Ronnie Simpson Rejoins Global Solo Challenge After Stopping for Repairs

After four exceptionally busy days in Hobart, Tasmania, Ronnie Simpson and Shipyard Brewing are back on the race track and headed south as they look for fresh, Southern Ocean breezes.

From the Global Solo Challenge website, “Ronnie Simpson and Shipyard Brewing have left Hobart and rejoined the Global Solo Challenge. The American skipper left a few hours behind schedule, crossing the assigned restart gate at around 0600 UTC, approximately four hours later than his earliest possible departure. He has nonetheless managed to restart without giving up his third place on water, 1400 nautical miles behind Cole Brauer on First Light and around 350 nautical miles ahead of fourth-on-the-water Riccardo Tosetto on Obportus.”

Ronnie called out a couple of dozen people in Hobart and from the US who helped him get his sails repaired, autopilot fixed and a number of other repairs needed to safely cover the last 13,000 miles of the race. It’s a big team that makes it possible for him to race solo! He is working hard to get south and back into the breeze of the Roaring 40s. He’s still in third place and is racing to catch Cole Brauer, who’s rocking along in second aboard First Light, and first-place sailor Philippe Delamare aboard Mowgli, who’s around 4500 miles ahead. West Coast sailor David Linger aboard his Class 40 Koloa Maoli is in seventh place, about 1,000 miles behind Shipyard Brewing. The boats behind have closed in, and there’s still a long way to go.

Despite having had to stop for repairs, we imagine Ronnie is considering himself fortunate in comparison to Ari Känsäkoski, who was dismasted less than 300 miles north of the Crozet Islands — he’s managed to gain over 600 miles with “a combination of motoring and patiently sailing at just a couple knots boat speed under jury rig.” Känsäkoski also completed a refueling operation at sea when he retrieved 300 liters of marine gas oil from a Japanese fishing vessel, He then set up a makeshift “refinement” station in his cockpit, pouring the MGO through paper coffee filters to remove the dirt, then “mixing it in a jerry can with some kerosene and/or light oil at approximately 1-2%, which was also requested from the fishing vessel for the purpose of thinning the MGO.”

The Global Solo Challenge is a “three great capes circumnavigation” covering approximately 26,000 nautical miles. We wish all the competitors good sailing.

You can catch up with Ronnie on his Instagram page here and follow him on the tracker here.