Oliver Heer: Worth the gamble

Solo ocean racing is a high-stakes game. Ollie Heer talks to Helen Fretter at Yachting World about why it’s worth the gamble:

It takes a certain type of person to become a solo ocean racing skipper. The pontoons of Lorient and Les Sables d’Olonne are filled with French racers who have grown up with salt in their veins, whose appetite for risk was honed during formative years spent racing Mini 6.50s and Figaros, aiming for the craziest challenge of all in the Vendée Globe.

IMOCA campaigns are now big budget, data heavy, complex projects. To succeed in this world requires other skillsets. But it also still demands a no-holds-barred commitment to the cause that most would flinch from.

So how did a sailor from landlocked Switzerland – a country renowned for its risk aversion – end up running an ambitious Vendée Globe campaign out of England? – Full report