1 SAIC LA JOLLA STORY from Interpersona ... - Interpersona Oy

SAIC LA JOLLA STORY from Interpersona Newsletter 

A focused leadership yields results 

Interpersona is the coach for the 

Finnish skipper Eero Lehtinen, 

who is participating at the Global 

Challenge 2004-2005 yacht race 

around the world. 

p. 2 

Interpersona is going to assist the Finnish 

skipper Eero Lehtinen in the Global Challenge 

2004-2005 yacht race 

Interpersona is going to survey 

the whole international crew of 

Lehtinen’s yacht SAIC La Jolla. 

This survey will examine every 

member of the crew regarding 

their natural talent and team 

work ability as well as look for 

possible risks of conflict. 

The leadership went well on the first leg of 

SAIC La Jolla 

The yacht that Eero Lehtinen 

commands arrived seventh out 

of twelve crews participating in 

the tough race. 

p. 5 

The spirit among the crew is still excellent! 

p. 3 

SAIC La Jolla arrived at Wellington in New Zealand, 

after the second leg which started 

in Buenos Aires and lasted five 

weeks. 

p. 7 

Second place through a goal-directed 

development of the leadership and the activity! 

SAIC La Jolla reached a top performance in the third 

leg of the race. 

p. 9 

Shared responsibility and work allocation were 

fruitful in Global Challenge 

The skipper was sick and under deck for almost three 

weeks but everything went well due to effective leadership 

preparations. 

p. 13 

”Hungry enough” for the last leg of Global 

Challenge 

SAIC La Jolla is fourth before the last two legs of the 

tough yacht race around the world. 

p. 16 

”Happy and proud at the finish of the Global 

Challenge yacht race” 

After all SAIC La Jolla with skipper Eero Lehtinen took 

the fifth placing in the tough yacht race around the 

world. In his report Eero tells about what happened 

during the two final legs 

(p. 20) 

A Column about efficient leadership 

Mats Kockberg, the coach of Eero Lehtinen and Team 

SAIC La Jolla in the Global Challenge race. 

(p. 10) 

Eero Lehtinen’s conclusions from the Global 

Challenge-race 

The Finnish skipper of Team SAIC La Jolla Eero Lehtinen 

settles his experiences and views from the tough Global 

Challenge circumnavigation race. 

(p. 5) 

The Crew 

Here we present the SAIC La 

Jolla Crew. 

p. 31 

About the race, racing schedule & route 

From Buenos Aires the yachts 

sail south to Kap Horn and from 

there continue west towards the 

hard winds and currents of the 

Southern Ocean. 

The Saic La Jolla 

The SAIC La Jolla that Eero commands 

is one of the identical 

72-foot steel yachts designed by 

Rob Humphries. 

p. 35 

Oy INTERPERSONA Ab • Uudenmaankatu 17 B • 00120 HELSINKI • puhelin 020 741 9570 • telefax 020 741 9571 

email: interpersona@interpersona.fi • http://www.interpersona.fi 

p. 34 

1

A focused leadership yields results 

In this review we can read an interesting story about 

leadership and sailing. Interpersona has been coaching 

the Finnish skipper Eero Lehtinen and his 18-member 

crew on leadership and building up team spirit on the 

72-foot yacht SAIC La Jolla, participating in the Global 

Challenge 2004-05 yacht race around the world. 

The story is worth reading even for those who are not 

interested in yachting or any other competitive sports. 

There are certain features and factors that affect the 

leadership of a team representing different nationalities, 

regardless of whether we are talking about a work community 

or some other group. Even the tools of success 

are similar to a great extent. 

For success there is one thing that is absolutely 

necessary, though: one must be totally and firmly devoted 

to the leadership. The coaching conversations I had 

with Eero during Global Challenge have clearly shown 

that he takes his challenge seriously also when it comes 

to the development of the leadership. All things that 

come up are important and the problems are not solved 

cynically but with actions. 

Results are yielded with a goal-directed work. But 

- just as in business – new challenges are ahead and 

the competitors have without doubt done their best to 

improve their own performance. It is not possible to rest 

on one’s laurels. The leadership and the development 

of one’s own activity must be on the agenda in every 

single moment. 

If you are interested in following the different legs of 

the yacht race more intensely, it is worth visiting the 

official website of the race www.globalchallenge2004. 

com as well as the website of Eero Lehtinen’s own crew 

www.teamsaic.com. 

The Interpersona Saic La Jolla web page will be 

updated in the end of July. 

Mats Kockberg 

Coach for Eero Lehtinen and Team SAIC La Jolla 

Corporate Adviser, President of INTERPERSONA 



2

Interpersona is going to assist the Finnish skipper Eero Lehtinen in the Global 

Challenge 2004-2005 yacht race 

Interpersona has reached an agreement on 

co-operation with the Finnish skipper Eero 

Lehtinen, who is participating at the Global 

Challenge 2004-2005 yacht race around the 

world. According to this agreement Interpersona 

is going to survey the whole international 

crew of Lehtinen’s yacht SAIC La Jolla. This 

survey will examine every member of the crew 

regarding their natural talent and team work 

ability as well as look for possible risks of conflict. 

In case of problems at sea which might 

ask for outside help, Eero Lehtinen can discuss 

the situation in his own language on the satellite 

phone with Mats Kockberg, Lehtinen’s 

coach and leadership expert. On 3 October 

the starting shot for the yacht race will go off 

in Portsmouth. 

Eero Lehtinen is an experienced 

ocean-racing yachtsman 

and is now the first 

Finnish paid skipper in Global 

Challenge. 

more or less on the right 

course, already starting from 

day 1, instead person issues 

and co-operation are going 

to offer a much greater 

challenge. During the legs 

of five weeks the hygiene 

is reduced to levels of the 

zoo, the temperature is more 

favourable for skiing than 

for sailing and in the worst 

case everybody is doubting 

whether we are going to 

live through this experience 

or not? 

Eero Lehtinen describes 

how important the agreement 

of co-operation is for 

the whole project: 

- The greatest challenge 

in the whole race will 

be to join together the 

rather large crew in 

demanding circumstances. 

It is not going to 

be a problem to keep 

the yacht moving at 

a reasonable speed 

In this kind of working surroundings Eero appreciates 

the existence of a personal coach and adviser. 

- Mats Kockberg and Interpersona are going to 

be a prop and stay of uttermost importance as 

the race proceeds. The help of an outside expert 

often easily resolves the inevitable person issues 

and perhaps urgent situations of conflict. When 

analyzing the situation an outside expert is able 

to remove the emotional aspects and the prestige 

issues. As the experienced yachtsman he is, Mats 

can also understand the circumstances and all 

the factors that might burden the crew during 

the longer legs. 

- I believe that this is going to be a giving and 

fruitful co-operation, hopefully we’re not going 

to be in touch on a daily basis, though, Eero 

Lehtinen says. 

Global Challenge 2004-2005 is a yacht race around 

the world “the wrong way” around, with 12 identical 

yachts participating with a non-professional crew led 

by a professional skipper. In spite of all the traditional 

yachting recommendations the route goes “the wrong 

way” around in the following matter: starting from Buenos 

Aires the yachts sail due south to Kap Horn and 

from there continue west towards the hard winds and 

currents of the Southern Ocean. 

The Global Challenge yacht race around the world 

was launched in 1992 by the legendary yachting figure 

Sir Chay Blyth, who during the years 1970-71 was the 

first solo yachtsman to sail non-stop the wrong way 

around the world. This year’s race is the fourth in order. 

Since the race was launched the starting point has 



3

een to take 20-60 year old participants from different 

countries, professions and circles. Each ordinary crewmember 

pays 27 000 pound for the participation in the 

nine month race. This amount also includes a profound 

period of training. A limited number of yachtsmen are 

also taken on the yachts for the different legs of the 

race. The yachts have eighteen-member crews. 

As paid skippers for the twelve yachts participating 

in the Global Challenge Chay Blyth chooses people 

with more yachting experience. This time he elected 

twelve skippers out of totally 348 applicants. There 

haven’t been any Finns in the previous races and therefore 

Eero Lehtinen has the honour to be the first. 

The 40-year old Master of Economic Sciences has an 

impressing list of yachting qualifications: in the 6mRclass 

he has, among other achievements, gold as well as 

silver medals in World and European championships. 

Eero has also participated in numerous famous ocean 

races; Gotland Runt, Fastnet Race, Azores and Back, 

Whitbread, Round Britain and Ireland Challenge etc.). 

