Natural selection

Adrienne Cahalan ready for the rigours of an Olympic short-handed campaign.

Written by Scott Alle
Photography by Carlo Borlenghi / Andrea Francolini

19 February 2020

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One of Australia’s best-known and most successful sailors, Adrienne Cahalan OAM, says she’s looking forward to the multiple challenges of the Mixed Two Person Offshore Keelboat category in the Paris Games in 2024.

The First Lady of the Chartplotter, (I know she doesn’t mind me saying that), along with old friend and another famous Australian sailing export Nick Moloney, are one of a number of teams vying for the Australian spot in the exciting new keelboat event to debut in Paris.

“Nick called me and said ‘Are you interested in this?’ “Cahalan recounted to Sails. The round the world record-holder and Volvo race veteran looked more closely at it and replied “absolutely”.

The pair have raced together before – to a nail-biting victory in 2001 aboard Ellen MacArthur’s Kingfisher sailing team in the gruelling 8,000-mile EDS Atlantic Challenge race. Adrienne was navigator and Nick co-skipper, taking over after Ellen MacArthur had to depart due to other commitments.

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The offshore 2024 Olympic race though will be a comparative sprint – a single, sudden-death run out of the sailing venue in Marseille, lasting up to four days and three nights. Whoever crosses the line first will be crowned Olympic champion.

Endurance, boat and crew management will be important, but the two sailors will need to possess a wide range of sailing skills.

“As a navigator you are basically awake all the time”, Cahalan explained. “this race will be interesting because it is the duration of your average ocean race”, (around 72 hours).

“Those endurance skills have been built-up over a long time, in addition to interpreting the information you are receiving you have to have a pretty broad skill set. There are also engines to run and a whole down-below to look after,” she adds.

If one of the major pre-requisites is hard, extremely fast ocean miles, Team Moloney/Cahalan has a formidable pedigree. Adrienne’s bulging CV contains 28 Sydney to Hobart Races; (six Hobart line honours and two overall Hobart wins), a round the world record in 2004 aboard the maxi-catamaran Cheyenne, watch leader on Nicorette when it broke the Transatlantic record in 1997, plus her Whitbread (Heineken 1993-4) and Volvo Ocean Race (Brasil 1 2005-6), experience. Moloney’s resume is no less illustrious, the first person to compete in the three greatest around the world sailing challenges; The Whitbread Round the World Race, The Jules Verne Record and the only Australian to have competed in the Vendee Globe.

Cahalan says the pair regularly keep in touch, there are parallels in their lives, both forging trailblazing professional sailing careers in the sport’s top echelons. Their kids are the same age and she admits “it’s hard to get a word in” in their conservations.

Moreover, there is a high degree of trust, absolutely critical in the short-handed version of ocean racing. “You want to be able to go to sleep and not be second guessing the other person,” Cahalan states.

And it’s clear her desire to compete remains very strong. “I can’t help it once I get out there,” she admits. When I was out on the 18 (foot skiff) recently for the first two races I was just getting round it, by the third one it was ‘I can’t let them beat me’.”

The immediate priorities will be regattas in Europe starting in April to learn the L30, the one design boat that will be used at the inaugural edition of World Sailing’s Offshore World Championship in October 2020 in Malta, alongside the Rolex Middle Sea Race. Teams from 22 countries are entered, but only one crew will be selected.

“Dinghy skills will help, these L30s are kind of sports boats,” the former skipper of Ella Bache and still regular 12-foot skiff sailor observes.

There is at least one, possibly up to three other Australian pairings in the mix. Sandringham sailors Ian ‘Barney’ Walker and Jade Cole have publicly declared their interest ahead of the close of registrations on February 29.

“There will be no substitute for experience in this new discipline,” Volvo and America’s Cup veteran Walker acknowledged at their campaign launch.

Whoever secures the Australian slot, they will potentially be up against some of the biggest names in the sport including Ken Read (Comanche and Il Mostro), Guillermo Altadill, Brian Thompson, Sam Davies, and Dee Caffari (Turn the Tide on Plastic).

The Class rules have also been the subject of lively debate. “There is a lot of conjecture about how long you will be sitting on the rail and things like that.” Cahalan says. “Hopefully it won’t be a soldier’s course. It’s going to be in the Med, in itself a challenging weather environment. Certainly, the Rolex Middle Sea races, they can be quite difficult conditions.”

Meantime, it’s about time out on the water. “Nick’s been saying to me ‘just keep racing, just keep racing’”.  And she’s been doing that with Alive on the recent Round Bruny Island Race and the coming Port Lincoln Race Week.

Adrienne names two big challenges in this campaign: finance and fitness. The campaign will be self funding and require a significant investment given the size of the boat, logistics and scope of the campaign. As for the fitness aspect that will involve “getting a personal trainer and getting back in shape”, something Cahalan reveals she is “looking forward to.”

Combine that sentiment with the irreplaceable knowledge garnered from four decades of professional sailing and you have a potent force in any scrap out on the water.

“One of the great things about sailing is there is always more things to do. There are always goals to strive for,” she says purposefully.

tokyo2020.org

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