Day 43

Today's update is in the form of some Q and A.

Rowing today was tough in the morning, but winds and seas picked up quite a bit in the afternoon and wind is now 15 knots plus. Still blowing a little more south than I'd like, but after three days of slow progress I'll take what I can get! Still focused on 40W, 50W, and Antigua!

> > How much sleep at night?
Hard to tell, 6-7 hours maybe? But I wake up 10 or so times a night when the boat is hit by a big wave or when cramped up from the confined sleeping space.

> > How much "downtime" each day?
If you don't count cooking/eating, it's maybe an hour in the afternoon and an hour and a half at night. A full hour is spent in the afternoon doing e-mails. An hour at night doing emails/blog. Another 20 minutes most nights watching an episode of The Office or Rob and Big

> > How much maintenance time?
Very little -- 20-30 minutes every other day.

> > How much water do you drink per day?
3 Liters or so, not including for cooking. Cooking is about 5 cups/day.

> > How do your planned calories stack up against actual expenditures?
Will count my consumption one of these days. I'm losing weight, so I am running a calorie deficit. Would guess deficit is 2000-2500 per day. The estimated hourly calorie burn while rowing is supposed to be 500-600.

> > What is the daily menu? Is any of the food cooked?
Breakfast is granola plus chocolate pudding mix and cheesecake mix (all from Mountain House), which with some water creates a delicious goopy calorie-packed breakast. Snacks are energy bars, nuts, trail mix, etc...lunch and dinner are cooked and freeze dried. Add two cups of hot water, wait 8 minutes and eat.

> > How is your food holding out?
I've got plenty of freeze dried food, going through the dinners at half the rate anticipated. I'm close to finishing my third week's worth, and have been out here for almost 6. I have 9 more bags, or at this rate 18 weeks worth, I think. Breakfasts are about as expected and should be fine. Candy bars are getting scarce, but I lost 1/2 or them or more due to water in the deck locker. Plenty of other stuff, though, not even touched. Energy bars out the wazoo.

> > How do you manage healing of cuts/blisters in the wet environment?
Everything takes forever to heal. Am able to treat some things, with special attention to backside, hands, and feet. The rest will heal in Antigua.

> > Do you fish?
Not yet. Maybe will later for fun, but usually would rather row towards home than screw around. Would throw the fish back anyway as I couldn't ever eat/use a 20+ pound Dorado.

> > How is that broken water maker working now?
It's been good for the past couple of weeks. I run it for 30 minutes every third day. Fingers still crossed. Don't trust it.

> > How about a daily weather report?
www.passageweather.com is pretty accurate.

> > What is the water temperature?
Not sure - can look it up on www.wunderground.com I think.

> > What is the air temperature?
70's?

> > Wind chill?
Not much.

> > What are you wearing (for weather)?
Shirts and hat donated by Coolibar and are UV proof (thanks Coolibar!) www.coolibar.com). Shorts are only worn between noon and 5PM for sun protection. These are regular JL Racing rowing shorts. Foul weather gear is a North Face Gore-tex shell jacket. No foul weather pants. Do have a one-piece survival suit, but it's really for emergencies only. If it's that bad out there I should be inside anyway.

> > Has it been raining?
Sprinkles are common, but nothing that would get me soaked.

> > How do you protect from sunburn (red heads have a problem with this)?
Lots of sunscreen and Coolibar clothes as described above.

> > What improvements or changes would you like to see on LIV2?
Many ideas, but no major changes. A king-sized bed would be nice!

> > How much electricity can you generate? Is it enough every day, or are you short some days?
Our solar panels are rated for 150 watt max output. Forward panel is 65w, rear is 85w. They provide plenty of power. I'm usually getting 13.0 volts or more from the batteries. I don't want to go below 12.4 or so, but have never been close, despite as much as three straight days of overcast weather.

> > How much battery capacity do you have?
2 x Lifeline brand 79 amp hour AGM marine deep cycle batteries.

> > Why wear socks?
I was getting blisters on my heels and toes early on, but socks prevent this mostly. The shoes are standard Vespoli rowng shoes and are bolted into the boat.

Thanks to all who have supported this expedition and important research at Yale Cancer Center with a donation to Row for Hope. If you haven't donated, or if you would consider donating again, it would be much appreciated. To donate online use the link in the upper right-hand corner of this page or visit www.rowforhope.com.