Eero lives in Cape Town with his wife Tonya, their three 

children and two dogs. 

- The slogan of this race is to arrive safe and 

sound, Eero Lehtinen says. 

- But of course every crew would prefer to be 

at the leg harbour welcoming the competitors, 

which means that not only the circumstances 

but also the competition, naturally, is going to 

be very hard. 

The SAIC La Jolla that Eero commands is one of the 

identical 72-foot steel yachts designed by Rob Humphries, 

which take part in Global Challenge. SAIC La 

Jolla is crewed by men and women between 22 and 

57 years and among them there are i.e. an ambulance 

driver, a lawyer, an electrical engineer, a retired, a student, 

a managing director, an IT trainer, a satellite engineer 

etc. Four of the crewmembers are women. 

The length of the route is about 30 000 sea miles. 

The racing days are going to be approximately 150. 

The journey starts 3rd October and the route will be 

Portsmouth–Buenos Aires-Wellington-Sydney-Cape 

Town-Boston-La Rochelle-Portsmouth. The date of arrival 

should be 17th July 2005. 

The main sponsor for SAIC La Jolla is SAIC, an American 

IT-business. Besides Interpersona also Suunto and 

Fiskars participates in the project from Finland. 

We are going to follow up the Global Challenge 

2004-2005 race in the following NEWSLETTERs, where 

we will tell about the sailing of SAIC La Jolla and about 

what the consultant and coaching assistance we give 

means in practice. 

If you are interested in following the different legs 

of the yacht race more intensely, it is worth visiting the 

official website of the race www.globalchallenge2004. 

com as well as the website of Eero Lehtinen’s own crew 

www.teamsaic.com 



4

The leadership went well on the first leg of SAIC La Jolla 

In the beginning of November the 72-foot yacht 

SAIC La Jolla, participating in the Global Challenge 

2004-2005 yacht race around the world, 

arrived at the first leg harbour at Buenos Aires. 

Interpersona is sponsoring SAIC La Jolla by 

coaching and leadership expertise. The yacht 

that Eero Lehtinen commands arrived seventh 

out of twelve crews participating in the tough 

race. 

- After the start from Portsmouth on 3 October 

we suffered from seasickness, but despite that we 

sailed well and after nine sailing days we were 

leading. We lost the leading position in between 

but regained it again 17th, Eero Lehtinen says. 

A few days after this SAIC La Jolla got caught in a totally 

windless doldrums zone as single crew of the race, 

- We lost our leading position in a situation 

where we were completely unarmed. There was 

no sign of wind and the current actually swept 

us backwards for some hours. 

Mats Kockberg from Interpersona was in Portsmouth 

a couple of days before the race started, giving Eero 

Lehtinen (on the right in the picture) and the crew of SAIC 

La Jolla the ”extreme unction” 

After this occurred the yacht was seventh and the distance 

to the others in front had become so long that 

there was no chance to gain in on them. 

- This didn’t lower our spirit, though. These kinds 

of things can happen in ocean races and besides 

skills you also need good luck in order to achieve 

great success, Lehtinen says. 

Before the ocean race began Interpersona made a team 

analysis of the whole crew. This survey evaluated central 

strengths and bottlenecks for the internal cooperation 

and the capacity of the crew. Mats Kockberg was 

in Portsmouth 30.9 - 1.10 giving the crew feedback 

of the results and on the same occasion coached the 

entire group and gave Eero Lehtinen advice on leading 

the crew. 

- The greatest benefit I got of the briefing in 

Portsmouth was the entry of an outside expert 

and the possibility to go through things in an 

equal and neutral forum. 

- For me and the crew it was positive that the 

discussion on team matters was started without 

difficulties and it became a weekly routine also 

at sea. When some of our weakest sides were 

charted and acknowledged it helped us to direct 

our discussions into real contexts and we got 

directly to the point. 

- Now it doesn’t seem like an emergency 

meeting as soon as we deal with team matters, 

cooperation and possible problems; everybody 

is used to the idea that we discuss stronger as well 

as weaker areas. We always focus on the team 

and its welfare, not on criticising individuals, 

Eero states. 

We also asked Lehtinen which the three things were 

regarding leadership that went particularly well during 

the first leg. He has a very clear opinion: 

- First of all sharing the responsibility from me 

to the team went very well. Many have taken 

big roles within their abilities and skills and the 

confidence is high concerning the internal work 

division of the team. 

- Another good thing is the daily circulation of 

information. Each day at 13 o’clock we have a 

meeting, where we share where, why and how 

we are going; we talk through domestic matters, 

talk about all eventual problems, give positive 

feedback and if necessary agree about new 

work divisions. Everyone is up to date and there 

haven’t been any rumours and gossips. 

- As third but not least matter I can mention 

that the trust and respect I enjoy is considerably 

strong. 



5

On 5 November SAIC La Jolla arrived at Buenos Aires, 

placing seventh after the first leg. The standing in the 

race that goes on until next July is 

1. Barclays Adventurer / sailed time 31 days, 20 

hours, 23 minutes 

2. VAIO /31 days, 20 hours, 38 minutes 

3. Samsung /31 days, 22 hours, 54 minutes 

..... 

7. SAIC La Jolla /32 days, 13 hours, 4 minutes 

In Buenos Aires the yacht crews do different maintenance 

and equipment work, and of course they rest. 

Interpersona is again going to analyse the situation for 

the team of SAIC La Jolla; the conclusions and advice 

drawn from that survey will then be transmitted to Eero 

Lehtinen and the other members of the crew. 

On 28 November the starting shot for the second 

leg of the yacht race went of. The leg is going to finish in 

Wellington, where the yachts are awaited in the beginning 

of January. 

SAIC La Jolla led the race twice during the first leg, but 

then got into a completely windless zone and fell to the 

seventh place. 



6

The spirit among the crew is still excellent! 

In the beginning of January the 72-foot steel 

yacht SAIC La Jolla participating in the Global 

Challenge 2004-05 yacht race around the world 

arrived at Wellington in New Zealand, after 

the second leg which started in Buenos Aires 

and lasted five weeks. Among other things the 

route included to sail against the wind ”the 

wrong way” round Cape Horn. Interpersona is 

sponsoring SAIC La Jolla and its Finnish skipper 

Eero Lehtinen by consulting them through 

coaching and advice on leadership. 

On this leg the crew arrived seventh – just as 

on the first leg. 

Here follows Eero Lehtinen’s report for the 

Interpersona-newsletter: 

The skipper of SAIC La Jolla Eero Lehtinen is the first Finn 

to participate in Global Challenge. Interpersona is sponsoring 

the yacht by coaching the captain and the whole 

18-member crew. 

The long and racking second leg from Buenos Aires to 

Wellington in New Zealand is behind us and the uppermost 

thing in mind is that we survived without bigger 

damages, the yacht is in good condition and with one 

exception everyone was fairly healthy during the whole 

trip. Our medic Karen Jones had some tough times, first 

when she fell sick with a difficult urinary tract infection 

and related problems with her stomach, and finally 

when she had to put up with the medical measures, 

including vaccination and intravenous medication, that 

the substitute doctor we call Mengelehtinen carried out 

with the trial and error technique. The substitute doctor 

SAIC La Jolla is a 72-foot steel yacht. The crew has 18 members. 

as well as the patient has now recovered and everything 

is fine again. 

The spirit among the crew is still very good, naturally 

everyone is to some extent longing for a change 

of environment, but a good sign is that the majority of 

the crew is leaving for vacation together. Distance from 

the yacht and the crew sounds like a good idea for the 

skipper at the moment, the break is really welcome. 

The yacht is in good condition, a few days hard work of 

cleaning and maintenance has given good results and 

now the yacht will rise on dry earth for the check up 

and service of the underwater parts. The maintenance 

team is going to go through the rig thoroughly and the 

yachts will be fit for action when we return from our 

two weeks vacation. 

During this leg we could see, that the crew members 

who were criticized at the crew debriefing after the first 

leg had kept the feed-back in mind and the change was 

delightfully positive. At some point we started hearing 

pretty loud judgments on the tactics on a person’s part, 

with the hindsight principle, but this was silenced in 

the very beginning after the skipper’s maybe even too 

harsh reaction. We have gone through all matters in the 

debriefing of the second leg as well as in the one-to-one 

conversations I’ve had with each member of the crew, 

and hopefully we start of on the third leg from a clean 

table and without any scores to settle. 

