Inspired by others to go offshore

Among the new events for the Paris 2024 Olympics was the Mixed Two Person Offshore Keelboat Event, and Francesca Clapcich was all in. Having already represented Italy in the Laser Radial at London 2012 and in the 49erFX at Rio 2016, competing in this new offshore format was her goal.

But when the event got removed from the 2024 Olympic sailing program, Clapcich pivoted to another pursuit – The Ocean Race 2022-23. As a member of US entry 11th Hour Racing Team, the Italian Olympian has been awed with the latest generation foiling IMOCA.

“It’s an incredible boat and like nothing I have raced before,” she says. “The 49er was fast, more wet, and closer to water, but this boat is a speed machine. We just crossed the ocean (in training) and the speed you can do on the boat is really impressive.”

Clapcich is back in The Ocean Race for the second consecutive edition after cutting her teeth in the 2017-18 edition as part of the Turn the Tide on Plastic VO65 crew.

She first became inspired by the idea of racing around the world as a young sailor starting out racing dinghies in Italy.

“I remember when I was little this incredible race called The Whitbread where the best sailors in the world were racing around the world so close to icebergs in the southern ocean and wearing just wool fleeces. At home in my room I had a big poster of Illbruck and Ericsson – as well as Amer Sport Too.”

But it was the 2014-15 race when Clapcich watched the all-women Swedish entry Team SCA racing around the world that she started to believe she could one day do the same.

Such was the international attention generated by the SCA crew that Clapcich remembers thinking at the end of the race: “They did it – and we can do it. We can do it really well – and we can do it even better.

“It was their own sponsor and their own team and it made [the opportunity really real. I think that was a big turning point for a lot of female sailors of that generation.”

Since the last edition of The Ocean Race, Clapcich has tried her hand at solo sailing with an entry in the 2021 La Solitaire du Figaro where she became the first Italian sailor to finish the grueling event.

That experience, it turns out, has paid dividends while training aboard the 11th Hour Racing Team IMOCA.

“Sailing short-handed has been really helpful because I understand better the dynamic of how to sail the boat only with a few people, and how the autopilot works.

“In the beginning it was quite hard for me to work out how hard we could push it when we are driving with the autopilot and trimming the sails – and just how brutal it is to live down below.”

Although Clapcich jumped at the chance to join Charlie Enright’s US campaign, she had to think long and hard about her commitment level after her first few sessions with the team.

“Life on board is not easy. The movements are pretty crazy and we sail the boat so flat that we are really just smashing in the water. I have heard a lot of stories about it but when you experience it you think: ‘Can I do this? Or is it too much?’

“I needed to make sure that I wanted to do it 100 percent before committing, because your team members don’t want someone on board who doesn’t want to be there.

“Being part of the 11th Hour Racing Team is an honor for me. It’s been great to be able to sail with them and be part of a project that is so focused on performance.

“In my first race we were a young and inexperienced team and for the first half of the race we were learning how to sail the boat and understand the dynamic on board. We were not really able to push as hard as the front teams.

“This time we feel like we are the boat that the other teams are looking at, to understand: How reliable are they? How fast are they going? How hard are they pushing?”

Sailing in a four person crew on a foiling IMOCA will doubtless make Clapcich’s second edition of The Ocean Race a different experience in very many ways – but, for all the differences, she says there are some key elements of the race that never change.

“It is going to be a really different race compared to the last one. There are less people on board and there’s a lot more to do. You are more covered [on board] but at the same time the speeds are higher. It is going to be all about understanding the reliability of the boats and making sure we are ready for anything out there.

“It’s still going to be about teamwork, as always. Whether you have 10 people on board, or five, or two, it’s about working together really well and it’s about helping each other in the moments that are hard.

“Out in the middle of the ocean you can get to some dark places and you need to push your brain and push your mindset to keep going. At the finish line you forget all the pain and it is about what you accomplished with a great group of people and you get a big reward for what you just did.”

In the next edition that reward could be delivered in Clapcich’s home country when the teams arrive to the final finish line in Genoa to complete their 32,000 nautical mile race around the world.

Race details – Route – Teams – Facebook

The Ocean Race 2022-23 Race Schedule:
Alicante, Spain – Leg 1 start: January 15, 2023
Cabo Verde – ETA: January 22; Leg 2 start: January 25
Cape Town, South Africa – ETA: February 9; Leg 3 start: February 26 or 27 (TBC)
Itajaí, Brazil – ETA: April 1; Leg 4 start: April 23
Newport, RI, USA – ETA: May 10; Leg 5 start: May 21
Aarhus, Denmark – ETA: May 30; Leg 6 start: June 8
Kiel, Germany (Fly-By) – June 9
The Hague, The Netherlands – ETA: June 11; Leg 7 start: June 15
Genova, Italy – The Grand Finale – ETA: June 25, 2023; Final In-Port Race: July 1, 2023

The Ocean Race (formerly Volvo Ocean Race and Whitbread Round the World Race) will be raced in two classes of boats: the high-performance, foiling, IMOCA 60 class and the one-design VO65 class which has been used for the last two editions of the race. Entries in the IMOCA 60 class will compete for The Ocean Race trophy, while those racing the VO65s will chase the Ocean Challenge Trophy. The 14th edition was originally planned for 2021-22 but was postponed one year due to the pandemic.

Source: The Ocean Race