Daryl 'WISBANG' Wislang - Volvo Ocean Race Winner

by Ian Thomson on 29 Jun 2015 Five and a half weeks before the first race in this edition of the Volvo Ocean Race, Daryl became a father. Many would think that he wouldn’t have competed this year, however, his wife Jessica has been with him on all of his previous Volvo Ocean Races and it was natural that he would compete once again.

Daryl grew up in New Zealand and was a sailmaker when the 2005 Volvo Ocean Race made a visit to Auckland. Before the race, he had offered his services to anyone coming that way and it was Bouwe Bekking and the Movistar team that gave him a shot and supported him into the race. As a 22-year-old, he was added to the shore team and raced in the odd in port race.

After the race he did a bit of TP52 sailing with Bouwe and he must of impressed as he was invited back with Bouwe in the 2008/9 edition of the Volvo Ocean Race as a full-time crew member on Telefonica Blue. They finished third that year. Three years later he would join the Camper with Emirates Team New Zealand where he again raced full time with a result of a second. This edition he was a late addition to the Abu Dhabi team when a mate ‘Animal’ withdrew. He simply put his interest forward through a few facebook messages and with some good words from ‘Animal’ and some other mates on the team, he got the gig.

I got a chance to catch up with ‘Wisbang’ before the final in-port race and got his thoughts on this edition and his future. The first thing I learnt about him was how grateful he was to Bouwe for his break. Even though he had actually beaten his idol in the race, he remains friends and has seen Bouwe’s daughter grow up from a six-year-old. Knowing his family was an important thing for Daryl and now with his own child I think Daryl will want to do the same for someone else down the track.

When asked about winning the Volvo Ocean Race for the first time, he said it hadn’t sunken in yet. Having gone from sinking to three, two and now victory is an amazing effort. He didn’t think the celebrations would be too big with an 11-month-old, however, was really looking forward to getting back to Nelson in New Zealand and settling back into life, catching up with family and friends that have supported him throughout.

But before he heads back he has a visit to Abu Dhabi on Monday and then he is off to join the 100 footer Comanche for the Transpacific race with Ken Read. He should be back to Nelson by around the 13th July and has plans to renovate the kitchen and get back to ‘Real Life’.

He really placed an emphasis on re-integrating with society having spent the last 12 months in the cocoon of the race. He feels this is an important thing to do to avoid growing into a lonely old man.

On his future after the kitchen reno, he was keen to look into an America’s Cup campaign and another Volvo but stressed that it would have to be the right setup and by that he means the right group of sailors. The ultimate goal would be to have his own Volvo campaign, but he will have to see where everything takes him. In his opinion the next edition will see a much more structured rotation policy on all boats as he felt most people didn’t realise how burnt out they were at the end and with the new one-design racing seeing personnel as the only difference in performance, having fresh and enthusiastic crew will be a key.

Staying healthy was a huge part of the race for every crew member. Wisbang was lucky not to get sick on an actual leg however he did get sick in China and only had two pieces of toast the day before the leg which isn’t the ideal preparation for a long ocean leg. Daryl had only lost four to five kilos over the race but as he said, he had a few to lose having come into the race ‘cold’, meaning he joined the team late so he was probably one of the few that managed their health well and maintained good weight and strength.

On the One Design of this edition, he said he supported it as it levelled the playing field. It may have dumbed down the development but he thought it was a great concept and seeing four boats finish a southern ocean leg within an hour was the testament to this. He felt it put more pressure on the skipper and navigator and spoke of ‘modeing’ the boat being really important.

By ‘modeing’ he was talking of sailing the boat wider or higher into the wind to set up for a later transition but the concept of not having a gun reaching boat take 30 miles out of you in the right condition was great because if you got a lead you had learnt it.

He even spoke of the boat on boat tactics rather than going with what the weather routing saying as being a part of this edition, especially towards the end. With the assistance of AIS and the boats being so close, you could see what another boat was doing and could follow them even if it was wrong by the routing models.

Daryl was fortunate enough to have his wife and child come to most stopovers meaning he didn’t have to travel home which made his stopovers much more enjoyable and maybe a reason he recovered so well and maintained his weight well. He did, however, fly home from China and Brasil to get a bit of home cooking in. The question of the next race beckoned the question of what do you do if you have two young children, but that was something he and his wife would look into.

The hardest part of the race for Daryl was to do with his family. Missing the ‘Firsts’ was a big thing. He will never get the first smile, the first laugh, the first step etc back and that is something that makes the race hard. He didn’t think that the race was as physically hard on the body as other editions, however, believed the mental challenge was much harder due to the fact it was one design and so close.

The highlight of the race for Daryl was winning, how you can go past that. He also loved the southern ocean leg where they did 550.8nm at an average of 24.2 knots to take out the IWC 24 hour run for the second year in a row after taking it out with Camper last year. The thrill of ‘sending it’ for long periods of time is something he loves and can’t get enough of. He said he was buzzing through that time.

He thought the new boats with the higher freeboards were a lot drier and he only had one or two occasions where he really had to hang onto the wheel to stop himself being washed off, whereas on Camper in the Bay of Biscay where they set the record last year, he had someone behind him to hold him onto the wheel all the time.

As the founder of Ocean Crusaders, I asked him about the state of the ocean and he said he had actually seen less general trash but in the Mediterranean there were plenty of Mediterranean White Fish (nickname for plastic bags), the odd ‘Wilson’ (Fishing buoy) and several little helium balloons from fairs but the biggest increase was in dunnage from ships.

They managed to get a full pallet stuck on the keel at one stage and had to back up to remove it costing a lot of time and had avoided plenty of others. In the 08/9 race, they actually saw a fridge floating but said it is hard to gauge the overall picture as you are so small in the scheme of things.

Some of the wildlife he had seen on the journey included heaps of dolphins, barely going two days without seeing any, plenty of whales out of Newport, Auckland and Cape Town, had some pilot whales swimming next to the bulb near Auckland checking out whether it was one of his mates, but no killer whales on this trip. Albatross numbers were on the increase again which was a positive sign.

In summing up Daryl really wanted to thank his friends and family for their support throughout the race and a particular thank you to his wife Jessica who supports him in everything he does.