In addition to all the rest, the crew has answered 

Interpersona’s questionnaire on team analysis. We used 

the same tool already after the first leg and now we are 

able to compare the results and see in which direction 

we are heading. For the skipper and the leader 

of the team this feed-back is of uttermost importance, 



7

we grab hold of the things as soon as they appear and 

whatever problem might be arising we can take actions 

immediately in order to prevent more serious infections. 

This is a valuable asset especially in an English 

dominated crew, because otherwise everyone would 

just thank and praise each other with vague politeness 

and clichés. The cultural differences are quite huge and 

my poor crew has every now and then had to bear my, 

as they see it, often to straight frankness and criticism. 

In the spirit of equality they think I’m too hard on myself 

as well, so altogether maybe we still are in an equal 

position… 

We all wish for better results, for which we still 

believe we have all the prerequisites. The third leg is a 

quite epoch-making stage, now if ever we should show, 

most of all ourselves that we can do better than middle 

placements (7. and 7. /12). But the race is still long and 

one should never give up, that is obvious! 

With kind regards from windy Wellington, 

Eero Lehtinen 


The results from the second leg: 

1. Spirit of Sark / sailed time 36 days, 6 hours, 

56 minutes 

2. BP Explorer / 36 days, 7 hours, 31 minutes 

3. BG Spirit / 36 days, 7 hours, 34 minutes 

….. 

7. SAIC La Jolla / 37 days, 6 hours, 40 minutes 

The standing in the whole race after two sailed 

legs: 

1. VAIO 25 points 

1. Samsung 25 points 

1. BP Explorer 25 points 

….. 

7. SAIC La Jolla 18 points 

After the rounding of Cape Horn the sailing conditions 

became very cold and stormy. 

The starting shot for the third leg of the yacht race will 

go of on 6 February. This leg only takes a week and will 

finish in Sydney. From there the race will continue on 

26 February with the goal harbor in Cape Town – the 

sailing time is estimated to about 5 to 6 weeks. 



8

Second place through a goal-directed development of the leadership and the 

activity! 

Eero Lehtinen’s crew arrived second in the 

tough leg from Wellington in New Zealand to 

Sydney in Australia, during only over a week. 

Before the leg the crew made thorough preparations, 

especially regarding different sectors 

of the leadership. Interpersona operates 

as adviser to SAIC La Jolla and Eero Lehtinen 

in challenges with coaching, leadership and 

strengthening of team spirit. SAIC La Jolla is a 

72-foot steel yacht with an 18-member crew. 

Eero Lehtinen’s report for the Interpersona- 

Newsletter: 

The third leg from Wellington to Sydney went perfectly 

for SAIC La Jolla. After about a week we arrived 

second at the goal line set in front of the famous opera 

house, loosing only 15 minutes to the winner BG Spirit. 

We had to defend our second position to the very last 

inches, as the “Teddy yacht” Me to You held us under 

pressure. Me to You sailed the last 220 sea miles right 

behind us, the distance varied between 0.3 and 2 sea 

miles. We followed the development constantly from 

the radar, even during the night, when the only visible 

things of the yacht were the navigation lights and the 

occasional glimmer of the trimmer’s flashlight. Finally 

Me to You crossed the goal line six minutes after SAIC 

La Jolla. 

We were not quite satisfied with our positioning 

(7. /12) after the first two legs and during the race we 

had done analyses and changes, with the purpose to 

In the third leg from Wellington to Sydney SAIC La Jolla’s 

skipper Eero Lehtinen steered his crew to a second placement 

in the yacht race around the world. 

improve the competitiveness of the team. In this work 

central tools have been Interpersona’s team questionnaires, 

which we’ve used in every harbour and which 

analyse the team spirit, the leadership and the division 

of labour. The results from these have shown clear 

development points, of which I as skipper have had 

most improving to do. The fact that the results have 

been available immediately after every leg has given 

me an excellent opportunity to grab hold of the right 

matters as soon as they appear. 

Based on the first two legs we have found some 

clear weaknesses. Among the issues that arose from 

the first leg where the daily team meetings and their 

ineffectiveness, too long duration and lack of priority. 

During the stop in Buenos Aires the ineffectiveness of 

the maintenance work and the use of time as well as 

the general negligence was criticized. The personal 

frustration and strong mood changes of the skipper also 

had a negative effect on the atmosphere in the whole 

crew. Due to the results and the anonymous feedback 

I could immediately see in which areas we and I had 

most to work on and then take actions right away. 

Clearly structured meetings 

The crew of SAIC La Jolla has 18 members. 

Our daily meetings were now clearly structured and 

we also set up punctual beginning hours and a maximal 

duration. For the stop in Wellington we made up 

a detailed work plan, named the persons in charge, 

shared the responsibility among a greater number, 

where everybody had their own clear roles and aims, 

the work tasks where placed realistically on the daily 

program and there where clear deadlines for the com- 



9

pletion of the work. We watched over how the work 

proceeded with daily quick meetings and if needed 

transferred resources to a place behind schedule. After 

we arrived in Wellington the yacht was ready to sail 

in record time and the crew could leave for vacation 

in high spirits, while the boat in only four days was 

cleaned, serviced and almost ready to start off on the 

next leg. During the last two days before take off we 

could relax, enjoy Wellington’s wonderful summer and 

lively supply of culture as well as watch the other crews’ 

last minute “busy doings”. We left off on the third leg 

very well rested and in a positive atmosphere. 

The spirit was high when SAIC La Jolla crossed the goal 

line in Sydney. 

We changed the sailing roles quite a lot after the second 

leg, we wanted to share the responsibility on more 

shoulders in order to make the journey more interesting 

for all of us and also to ease the burden on the skipper 

and hence avoid weak moments, when the setbacks 

took the skipper and with him the whole crew down 

to the lowest spirit levels. One of the watch chiefs was 

changed to a young and during the journey enormously 

developed Julian Colls, who took the new challenge in 

a marvellous way and immediately gained the support 

and trust of the crew. We named assistant watch chiefs 

to both watch chiefs, and their tasks were to serve as 

bouncing boards in tough decisions and if needed let 

the watch chief take a rest under deck. The second 

men also had the task to keep the watch chiefs awake 

– we all have our weak moments and then it’s good to 

now who is named to kick you in the but. Jim Walker, 

who was transferred from his task as watch chief after 

the second leg, got new roles – speed doctor & assistant 

tactician. Jim took the change in a positive manner, 

he was actually visibly relieved that his work as 

watch chief ended and gave his full support to the new 

man for the task. As speed doctor he kept an eye on 

the numbers on deck and constantly searched solutions 

for increasing the speed. As assistant tactician he 

worked in the navigation station with the skipper and 

the second skipper. There his tasks were helping and 

serving as bouncing board in analysing weather reports 

and information on the locations of the other yachts 

as well as in making route decisions based on those 

analyses. In this way Jim, who quite loudly criticized the 

route decisions on the second leg, entered in the roots 

of decision making. He was constantly conscious of 

where we went and what we aimed at and acted very 

constructively during the whole leg, both on as under 

deck. As Jims counter watch we had another speed 

doctor, Steve Wotton, who came out in a completely 

new way since he got his own role in maintaining the 

capacity of the yacht. Steve is an experienced racing 

rower and of very competitive nature. In the beginning 

of the race he was a complete novice as yachtsman, 

but is already one of the bearing forces on foredeck 

and now also a central part of the velocity of the boat. 

We developed the routine processes 

We made changes in the routine processes concerning 

among other things the watch system, the daily crew 

information and the follow-up of the results. Most of 

the watches were divided into new compositions, we 

wanted everyone to get a change of environment, circulate 

experiences from one watch to another as well 

as make the free watches more efficient by extending 

the length of the night watches from four to six hours. 

On the leg, which was estimated to take only a week, 

we skipped the daily meetings and instead the skipper 

wrote a “newsletter” for each day. In these he informed 

about the current situation and the tactical plans for 

the race, shortly commented on the so called domestic 

matters, listed the need of technical service, transmitted 

the greetings and encouragements that arrived 

at the yacht and gave necessary information about 

the harbour arrangements etc. in Sydney. Due to this 

nobody had to give up their free watches because of 

a meeting and the skipper could choose the most suitable 

moment for going through matters. Each morning 

before the first breakfast was served a fresh newsletter 

was waiting on the table. The crew was also informed 



10

about the race progress every six hours by an up to date 

map, where the location of all the yachts, the remaining 

distance and the course and the speed of the moment 

were visible. We tried to avoid staring at plus and minus 

in each report so during most of the leg we hid the red 

(lost miles) and green (gained miles) numbers from the 

result follow-up table. Toward the end we started to follow 

the numbers more intensely, during the whole leg 

at least a couple of yachts were visible all the time! 