Paul

Day 42

Shorter update today, as it's been a draining day on the oars. Sleep last night was pretty terrible, even by ocean rowboat standards and I was a little dehydrated today, which took a little energy out of me. It must be a result of the warmer weather I'm getting now that I'm 600 (or more?) miles south of where I started. Anyway, nothing serious, and I should be back to normal tomorrow, I hope.

Winds weren't great today either, coming from the NW and blowing me SW, which would have been great a month ago but is frustrating now, because I pretty much just need to go West from here. The boat felt slow enough this morning that I spent a good part of the shift cursing the barnacles which must have built up underneath, meaning I should get in and scrape again. At the end of the AM shift I reached under there as far as I could and all was clear, which meant I wouldn't have to scrape, but also that the boat would stay slow for the evening shift, too. Arggg...

I saw a school of fish around the boat today, numbering at least a couple dozen. They were maybe 12 inches in length, half of them grayish with lighter spots and the other half light blue with lighter spots. Interestingly, all had fins both on top and underneath (closer to the tail) that seemed to move side to side, whereas on most fish I've seen they stay straight. Weird...

That's all for now, and thanks again for the continued support! Reading your comments is still the highlight of every day.

Thanks to all who have supported this expedition and important research at Yale Cancer Center with a donation to Row for Hope. If you haven't donated, or if you would consider donating again, it would be much appreciated. To donate online use the link in the upper right-hand corner of this page or visit www.rowforhope.com.

Paul

Day 41

OK, here's Part Two of my thoughts on mental training. The second phase is "the day to day," phase, which started for me some time in the third week, when the initial shock had subsided and it was time to get to work on rowing across the ocean. Here's a little on how I've been doing it. You'll have to read my book for the full analysis...

The hardest part is getting out of the cabin in the morning, when I still have 10 or so hours of rowing ahead of me. Luckily, I think that years of rowing, especially the last 24 months that were done primarily by myself, have conditioned my body to at least easily get moving in the direction of the boathouse, rowing machine, gym, etc...which is the biggest challenge of all. Once I arrive at the place where I'll be training, I'm always be able to convince myself that, since I've come this far, I might as well get my rowing piece, lift, run, etc...over with so I can go home and not be a quitter. So, it's generally the same unconscious movement that pulls me out of the cabin and onto the rowing seat every morning and afternoon.

OK, I'm in the seat, gloves on, socks on, ready to go. I have to turn the boat stern to the waves or I'll get soaked in a minute or two, so no messing around. Once I've turned the boat around and pointed west (or whatever direction the wind will take me), the rowing has basically begun, whether I know it or not.

I realized early on that ocean rowing, unlike flat-water rowing, is really a defensive sport. I don't ever go out there to show the ocean who's boss; instead I take every oncoming wave individually with two goals: 1) Don't let the boat capsize or take the wave broadside and get soaked, 2) Use the power of each wave to my advantage to move to boat as far as possible. That's it. My rowing out here is more about protecting myself and not missing any opportunity to gain distance from every wave than it is about actually rowing the boat across the ocean.

Does that make sense? It might be like a boxer that blocks every one of his opponent's punches until the opponent finally falls down, rather than throwing punches in an effort to knock the opponent down directly. It's the ultimate war of attrition.

So that's the mindset, but in order to stay focused I have to see progress and hit milestones constantly. I do this by setting dozens of goals during every shift, each with its own reward of some kind. The GPS screen that I'm looking at shows my position down to .001 nautical miles, so that's an easy way to measure my performance. Any time I want to snack, change the song on my ipod, take a break to stretch, go to the bathroom, etc...I won't do it until I've reached a certain easily attainable goal that I'v set arbitrarily. Bigger rewards for bigger milestones, which means for example that I only end shifts at whole numbers of miles rowed. Things like that...by earning lots of tiny victories all the time, the days go pretty quickly and before I really know it I've rowed all day.

Hope all this makes sense! Note to self -- write shorter posts...

Thanks to all who have supported this expedition and important research at Yale Cancer Center with a donation to Row for Hope. If you haven't donated, or if you would consider donating again, it would be much appreciated. To donate online use the link in the upper right-hand corner of this page or visit www.rowforhope.com.

Paul

Day 40

Today a few thoughts on the topic of the "mental training" that I did to prepare for this row, which I think is serving me pretty well now. Carter in Kentucky, thanks for the post; it got me thinking about all of this during my evening shift. One thing to note throughout - the physical and mental sides of training and rowing (among other things) are very closely linked, and of course each has a massive and constant influence on the other...

