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SETTING SAIL ACROSS THE PACIFIC
BY RACHEL WRIGHT I magine this: You’re on a 40-foot boat, open ocean, somewhere between California and Hawaii, nothing as far as the eye can see. You haven’t seen another person for over two weeks. You’re at the mercy of the elements and have already dealt with some less-than-ideal weather that nearly tipped your vessel. You have seven more days of this to go. This was The Landings Golf & Athletic Club member AJ Goldman’s reality for 21 days, 9 hours, and 17 minutes as he solo sailed the Singlehanded Transpacific Race (SHTP) in 2010. SIX YEARS OF PREPARATION Goldman had been sailing for 35 years before making his transpacific trek, beginning in high school, then competitively in
college and beyond. He started preparing six years prior to the race starting with 10- to 20-mile singlehanded races, working up to the qualifying race for the SHTP, which is a 400-mile singlehanded ocean race. “It wasn’t my original goal [to participate in the SHTP],” said Goldman. “I just wanted to get out there by myself and relax.” After a friend won the SHTP in 2004, Goldman was hooked and wanted to learn everything he could about solo ocean sailing and participate in the race. A ROUGH START AJ Goldman departed San Francisco on June 19, 2010. “We started in a full storm. The wind was blowing sustained 50 knots with gusts over 60 knots. These are bad conditions for the
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