“I was only the conductor” 

Some of the measures mentioned above had a direct 

effect on my own mood. It was nice to start of on the leg 

well rested, the responsibility had been shared more 

efficiently and we had made thorough preparations 

for the weather reports and the tactics. I had spoken 

openly to the crew about my own frustration and it was 

now easier for me to find someone to talk to when I got 

nervous. All were very constructive and encouraging 

about it when we had realised the problem and discussed 

it without leaving anything out. Every now and 

then I simply kept the steam inside me and let the crew 

sail the yacht more independently and see for themselves 

what went well and what went wrong. During 

the whole leg the focus and the motivation on the yacht 

were of top level and I did not in any moment have to 

question our capacity. The helmsmen had made up a 

schedule for who was supposed to steer when, which 

worked so well and was so exact that it was hard for 

me to find a moment for myself at the helm. I spent 

much less time then earlier at the rudder, only during 

the tough spinnaker beam reach of the very last day 

there was more demand for me. We arrived at the harbour 

of Sydney and the goal line steered by the boat 

Nestor Larry Deshler; I was only the conductor as we 

sailed through the lively harbour. 

As we arrived at Sydney bay we had a meeting 

on deck for the whole group, we assigned the tasks, 

decided when the spinnaker was to be taken down and 

what plan we had to keep Me to You behind us. During 

the whole day BG Spirit came towards us with its aft 

ahead and was only a couple of miles ahead of us, but 

we set up as a clear goal to defend our second place 

and decided to stay cool and keep the noise down, no 

matter how tough the game would get. I told everyone 

how proud I was of them and that we already at that 

point had sailed a brilliant leg. The spirit was excellent 

and the greatest problem was to keep down the laughter, 

so that we could hear important communication 

from the fore to the aft of the yacht. Finally the biggest 

threat to our second position was the busy traffic; a 

bump into another yacht could have mixed up the picture 

quite a lot… 

Due to our good leg and to a great extent to our 

varying placements we are going to start from Sydney 

to Cape Town from the fifth position. It is great to start 

off on the toughest leg in high spirits and rising shape. 

Personally I also have an extra motivation as my wife 

and our three children, whom I haven’t seen since last 

September, are in Cape Town waiting for us to arrive. 

The leg is once again physically very tough and will 

take about 40 days. We must now how to combine our 

conservative and safe sailing style from the second leg 

with our continuous trimming and exact steering from 

the third leg. During the long leg a shared responsibility 

is going to be an even more important factor and 

we must be able to help each other through difficult 

moments and hard conditions. Mats Kockberg is ready 

to coach me through the satellite phone if needed and 

Interpersona is going to survey the crew’s spirit again 

in Cape Town. From there our journey continues back 

to the Atlantic, that is our ”home ocean”… 

Greetings from Sydney 

Eero Lehtinen 


During the leg of one week everything had to work efficiently 

and perfectly—all the time. 



11

The results from the third leg: 

1. BG SPIRIT / sailed time 7 days, 2 hours, 11 

minutes 


2. Me To You / 7 days, 2 hours, 32 minutes 

The standing in the whole race after three 

sailed legs: 

1. BG SPIRIT 39 points 


3. Samsung 35 points 

... 


The starting shot for the fourth leg of the yacht race 

went off on 27 February. The goal harbour is Cape 

Town and the leg is estimated to take about six weeks. 

SAIC La Jolla and the other 72-foot yachts participating in 

Global Challenge are now on their way to Cape Town. 



12

The shared responsibility and the work allocation were fruitful 


2004-2005 yacht race around the world 

with Eero Lehtinen as skipper, now holds the 

fourth place in the race. In his report for the 

Interpersona-Newsletter Eero tells us about the 

fourth leg of the race. The leg was very tough 

as the skipper was sick with fever and under 

strong medication for three weeks. In that 

situation his careful preparations, especially 

regarding leadership and team spirit, proved 

to be most useful – everything went well even 

though the skipper was sick in his cabin for a 

large part of the time. 

Interpersona is adviser for SAIC La Jolla and Eero 

Lehtinen when it comes to challenges concerning 

coaching, leadership and strengthening of 

team spirit. SAIC La Jolla is a 72-foot steel yacht 

with an 18-member crew. Totally 12 crews with 

identical yachts are participating in the Global 

Challenge yacht race around the world. 

In Cape Town SAIC La Jolla’s skipper Eero Lehtinen met 

his four-member family for the first time in six months. 


Newsletter: 

The fourth leg provoked respect mingled with fear in 

all the crews and on Sunday morning 27 February the 

crews which met each other, before releasing the lines 

and going to the starting area in the hectic harbor of 

Sydney, were unusually serious and thoughtful. The 

twelve soldiers of SAIC La Jolla, all dressed in blue-andwhite, 

stood side by side in a row on the foredeck for 

the traditional blessing of the flotilla and the sailing ceremony. 

The Norwegian seamen’s chaplain held a short 

but competent introduction; the crews prayed together 

to the powers above for sympathy for the tough leg and 

finally wished each other a safe journey. La Jolla’s crew 

then made a tight circle on the foredeck, a few words 

from the skipper, a firm team hug and the war cry “LA 

JOLLA” gave us all the adrenalin kick we needed to get 

rid of a slight tension and surges of emotion. As the 

team songs ringed out one yacht after the other left 

the dock. 

When they left Sydney they were well prepared and 

rested. 

We had used the stop in Sydney efficiently; the yacht 

was once again in top condition, the crew was well 

rested and we had made careful preparations for the 

weather reports, tactics and safety aspects. In order to 

furthermore develop the safety I had given the crew so 

called What if- teamwork, which dealt with how to act 

in different situations of danger, such as man over board, 

if the mast comes down, fire, hull leakage, serious injury 

and other undesirable situations. Lucky enough, none 

of these situations happened to us on this leg either, but 

our conservative philosophy, saving both the crew and 



13

the yacht, furthered our up-going performance, as it led 

to less injuries and equipment damages compared to 

the other yachts. When we arrived to Cape Town the 

atmosphere on deck of La Jolla was visibly happier than 

on the other yachts and the unity of our team is becoming 

the talk of the town among the fleet. 

A terribly rough sea south of Tasmania 

The leg started nicely, as we already during the first 

night were in head of the fleet as we sneaked right next 

to the east coast of Australia, heading south. Out on the 

open sea we later on got caught in lighter winds than 

our competitors already in front of us, though, and we 

crossed the Bass Strait on the latter half of the fleet. 

In the beginning the weather conditions were pleasantly 

warm and the warm sea current took us due 

south quickly and postponed the arrival of the colder 

weather until the southeastern edge of Tasmania. There 

it was time to face reality, which as far as conditions 

are concerned was highly demanding for the following 

The conditions were sometimes very hard on the Southern 

Ocean. 

three weeks. The wind blew almost without exception 

with a speed of 20-40 knots; most of the time from 

the opposite directions and therefore the conditions 

were cold and humid for all but some exceptional days. 

South of Tasmania the rough sea was truly terrible as 

we crossed the continental block, were huge waves 

and water masses crowded in the lower layers of the 

sea; the sea takes many different directions, rhythms 

and wavehights – each activity on deck becomes dangerous 

and crewmembers falling also inside the yacht 

causes seriously dangerous situations. Team Save the 

Children was forced to turn back, as one of the crew- 

members got seriously injured in his own bed! A big 

wave crashed the yacht into the trough of the wave and 

the unlucky crewmember that was sleeping in his bed 

fell against an aluminum pipe breaking his hips. After 

that there was no other choice but to turn back towards 

the coast guard and send the patient to the hospital as 

soon as possible. 

