Extraordinary Solo Sailors for Hall of Fame
by Cruising Editor on 27 Jun 2006
Museum of Yachting SW
Four extraordinary sailors have been singled out for induction into the ‘Single-Handed Sailors’ Hall of Fame in the United States next month. And they are:
Dame Ellen MacArthur, 28, the fastest woman to sail around the world;
Minoru Saito of Japan, 71, the oldest to complete his seventh solo non-stop circumnavigation;
Jean-Luc van den Heede, five-times circumnavigator;
and BOC record-breaker Bertie Reed, South Africa’s most famous ‘old salt’.
The four were chosen for their 'unique contribution to single-handing sailing, extraordinary achievement, pioneering spirit overcoming a remarkable challenge and providing a source of inspiration to others', and were nominated by a panel of internationally renowned single-handed sailing experts.
They will join an elite bunch. The seven current Hall of Fame members include Joshua Slocum, Sir Francis Chichester, Harry Pidgeon and Sir Robin Knox-Johnston.
The Induction Ceremony will take place in Newport Rhode Island, the home of the America’s Cup and often called the sailing capital of the world, on July 14, at the Museum of Yachting.
IOL in South Africa reports that Bertie Reed, now 63, began his solo sailing earnestly in 1982 when he was placed first on handicap in the inaugural BOC Challenge, and subsequently logged more than 100 000 miles of single-handed ocean racing.
During the third of his three solo BOC circumnavigations, in 1990-91, he pulled off a dramatic 'needle in a haystack' type search-and-rescue operation in the dark to find his comrade and fellow South African sailor John Martin, whose yacht Allied Bank had been hit by a 'growler' (a submerged piece of a melting iceberg) near Cape Horn.
Thanks to the fact that Reed's purpose-built yacht Grinaker had recently been fitted with a global positioning system, which was far more accurate than the earlier satellite navigation system, he found his friend just in time.
Martin had by then abandoned his yacht and was in a water-logged rubber duck, suffering from hypothermia. (Pete Goss, incidentally, later achieved a repeat of this feat when he rescued fellow racer Raphael Dinelli in the Southern Ocean on Christmas Day 1996.)
'It was a sad day for John,' recalled Reed. 'He was in the lead and would have won the race. I don't think anyone can put themselves in his shoes at his disappointment of being right on top of the world... and the next day to know his yacht was finished.'
For this selfless act, Bertie Reed was awarded the Wolraad Woltemade Decoration - then South Africa's highest civilian award for bravery.
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