Nelson sailor Daryl Wislang’s Abu Dhabi Ocean Racing Team has won the Volvo Ocean Race with a leg to go and the former Nelson Yacht Club junior says he’s already setting his eyes on the next one.
Daryl is the boat captain of Abu Dhabi Ocean Racing which crossed the finished line into Lorient in France in third place, but secured it enough points to ensure they could not be overtaken in the race for the round the world title.
He says it was a strange feeling on the boat when it crossed the finish line knowing they’d done enough to win. “It was really close heading to the finish line, a team was just 0.6 of a mile behind us and if they had overtaken us we wouldn’t have been in the wining position, so it was pretty tense right up until the finish.”
Daryl has been involved in the Volvo Ocean Race for a decade and he says to win it is a huge achievement. “It doesn’t matter how little sleep you’ve had, you’ve got plenty of energy to have a good celebration when you cross the line. It’s been ten years of my life to try and do it and it’s a great feeling.
“There’s the America’s Cup, the Olympics and the Volvo Ocean Race, and to do well in any of those races is amazing.”
The nine month 38,739-nautical mile race started in Spain in October, before heading to South Africa, the United Arab Emirates, China, New Zealand, Brazil, the United States, Portugal, France and it will finish in Sweden.
Daryl says he’d love to take the next step and skipper his own boat. “It would be quite nice to get something going out of New Zealand. Skippering a boat is a goal I’ve had for a long, long time but whether or not that happens, who knows?”
He has tried in the past to pull together enough sponsorship money to put a New Zealand-based team together and is hopeful it can be done for the next race.
In the meantime, Daryl will head to the United States a week after the end of the ocean race to sail in a trans-Atlantic race before taking a break. After that it could be planning for the next round the world race, or perhaps a tilt at the America’s Cup.
“With all these people leaving Team New Zealand there might be an opportunity to go and do the cup with them, you never know.”