For me the leg became long and painful as I fell sick 

during the second week, having to spend three weeks 

under deck, of which almost two weeks under strong 

medication in my own bed. The positive thing about 

it was that the situation for the crew turned out to be 

the teamwork practice of all times. Now we could reap 

the fruit of our labor with early responsibility sharing 

and delegation. My assistant skipper John Wilkinson 

took the role of the skipper and the crew sailed the 

yacht under the leading and responsibility of the watch 

chiefs. Except for one unsuccessful change of sail (the 

staysail was badly torn up as the clew of the third genua 

sail hit against it, a situation where the collaboration 

between the crew on foredeck, the trimmer and the 

helmsman must work without problems in order to 

avoid dangerous situations) Team SAIC La Jolla coped 

with the situation marvelously and the skipper’s crisis 

actually became a victory for our preparedness in the 

ongoing race. At worst we only had a couple of short 

discussions a day with John about where we were standing 

and what we had ahead of us. We followed our 

policy of the shortest route and tried to stay near our 

competitors. As we approached Africa the increased 

high pressure gave us the awaited chance to gain in on 

the others, which we also managed to do. We immediately 

pushed Barclays, Samsung, Me to You and BG 

The journey for SAIC La Jolla continues the first of May: 

the fifth leg finishes in Boston on the US east coast. 



14

After six weeks of sailing the reception in Cape Town was 

warm! 

Spirit, which had been threatening us, to a safe distance 

behind us and also gained in on the leading five yachts, 

especially Pindar. At this point Save the Children and 

Vaio were already helplessly far behind the others. 

A tough fight in front of Cape Town 

During the last week I could take more part of the sailing 

and the last part of the leg, which during the whole 

time had been up-going, escalated into a tough fight 

with the Pindar crew about the fifth placement. One 

week before the leg finished Pindar was still 60-70 sea 

miles ahead of us (roughly taken the distance from 

Helsinki to Hankoo), but during the last days the gap 

between us varied from less than one sea mile to five 

sea miles. The fight didn’t end until in the final straight 

when Pindar managed to cross the goal line in light 

winds six minutes before us. A week later the positions 

changed, though, as Pindar got a 40 minute time fee 

for having used the motor during the leg, in order to 

get rid of the heavy seaweed that had become entangled 

in the yacht’s rudder. So our persistent chase gave 

the result we wanted after all and we got an important 

point, which lifted us to the fourth position in the whole 

race. We now have four points less than the third yacht 

BG Spirit and one more than the fifth one (Samsung). 

Much can still happen during the three remaining legs; 

and at least the race seems to remain interesting until 

the end. 

After 38 days of sailing the arrival at Cape Town was 

in many aspects a very emotional experience for me. 

As the night fell on just before we arrived to the goal, 

several spectator boats came closer; on deck there 

were many friends and most of all my wife Tonya and 

our three children Alex, Edu and Hanna. More than six 

months had passed since the last time we saw each 

other and during the last year we had only spent one 

week together. I finally lost concentration on the winds 

when one could hear a ceaseless three-part spur out of 

the dark “Daddy, Daddy, Daddy...”. Both my employer 

Challenge Business as well as my own crew has allowed 

me some extra spare time with my family, and I 

have made the most of every moment. The first of May 

it is once again time to wave goodbye to the family and 

continue the race towards Boston. The long leg will 

probably be tactically demanding, painfully hot and of 

any shape and form when it comes to winds. Our sailing 

guard robe is in the best shape for the whole fleet, 

we even have one middle wind spinnaker sail, which 

now will come in use. I believe that Team SAIC La Jolla 

still hasn’t said it’s last words and our progressive grip 

will hopefully be continued already in the next, fifth 

leg! 

With best regards from sunny Cape Town, 

Eero Lehtinen 

Skipper, SAIC La Jolla 

The results from the fourth leg: 

1. Spirit of Sark / sailed time 37 days, 9 hours, 

24 minutes 

2. BP Explorer / 37 days, 10 hours, 13 

minutes 

3. Team Stelmar / 37 days, 10 hours, 52 

minutes 



... 


The standing in the whole race after four sailed 

legs: 


2. Spirit of Sark 48 points 

3. BG Spirit 46 points 


The fifth leg, Cape Town-Boston, of the yacht race will 

start 1 May. The leg is estimated to take about five 

weeks. After that two legs remain in the race: Boston-La 

Rochelle and La Rochelle-Portsmouth. The yacht race is 

estimated to end 16 or 17 July. 

15

”At least we are hungry enough for the remaining two legs!” 


2004-05 yacht race around the world with 

Eero Lehtinen as skipper, is after five sailed legs in 

a good position for the placement in the whole 

race. The crew is fourth facing the remaining 

two legs. The crew arrived fourth after the latest 

leg as well, following several occasions in 

the leading position. The tactical decisions in 

the final straight weren’t the best though and 

three yachts managed to run off. Interpersona 

operates as adviser to SAIC La Jolla and Eero 

Lehtinen in challenges with coaching, leadership 

and strengthening of team spirit. 


Newsletter: 

For me the stop in Cape Town was like the fulfillment 

of wishes. Most of the time I spent together with 

my wife Tonya and our children (Alex 10, Edu 9 and 

Hanna 5), I met friends and family friends, lived at home 

and mostly stayed away from the yacht. My employer, 

colleagues (other skippers) as well as my crew had all 

in a good spirit of solidarity promised me a couple of 

weeks extra break. I hadn’t seen my family since last 

September and therefore this felt great. Time ran far 

too fast, though, and a bittersweet farewell faced us the 

first of May. Our middle child Edu wasn’t able to stop 

shedding his tears when it was time for the goodbye 

hugs. It was only an exceptional dose of adrenalin that 

saved me from the same phenomenon and I managed 

to keep my poker face through the entire hectic day. 

The day of departure was cloudy and there was 

no wind at all in the beginning. In the time of sailing 

the yachts were sailing with a speed of one knot and 

the balancing was interesting as the favorable current 

pushed yachts almost out of control over the line. Italian 

skipper Amedeo Sorrentino’s gamble failed and 

the yacht crossed the line about one second before 

the starting shot. We staid safely on the line but had 

to hold back until the last seconds and the yacht was 

fairly crosswise when the starting shot was heard. The 

second skipper John Wilkinson was at the helm and I 

was trying to watch the competitors and the rising of 

the winds in order to find the best sailing route. Only a 

couple minutes after we sailed off the wind started to 

wake up and we were on the more favorable side of 

the line. The ones who left from the yacht end were all 

still in the calm, while a group of four yachts - Samsung, 

SAIC La Jolla with skipper Eero Lehtinen is well positioned 

when two legs of Global Challenge remain: the crew is 

fourth with good potential for a medal. 

Stelmar, SAIC La Jolla and Spirit of Sark – shot ahead 

and towards the first turn sign at the shore of Cape 

Town. La Jolla was third to round the sign and headed 

towards famous Robben Island, being the first to lift its 

screaming orange spinnaker. A better route choice and 

good maneuvers speeded up La Jolla to a good rhythm 

and we left Table Mountain behind us as the yacht took 

the first position when the first night fell on. 

A broken sail 

The first night was full of action as the wind rose to 

15m/s when the fleet was bunched together. We had 

7 boats in our wake within a few miles, the hard wind 

spinnakers were beginning to be too much in the small 

hours and the crew had to work hard changing sails 

and trimming. The helmsmen got aching shoulders 

already in the very beginning and the speed was wild. 

Tough ocean conditions create stress and make leadership 

really challenging. 



16

Our spinnaker of 2.2 ounce ripped itself of the sheet. 

Before we managed to get the sail beating in the rising 

wind under control and lowered, the metallic edge had 

beaten a hole the size of a fist in the middle of the mainsail. 

The hole didn’t show any signs of growing larger 

and we waited for the day to dawn and the weather 

to stabilize before we started fixing the sail. The repair 

project was done in two stages, first we only taped one 

side and a few days later, when we for the first time had 

jibed to another tack, we could patch the sail from the 

other side as well. These operations were sufficient for 

the entire leg and the mainsail functioned perfectly. 

Brisk fair winds kept up our speed almost nonstop 

for the first three weeks and the spinnakers were in 

The sextant is not a key instrument for modern circumnavigations—but 

on the other hand: its place is not at a 

museum! 

hard use. The journey went in record time and the organizers 

of the race were becoming concerned that we 

would arrive far too early! There was no need to worry 

though; the remaining third was really difficult sailing 

in extremely light and unpredictable wind conditions. 

La Jolla persistently clung to the top group and when 

two thirds of the distance was behind us we had led the 

group almost half of the time. We had other reasons to 

celebrate as well, we celebrated five birthdays, crossing 

the equator, returning to the northern hemisphere and 

cutting our own route (from the first leg), which sealed 

the sailing around the world already on this leg. Our 

Minister of Culture Greig Taylor was prepared for all the 

parties with due serving and therefore we had enough 

delightful moments during the trip. 

Risk taking took us to the lead 

It is good, healthy and rewarding to have fun during a tough 

contest. 