When it comes to the mental side of rowing, there are two different stages to think about, with different challenges:

The first 10-15 days - As you can probably tell from my posts, the early days of any ocean rowing expedition, mine included, are some of the hardest. I struggled with how to best prepare mentally for this stage, and what seemed to serve me best was the idea that I could anticipate and therefore take control of some of the mental hurdles I'd have to clear. The biggest one I feared was the feeling, "This isn't what I signed up for, how can I get out of this!?!?" Somehow, by acknowledging in advance that I would probably feel this way, I was able to say "Oh yeah, I knew this would happen" when the feeling came, which it did...often.

The other way I dealt with the "Get me outta here" feeling was borrowed from the British doctor/adventurer Mike Stroud, who wrote a book called "Survival of the Fittest," which was given to me shortly before I left for the Canary Islands (thanks Rick Smith!). There's a passage in the book in which Mike and a partner are on an expedition in Antarctica and are pulling heavy sleds over undulating frozen terrain in 60-degree-below-zero weather on their way to look at penguins (I think). Unsurprisingly, Mike is miserable and spends the first several days trying to think of how he can get out of the rest of the expedition while maintaining his dignity. He finally settles on collapsing in the snow and saying he had a certain type of stroke (don't remember the name) that would require him to be rescued but not have any long-term effects. He goes on for a while just waiting for the right time to put the plan into action.

Before he gets a chance to act it out, Mike confesses to his partner that he'd been planning to fake this emergency so he could be rescued. His partner is shocked, and then proceeds to confess that, while he hadn't been planning to fake an injury, he had just spent the past few days hoping something would happen to Mike so they could both go home!

Haha...love that story. The point is, by admitting they were both looking for ways out, they made it impossible to actually carry out one of these schemes. I don't remember what day it was, but when I found myself in a similar situation (i.e. miserable, seasick, hungry, scared, exhausted, and wishing I could go home), I called my sister Joy and said "Hey, so I just spent all of last night trying to figure out how to get out of this. Anyway, don't let me do it. I'm going all the way."

Problem solved! I never thought of taking the easy way out again. I never did come up with a good "out" though.

I'll have to write about the other mental feats of strength tomorrow. They'll have to be in full effect out here for the next few days, with light winds (10-15 knots) forecast until Friday.

Thanks to all who have supported this expedition and important research at Yale Cancer Center with a donation to Row for Hope. If you haven't donated, or if you would consider donating again, it would be much appreciated. To donate online use the link in the upper right-hand corner of this page or visit www.rowforhope.com.

Paul

Day 39

Short update today. Winds are lighter (15 knots) than the last few days, but hopefully I can keep my progress in the range of 40-plus miles per day. Daytime mileage was good, but we'll see what I get during the night.

The full moon made for some nice night-time rowing to end the day. I don't generally row much at night, because by sunset I've always rowed 10 or so hours already, but when the moon is full it seems a shame to turn in without enjoying a little bright moonlight rowing.

The highlight today after dark was when a huge dorado that must have been over three feet long leaped out of the water right by the boat, three times back to back to back, with big belly-flop-style splashes in between. After the third splash, a half-dozen flying fish took off from where the dorado had landed and crossed right in front of me, landing 30 yards or so from where they took off. Very cool, as all were silhouettes viewed in the light of the full moon.

Thanks to all who have supported this expedition and important research at Yale Cancer Center with a donation to Row for Hope. If you haven't donated, or if you would consider donating again, it would be much appreciated. To donate online use the link in the upper right-hand corner of this page or visit www.rowforhope.com.

Paul

Day 38

Today a little on what rowing in big seas is like. To set the stage, when rowing I'm sitting on a sliding seat facing the back of the boat with a big hatch and bulkhead immediately in front of me. I can't see the horizon immediately over it, but can see to either side and also the sky straight ahead. In the seat I'm no more than six inches off the water, so every wave that comes my way of course looks pretty big, and nearly all of them are above eye level.

So, big seas around and a 20-footer coming my way. I can see it approaching behind several smaller waves of 5 or so feet coming from the same direction. When I see a big one coming, I'll usually ignore the small waves and start rowing hard on one side or the other (remember that the toe steering is broken, so no help from the rudder as I go from one wave to the next) to angle my stern into the oncoming wave. When I'm in position, it's simply a matter of rowing up the front side of the wave, where you can usually get a stroke or two in, and taking one hard stroke right before the top, to "pick up" the boat, which will help me get a bigger speed boost as I'm carried down the back side. If I don't get my stern around in time, I'm usually rewarded with either a soaking splash or buckets and buckets of water being deposited in the cockpit.

