Hi folks,
I really enjoyed the SHTP, except when I was terrified and felt like I had no idea what I was doing out there. Now I am struggling to find a way to get my boat back to California. The situation has really fallen apart.

When I was planning to do the race, my three close friends were going to help me sail the boat home. This was a comforting plan, and they attended all of the seminars with me. Fast forward to Memorial Day weekend, and when I finally got these small boat sailors offshore, they were seasick and miserable, useless to me and to themselves. So what to do then? Give up on SHTP? Sail the boat home alone? I chose, in complete ignorance, to sail Shaman back by myself. Now fast forward to today, and I have blown up my 155% genoa, 95% jib and my lower back. No upwind sails and a 62-year-old skipper who can’t do the job. What to do?

My three options, as I see them, look like this:
1) Buy a headsail, either a new Dacron jib or a used sail via Minney’s, Pineapple or elsewhere. Hire a delivery skipper. Pay what? About $5000 to $10,000?
2) See if any Cal 40 has a trailer or cradle available, and have the boat shipped back. How much would this cost and is it even a possible option? I missed a trailer Stan Honey advertised in the July Latitude 38 issue by two days. Damn.
3) Put the boat up for sale, as-is, where-is. I hate to say this, but Option #3 seems like the only one that has any realistic grownup likelihood of happening.

I bought Shaman for $80,000 and have spent another $30,000 in a year and a half. As a three-time cancer survivor with a 40% chance of being healthy in five years, I wanted to do this race NOW, not in two years, when I would really be ready. Although I am proud to have completed the race, I feel like I have really blown it, like I had no idea what it would be like “out there,” and am completely terrified to take this three-week upwind bash. So it feels like I am going to lose my boat, and about half the money I have spent—or more.

Does anyone have some advice for a stuck competitor?

Tom Burden