The race was exiting and really tight, halfway we were 

leading BG Spirit with a margin of 14 sea miles, the 

largest distance between the first and the second yacht 

until then! Tactically we chose the more risky western 

route for the first week, a decision that worked marvelously 

and we kept the leading position for most of the 

time. The fleet broke a lot of sails in the hard winds of 

the second week; we managed to keep our positioning 

and had good contests between two yachts, among 

others with BP Explorer and Spirit of Sark. Closer to the 

equator we sailed with the spinnaker a pitch-dark night 

and a hard tropical squall surprised us. Even though we 

managed to keep the yacht under control for a long 

time we finally got into a fatal broach. The sail was 

badly torn and a couple of fellows got nasty burns in 

their feet and hands when we fought to take down the 

sail that was torn up in the hard wind. Finally we got the 

shreds in the yacht and our yacht’s doctor Karen Jones 

took care of the injuries. Everybody was in working 

order and the wounds healed delightfully rapidly. 

We crossed the equator as third crew and the doldrums, 

which frightened us and treated us cruelly during 

the first leg, went easy on us this time. We sailed our 

eastern route faster than the others to the north-eastern 

passages and took the leading position once again 

during this leg. We thought that we had overcome the 

worst obstacles and imagined that we were fighting for 

leg victory by sailing sensibly and without risk taking. It 

didn’t work that way. One high pressure after the other 

appeared from the west, causing us painful moments. 

The temperature was burning hot and the winds fell 



17

silent for several hours. We had to reef the mainsail in 

order to get even a little bit of air in the spinnaker. It was 

nerve-racking; every now and then we floated with the 

currents further away from Boston. We even thought of 

heading north so that we could round the area of enormously 

high pressure. The route choice was a clear risk, 

but it also included the possibility to settle the game 

already a couple thousand miles before the goal line. 

24 hours later the weather forecast seemed considerably 

more promising and we cancelled our radical 

route choice and headed back towards the main 

group. Already the next day the forecast became worse 

again and BG Spirit on the second place 15 sea miles 

behind us headed north. Once again we thought over 

our route choice, but decided to stay between the main 

The Global Challenge race is extremely even. Crew skills, 

attitudes and processes make a difference when all 12 

participating yachts are identical. 

group and the goal, which we saw as the option with 

fewer risks. And here the victory of the leg was sealed, 

unfortunately in benefit of BG Spirit. The end of the 

leg was tough. The yachts we left 100-150 sea miles 

behind us gained in the distance, and before we knew 

it we were fighting for the positions 2-9, while BG Spirit 

was increasing its lead to more than 300 sea miles. One 

windless evening our navigation got blocked and we 

noted something orange around the helm. Greig Taylor 

dived under the yacht and released several meters of 

nylon line between the helm and the skeg. In some 

peculiar way our helm was entangled by a fish or a 

lobster net that had floated out on the open sea. 

The fourth place was a disappointment 

We held the places 5-7 in between, but soon managed 

to rise back to the second position in the beginning of 

the last week. Then it was Vaio’s and Barclay’s turn to 

play us a trick. One chose the more radical southern 

route and the other headed sharply north when yet 

another high pressure moved towards us from the west. 

Both succeeded better along the happy mean and we 

fell down to the fourth place, from which we weren’t 

able to rise any higher. 

During the last days the weather conditions became 

colder and we sailed in a cold fog for hours. Crossing 

the Gulf Stream was an interesting and challenging 

exercise tactically, we succeeded better than the yachts 

nearby and increased the distance to the group of three 

yachts (BP Explorer, Imagine it Done and Spirit of Sark) 

lurking behind us. We gathered valuable information on 

the behavior of the Gulf Stream and the big whirl streams 

around it. These phenomena normally remain in 

the same waters for long periods and therefore we can 

make use of our experiences when we will be sailing 

from Boston to La Rochelle a couple of weeks later. Closer 

to Boston we sailed through enormous whale flocks 

and caused a headache for at least one of them, as we 

bumped into a lump dozing in the surface water. 

We arrived at the goal in Boston early in the morning 

the first Monday in June. To meet us was an abundant 

crowd consisting of family members and friends 

of the crew. The entire Barclays’ crew as well as the 

skipper of BG Spirit Andy Forbes met us in good festive 

spirits. Boston’s own son Larry Deshler was at the helm 

during the last hour and he steered us over the goal 

line. Tears fell down on Larry’s cheeks, as landscapes 

familiar to him already in his childhood rose in front 

of us. Unfortunately the main feeling among our crew 

was disappointment. We were painfully aware that we 

had a great opportunity 

to a much better result. At 

least we remained hungry 

enough for the two remaining 

legs! 

In about a month the 

race is going to end. Still 

I would already at this 

point want to thank the 

entire Interpersona team 

A whale observed by the 

SAIC La Jolla crew at the 

Atlantic Ocean. 

and specially Mats. For 

me our co-operation has 

been very useful and 



18

instructive and it has given the entire project a new 

dimension. This has helped us as a team and me as its 

leader to achieve better results at sea as well as inside 

the organization. We are the only yacht in the entire 

fleet, which is still continuing the race with the original 

crew. And even though the away-staying unfortunately 

often has been due to injuries and problems external to 

the yacht race, I believe that our stake on the well-fare 

of the team and a continuous development has helped 

our coherence and high team morals. It is also a fact 

that it’s easier for a satisfied team to focus on the right 

things and accidents don’t occur so easily. Interpersona 

is without doubt a key factor for the well-fare and success 

on sea of Team SAIC La Jolla. 

Eero Lehtinen 


The results from the fifth leg: 

1. BG Spirit / sailed time 34 days, 24 

minutes 

2. Barclays Adventurer / 35 days, 14 hours, 

24 minutes 

3. Vaio / 35 days, 17 hours, 21 minutes 

4. SAIC La Jolla / 35 days, 20 hours, 57 

minutes 

The standing in the whole race before the last 

two legs: 

1. BG Spirit 61 points 

2. Spirit of Sark 58 points 

3. BG Explorer 58 points 


The 12 crews participating in the yacht race sailed off 

on their sixth leg Boston – La Rochelle on 19 June. The 

leg is estimated to take a couple of weeks. The starting 

shot for the last leg La Rochelle – Portsmouth will be 

shot on 13 July and the leg is estimated to three-four 

days. 



19

Eero Lehtinen’s report from SAIC La Jolla’s last two legs in the Global Challenge: 

In the middle of July the Global Challenge 

2004-05 yacht race around the world finished 

at the final harbor in Portsmouth in England. 

In the hard struggle between twelve identical 

yachts SAIC La Jolla with skipper Eero Lehtinen 

took the fifth placing in the whole race. As such 

the placing was a small disappointment for the 

crew but in all the spirit was high, though: during 

the race of nearly ten months the crew had 

no drop outs due to internal problems or injuries. 

During the entire race Interpersona has 

operated as adviser to SAIC La Jolla and Eero 

Lehtinen in challenges with coaching, leadership 


Leg 6: Boston - La Rochelle, 3000 sea miles 

We started from Boston right beneath the windows of 

Boston Harbour Hotel, the traffic in the narrow dock 

was busy as usual on Sundays and the wind was of 

course weak and blew in various directions. The start 

line was so aslant from the wind that it wasn’t possible 

to cross the line with the starboard tack. Therefore all 

the yachts hankered after the ”starting square” from 

the left and windy side. Just a couple of minutes before 

sailing we tacked really close to the line at the side of 

the judge boats and headed towards the buoy side with 

starboard. Thus a couple of yachts had to give way and 

we managed to reach the place we aimed for. Finally, 

after the last tack, our acceleration towards the line 

came too late and we didn’t reach the free wind but 

remained in the backwind of BP Explorer and Samsung. 

Before them there was Stelmar too, which had made a 

false start. We were fourth to cross the line, but weren’t 

able to speed up properly in the disturbed winds. When 

we also had to tack several times as the wind switched 

direction completely we lost even more due to the bigger 

foresail. We had as only yacht started with genoa, 

which in fact was the right sail for the strong wind, but 

slow and clumsy in the numerous turns in the narrow 

canals. Not until we arrived outer on the sea the genoa 

started to give results and in the ever lightening wind 

we rose from the tenth position to a narrow lead, having 

sailed delightfully through the entire fleet. 

