Mark Sinclair: last finisher of the 2018 Golden Globe Race

The last skipper of the 2018 Golden Globe Race has finished.

Australian solo sailor Mark Sinclair, 63, took 174 days to sail from Australia to Les Sables d’Olonne in France, arriving on May 27.

He restarted the race on 5 December 2021 from his home port of Adelaide after stopping there three years earlier when a lack of water and slow progress, due to barnacles on his boat’s hull , prevented him from continuing the 2018 Golden Globe Race.

Under the rules of the race, he was allowed to restart, but in the Chichester class for participants who make a pit stop. In total, he spent 332 days at sea.

Winner of the 2018 Golden Globe Race, Jean-Luc Van Den Heede completed the race in 211 days.

Sir Robin Knox-Johnston, who won the 1968-69 Sunday Times Golden Globe Race, circumnavigated the globe in 313 days.

Sinclair, who endured 50 knot winds and 6 meter seas as he rounded Cape Horn, as well as damage to his 1980 Lello 34, Coconut said he felt a “relief” arriving in Les Sables d’Olonne, adding that the race was “very hard but a very good experience”.

“It happens at the stage where you sail and it doesn’t matter. An extra day doesn’t matter; the sun rises and sets, the moon waxes and wanes, but I don’t like really not the bad weather and I had a lot of it,” he said.

Mark Sinclair savors his wand; he had been eating freeze-dried food for weeks. Credit: Bernard Gergaud

He said as he rounded Cape Horn he suffered “storm after storm after storm”, which left him with bruises and cuts and feeling like he had “done a few laps with Muhammad Ali”.

“It was relentless and you can see the boat being picked up and thrown around, pieces coming off. The equipment was broken. I have a 1904 chronometer that was thrown off its gimbals and shattered, I was hit in the head by a metal water bottle.

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“Across Le Maire Strait, I was on the tidal current which carried me in a force 10 and through some overflows and I tried to take in a reef with the staysail; there was a bit of reef badly caught but I couldn’t move forward. I had three reefs in the mainsail, so I crossed with three reefs in the mainsail. I took the vang off as the boom was in the water most of the time which was a relief,” explained Sinclair, who is a hydrographic consultant.

The growth of barnacles on Coconutthe hull after 174 days at sea. Credit: Bernard Gergaud

He made slow progress in the Atlantic, beleaguered by variable winds and heavy weather; several knockdowns left him without a functioning satellite phone (although the race prohibits modern equipment, a satellite phone is permitted for weekly check-ins with race HQ), his number 4 staysail swept away and his number 3 jib was torn apart in a Force 9 wind. The whip of the metal HF radio receiver CoconutThe transom of was also bent 90° by the waves.

He said he now had “a to-do list” and that would determine whether he competed in the 2022 Golden Globe Race, which begins September 4, 2022; he originally planned to finish the 2018 race in April.

Damage Coconut means that Mark has a long list of jobs to go through before he can decide if he will race in the 2022 Golden Globe Race. Credit: Bernard Gergaud

Sinclair’s Lello 34 has damaged forestay and inner staysail due to two cotter pins failing; the boat also has engine problems.

“If it’s a fuel issue, that’s fine,” he said. “But if I have to replace the engine, it will not only be a question of cost but of time.” It’s a 40 year old diesel [engine] and I fixed the head once before. I have to go through this list of jobs and I think the question of what happens with the 2022 race depends on it.

Mark Sinclair was welcomed by 2018 Golden Globe Race winner Jean-Luc Van Den Heede and 2022 GGR skippers Michael Guggenberger and Arnaud Gaist. Credit: Bernard Gergaud

“I’m not a racing sailor, I’m more of a sailor type, but it was a really good experience and I learned a lot,” Sinclair added, before enjoying a cold beer and fresh fruit after having quits Coconut.

For the past few weeks, he has been eating dehydrated foods and drinking powdered milk. He had also run out of toilet paper.

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