained by record-setting ocean rowing coach Duncan Roy, who has rowed across the Atlantic twice himself, the first time becoming the youngest person to row in a team across the Atlantic, at just 27 years old.
Crowds gathered in English Harbour to cheer in the 2019/20 winners.
“It feels absolutely amazing, and the reception we've had here couldn't be better, friends, family and people we've never met,” said Foley.