During the first night the wind was light and unstable, 

the spinnakers rose before morning and we were nicely 

in the leading group. In the small hours we had to make 

a big decision whether to take the southern route and 

seek more force from the Gulf Stream and the possibly 

Interpersona Newsletter 5/2005 

”We didn’t win a medal but are happy and proud of our achievement” 

The struggle for the lead was hard – in the end SAIC La 

Jolla took the fifth placing in the race. 

better winds that seemed to be arriving from the south 

a couple of days later. All the others headed to the 

more conservative, northern and straighter route. We 

took the risk and headed south. 

First place turned into last place 

In the short term we couldn’t expect but defeats from 

our lonely choice of route and that was also the case. 

The nerves of everyone was put on a test as the good 

positioning of the first night rapidly changed into a 

jumbo placement and the distance to the rest of the 

group only grew bigger. Finally a couple of days later 

we started to see the light in the end of the tunnel. 

We got new winds from south and sat in a favorable 

current of almost two knots in the whirls near the Gulf 

Stream. First we rose from the twelfth position to the 

seventh and already during the following six hours to 

the lead. Finally we increased the lead to almost 50 sea 

miles and everything seemed to be going really ideally. 

The risky part of our tactics was planned to end at 

Waypoint Charlie, towards which everybody directed 

their bow for the first little less than 1000 miles. From 

there onwards it was obvious that the northern route 

would be faster and more secure, we wanted to assure 

our victory at this point and stay between the ones 

behind and La Rochelle, defending our lead. But the 

winds chose otherwise. 



20

Eero Lehtinen’s role as skipper 

and team leader on SAIC La Jolla 

was especially praised among 

the crew. 

The direction from Charlie to La Rochelle was a large 

circled route of 66 degrees and we hoped to be able 

to take a course of about 55 degrees. But the angles of 

favorable winds offered us an angle of 70-75 degrees 

or alternatively with the port tack an almost northern 

direction. On the course which took us farther south 

our speed per mile was 9-10 knots, with the other tack 

4-5 knots. It was an easy decision, we continued farther 

south – ”the wind will change and the ones following 

will face the same problem…” But they didn’t. The rest 

of the group, which rounded Charlie five hours after us, 

was in different wind conditions able to sail precisely 

on the course of 55 degrees that we wished to take 

and the distance between us began to grow rapidly on 

the northern-southern axis. After we had drifted farther 

south the wind started to weaken for us, but in the north 

the wind was still blowing nicely. To our salvation we 

once again found the Gulf Stream which leveled down 

the speed differences, until the stream a couple of days 

later started to turn more to the south and the benefit 

we gained from it therefore dwindled away. The wind 

didn’t at any point give us even a reasonable chance to 

jib to north to ”count our money”. The situation started 

to seem more insecure and our lead began to diminish 

for each report. We could only wish that we at some 

point would get better winds and could improve our 

positioning again. 

Dolphins, whales, sharks and tunas 

After halfway Stelmar took the lead from us for the 

first time, in between we took it back but then our 

constant slide towards worse placements began. At 

this point our slightly depressing course was lightened 

up by the continuous visits by dolphins and whales. 

We also saw very closely a couple of big sharks and 

some chases really full of action, where big tunas and 

dolphins jumped wildly along the surface water. Twice 

we sailed closely beside a big whale; a collision in a 

speed of ten knots could have caused a light headache 

for both parts… During the last days we continuously 

lost more and a days sailing from the goal I could affirm 

that we had realistic possibilities to beat only one, 

maybe two yachts. 

Weak winds made the journey more difficult. 

Even though one must never give up in sailing 

before the goal line is crossed I decided to say a few 

preparatory words to the whole bunch, when we still 

had 225 sea miles to go. I told them frankly how disappointed 

and displeased I was of what happened and 

the entire situation. Contemporarily I praised the persistent 

effort from the crew; the yacht had never been 

sailed as well and hard as during this leg. In my opinion 

we were close to perfection regarding handling of 

the yacht, trimming and keeping up the speed. At the 

same time I advised everyone to take some distance 

to the entire project and look at it as a bigger entity. 

Our achievement was already as it was magnificent; 

we had kept the team united, the yacht and the people 

intact and managed through many kinds of challenges 

and problems. We had all reason to be proud of our 

common project. 

But the result from this leg was thin and the disappointment 

even thicker. We concluded the meeting 

easing our sorrow taking a pull at two bottles of whisky, 

which had been waiting for news from land during the 

entire leg – John Wilkinson was supposed to become a 

grandfather during this leg – but finally we found other 

use for the whisky. For a while we stared at the sea in 

total silence, the tears of disappointment fell irresistibly 

down on my cheeks and the same thing happened to 



21

many others. We faced the defeat together and decided 

to work through the worst disappointment before the 

end of the leg. We decided to drop all speculations, 

everybody knew that a victory on this leg would have 

lifted us to the second position and included us in the 

struggle for the victory of the whole race. It was so near 

and then so far away. 

Now it’s time to look to the future once again, to 

stake everything on our know-how and experience 

on the last leg without making further calculations on 

what impact it will have on the whole race before the 

entire job is done. Secretly we have always dreamt of 

winning the leg and what would be sweeter than winning 

the final leg. We will do our uttermost for it and 

whatever happens we will end this fight proud of our 

achievements and numerous experiences wiser. 

The results from the sixth leg 

1. Team Stelmar 

2. BG Spirit 

3. Image It. Done 

… 

11. SAIC La Jolla 

The yacht race around the world in hard conditions 

puts the crew to the test both physically and mentally. 

Leg 7: La Rochelle – Portsmouth, ca 550 sea 

miles 

The last leg of the race started at the Bay of Biscay in 

a really light easterly wind. So we sailed off into a fair 

wind in a favorable current; always an interesting exer- 

cise with a big and heavy yacht. 

In the light and torn wind we managed well to the 

first turn sign that was first rounded by Stelmar; we 

were second and Samsung was third. In the leading 

group the distances were short, but a few yachts (Spirit 

of Sark, Me To You, BP Explorer) got caught in a bad 

wind hole and were left behind pretty much already 

during the first miles. The leading group disappeared 

into a faint fog, the wind rose and the spinnakers were 

taken down as our course changed to the north and the 

wind turned. We managed to round all the signs without 

tacking, though, and thereafter the wind opened 

up for spinnaker angles again. During the first morning 

we were the first to raise the spinnaker and were able to 

slide to the top. Right behind us BG Spirit and Barclays 

Adventurer were holding the following places, only 1-2 

sea miles behind us. The other group was left further 

behind and the gap was 6-7 sea miles. BP Explorer, 

which still in France had blustered about winning the 

entire yacht race, faced the toughest destiny. By mistake 

it hadn’t rounded one sign and had to turn back when 

it was already 15 sea miles away from the compulsory 

turn sign. This meant that the dream of win finally fell 

flat and in fact the fall from the winners’ rostrum was 

closer than anybody could have expected. 

We came to Ushant Waypoint about 2 miles from 

the lead, followed by BG Spirit, Barclays and Vaio. The 

others were already behind the horizon and we were 

steadily going strong. We were only afraid that the wind 

would die out completely; otherwise we were convinced 

that we would be able to keep our competitors 

behind us. During the second night we passed Ushant’s 

shipping lanes, which we did not have the permission 

to enter. The wind died out just as we had come to 

the outer corner of the lanes and the current started 

pushing us towards the forbidden zone. As duty yacht 

of the fleet I was in contact with Ushant Traffic Control 

on the VHF and got the answer I expected: ”Race or 

no race, you have no business on the boat lanes – start 

the engine if you are not able to stay outside the lanes 

when sailing.” At the last moment we got enough wind 

to be able to steer the yacht again and we staid away 

from the boats. BG and Barclays sneaked quite behind 

us and the race was truly exciting. 

On Friday morning we were already 2.9 sea miles 

behind BG, while we sailed towards Plymouth and the 

Eddystone Rock lighthouse in an improving fair wind. 

We set as a target to catch up with BG before sunset 

and started to attack, constantly sailing slightly diffe 



22

ent angles, actively watching the spinnaker and sailing 

across the previous wind barriers with our lightest 

and largest spinnaker. We didn’t give the BG crew 

a moment’s peace and on the radar we saw that the 

distance was slowly shrinking. Half an hour before we 

rounded Eddystone we were one mile from BG, Barclays 

was little less than three miles behind us. Vaio 

had sailed a more eastern route and now got a better 

wind angle and was catching up with Barclays in a fine 

speed. We arrived at the Eddystone lighthouse with its 

dramatic appearance and stony nearby waters as the 

sun shined magnificently and the photographers’ boats 

swarmed around us. John Wilkinson navigated with 

precision, I sailed and together with Julian Colls we 

led the orchestra as we jibed really close to Eddystone 

Rock as BG tried to escape in front of us. We caught 

up with them another half a mile and started to see a 

nervous fuss on deck of the yacht. 