A big swell will start to pick up the boat and I'll reach the top about five seconds later, at which point the wave will either be breaking, splashing, and frothing its way past me (hopefully without leaving too much water on me and in the boat), or it will pass by without breaking, which is a dryer experience. In general, one wave in four or five will break, but it all depends on the wind, and on any given day all or none of them could be expected to get me wet.

The best thing about bigger waves of course is that I get a bigger speed boost from them. I also get more speed when one breaks around me (or on me!), though of course I'll usually pay for it with a soaking. I've made up to 10.1 knots "surfing" down the back side of a big wave, compared to the 2-3 knots I'd make in flat water.

I hope this is interesting and makes sense!

Finally, a big shout-out to Susan T of my Greenwich Associates family. Susan was one of Row for Hope's biggest supporters at the office and, in addition to tirelessly reminding our colleagues to donate to the cause, on her own initiative Susan organized a great bus trip that took 25 or so coworkers of ours to Mohegan Sun for a day in November, raising more than $1,000 for Row for Hope in the process. Susan, please keep in touch (paul@rowforhope.com after I return) and thank you again for your generous support!

Thanks to all who have supported this expedition and important research at Yale Cancer Center with a donation to Row for Hope. If you haven't donated, or if you would consider donating again, it would be much appreciated. To donate online use the link in the upper right-hand corner of this page or visit www.rowforhope.com.

Paul

Day 37

A good day yesterday (53.3 miles), and hopefully another good one today, at least in the mid-30's, I would hope. The wind, at least until this afternoon, has been in the 20-knot range, with the larger swells being 20 feet or so. Winds are less now, but shifting more to due west after being a little more south-west yesterday and this morning. Tomorrow I'll write about what it's like to row a small boat in 20+ foot seas...it's pretty wild.

Looking ahead, here are my thoughts on this stage of the row. I crossed 30W on Monday (I should cross 33W tonight or tomorrow morning), putting me in the 2nd quarter of the row, the way I'm thinking about it. Technically, I'm well into the 2nd quarter (as my dad pointed out when I passed the 33% mark a few days ago). Anyway, I'm expecting the quarter between 30W and 40W (this one) to be the most difficult mentally, as it's still very far from the finish line and also pretty void of milestones and such to get excited about. So, the mentality is to just get over it ASAP with no drama.

After I reach 40W (the half-way mark that I'm going to celebrate), things will start to happen more quickly. The actual half-way mark from and east to west perspective is 39 deg 26 mins West, so by the time I cross 40W I'll be over half-way any way you look at it. You might wonder why I wouldn't celebrate the actual half-way point? Well, I don't really know, other than that I'm a "delayed-gratification" sort of guy - this might be obvious!

Starting at 40W, the milestones I can think of off hand are:
- My halfway point (champagne)
- Flip over my big map to the side with Antigua (and other familiar places) on it
- A new time zone (45W)
- Under 1,000 nautical miles to Antigua
- Under 1,000 statute miles to Antigua
- The final quarter of the row (50W)
- The beginning of the end (60W)
- Another new time zone (60W)
- See land for the first time in months
- Last night at sea (more champagne!)
- Antigua!!! (61 deg 45 mins West)

Those last few might not be in order, but you get the idea.

Dan P in Norwich -- Yes, I was in the scouts when I was younger and wish I stayed active longer than I did. I was in Cub Scouts as a kid and Boy Scouts in middle school and enjoyed it. One of my good friends from college, Casey, was an eagle scout and I have tons of respect for his achievement. It took him from the Air Force Academy, to Colgate University (go 'gate!), and now to medical school. I'd love to talk to your troop if we can get the logistics to work. I'll post something with more detail on how to arrange this when I'm closer to land.

Marlene -- Yes, the petrel is still here, and the seagull stops by once or twice every day. Neither are big talkers, though... yet.

Thanks to all who have supported this expedition and important research at Yale Cancer Center with a donation to Row for Hope. If you haven't donated, or if you would consider donating again, it would be much appreciated. To donate online use the link in the upper right-hand corner of this page or visit www.rowforhope.com.

Paul