The wind died out and we missed the leg win 

As we approached South Devon Waypoint the wind 

suddenly changed and we jibed to BG’s inner side and 

managed to get between them and the next sign. The 

situation was nicely under our control and slowly BG 

remained further behind us. At that point I took the 

entire bunch up on deck, explained where we were 

standing and everybody saw BG on our starboard. I 

said that this was the best opportunity we have ever 

had and would ever have; a leg win was closer than 

ever. Unfortunately the wind gods weren’t on our side 

this time either, and as I woke up from my three hours 

nap after a long day, we had fallen down to the fourth 

place. John, who was almost tearful, explained to me 

that the wind suddenly died out, BG only stopped for 

a moment and then got new wind and disappeared 

into the darkening evening. Barclays and Vaio behind 

us saw what happened to us and changed their course 

slightly further out and after less than a mile they sailed 

past us. The cup had never been bitterer. 

The following morning we found a couple of proper 

currents quite near the coast and gained in on the ones 

before us. We came two miles from the leading three, 

who proceeded very slowly against the hard current 

in the Needles Channel. Vaio even ran aground quite 

close to the coast of the Hurst Castle, but managed to 

get loose before we came to the spot. The current only 

increased and we had to fight with intense concentration 

in order to get through the narrowest channel. 

Then we sailed a couple of hours more through the 

SAIC La Jolla is a 72-foot steel yacht, as are the other yachts 

participating in the Global Challenge yacht race. 

Solent and hundreds of boats, of which a significant 

part was there to welcome us and the entire Global 

Challenge flotilla. Behind us a wild competition for placing 

5-11 was held, BP was more than a hundred miles 

away. BP had invited a couple of thousand employees 

and clients, but their yacht didn’t arrive until the following 

day, as the wind died out on Saturday and David 

Melville and crew had to anchor as the others celebrated 

at Portsmouth Gunwharf. 

The fourth placing in the final leg felt as a disappointment, 

as did the fifth placing in the entire race. 

Awareness that we with our lead during the last night 

were taking the second placing in the entire race didn’t 

make the situation easier. Finally the distances between 

placing 2-5 were minimal small and we got the bitterest 

part. But after all we could see the big picture, though, 

and be happy and proud of our achievement and most 

of all of the fact that we were one of two crews, which 

didn’t have any drop outs due to internal problems or 

injuries. The entire crew participated with enthusiasm 

and as a united group until the end; during the final 

transfer fare on Tuesday 19 July we still had a boatful 

of people and were the only yacht to sail the distance 

from Portsmouth to Southampton. The following day, 

as I left of to Heathrow airport, the last members of my 

crew were still sitting on the deck of the yacht shedding 

tears and hugging each other. For many it was hard to 

face everyday life and after the moments we shared 

together it was surprisingly hard to jump of the yacht. 

From the skipper’s and ”Customer Service Manager’s” 

point of view apparently a good sign. 



23

The crew members consisted of 16 persons who participated 

in the entire race. In addition to them there were two 

so called ”leggers” on each leg. 

The results from the seventh leg: 

1. BG Spirit 

2. Barclays Adventurer 

3. VAIO 


The final results in the Global Challenge: 

1. BG Spirit 

2. Barclays Adventurer 

3. BP Explorer 



… 


Eero Lehtinen’s analysis on the entire race and the 

cooperation between him and Interpersona will be 

published in the next issue of our Newsletter (November). 

24

Column 

An efficient leadership requires engagement 

The year 2005 was rewarding in many ways. 

At Interpersona we carried out more than 50 

interesting and challenging assignments. Each 

one was different and required that we carefully 

attended to both the problems observed 

as the unexploited possibilities. In each project 

our goal was to gain tangible results and based 

on the feedback we’ve collected our clients 

also feel that our work has given them added 

value. This encourages us to even better results 

in future! 

Besides the client assignments, we sponsored Team 

SAIC La Jolla and concentrated on coaching the skipper 

Eero Lehtinen and his 18 member crew in the Global 

Challenge 2004-2005 yacht race around the world. In 

the tough race that lasted ten months leadership was 

an important success factor and one of the key fields 

of the leadership was building up a team spirit. In these 

matters we put our expertise and know-how at Eero’s 

and his team’s disposal before the race and during it. 

Thus the sponsorship consisted of work and advisory 

services. 

The results were very encouraging even though 

SAIC La Jolla’s final placement (5/12) didn’t answer 

the skipper’s expectations. Choices of sailing tactics are 

crucially important in this kind of race and on that point 

everything didn’t always hit the bull’s-eye. But from the 

point of view of leadership and team spirit everything 

went brilliantly. This is proven by the statements given 

by the entire SAIC La Jolla crew and the skippers on 

competing yachts. Also Eero Lehtinen has justly stated 

that he was successful in his role as leader. 

When I myself as his coach evaluated Eero’s activity 

and success in the leadership of a team representing 

many different nationalities, professions, cultures, 

sexes, age groups and sets of values, in physically very 

tough conditions marked by hard rivalry, I can bring up 

three very central success factors in his activity. 

Insight. From the beginning Eero Lehtinen understood 

that an efficient leadership was required to successfully 

carry out the race. You are not born a leader, 

you take the leadership. Leadership is a way for any 

human being to influence. Leadership can be seen in 

all interaction between people, in all situations and all 

relationships. You either lead or you follow. Without 

comprehending this it’s difficult to become a good leader. 

Methodically—not by chance. Leadership requires 

detailed planning, vigorous realization and scrupulous 

follow-up. Leadership isn’t always easy but you can 

prepare yourself for difficult situations and plan – and 

train – them. “Predict the coming situation” has been 

a motto in traffic training for ages and the same phrase 

can also be applied on leadership. Eero realized this 

from the very beginning. 

Persistence. A good leader doesn’t act like a weathercock 

but creates security and motivation by showing 

in which direction we’re heading. Eero believed 

in his cause and aspects of leadership were on top of 

his work priority list, every day. Leading a crew and 

improving the performance of a team is not a project 

but a part of everyday activity. This goes for a big yacht 

as well as for a normal working community. 

Project Team SAIC La Jolla was an interesting experience 

for us advisers at Interpersona, working with 

different dimensions of leadership. We believe that we 

were able to help both the yacht skipper as the entire 

crew to a good placement and a unique experience. 

For sure, we as coaches also learned a lot from the 

project that we can pass on to our clients in a way that 

benefits them. 

Wishing you a happy initiated year! 

Mats Kockberg 

Corporate Adviser 

President of INTERPERSONA 



25

Eero Lehtinen’s final summary of Global Challenge: 

”This project has taught me more than any other work experience before” 

In this report Eero Lehtinen, the Finnish skipper 

who participated in the Global Challenge 

2004-2005 yacht race around the world, sheds 

light on the entire race both in an integrated 

way as analytically analyzing. During the entire 

race Interpersona’s Mats Kockberg operated as 

adviser and coach to the SAIC La Jolla crew and 

Eero Lehtinen in challenges with leadership 


Leadership and teambuilding where top priorities when 

Team SAIC La Jolla participated in the Global Challenge. 

The entire crew is in the picture. 

Statistics: 

Portsmouth – Buenos Aires – Wellington – Sydney – 

Cape Town – Boston – La Rochelle – Portsmouth 

2.10.2004 - 16.7.2005. SAIC La Jolla sailed 32.350 

sea miles, the shortest distance among the 12 crews. 

Besides the skipper 15 basic crew members sailed in 

SAIC La Jolla’s crew. Four of them were women, 14 sailed 

the entire race, one had to quit the game in Boston 

due to backache, but he traveled on his own expense 

to the remaining harbors in order to be part of the team 

until the end! In addition to that 11 leggers sailed with 

the yacht, 5 of these were women. From Cape Town 

onwards we had the same two leggers, because they 

didn’t want to leave the boat before the race finished! 

The oldest crew member on SAIC La Jolla was 55 years 

old, the youngest 23. 

How it all began 

For me the fact that I took part in the race was greatly 

coincidental and the final decision was also hard to 

make. Actually I wasn’t that enthusiastic about the 

whole thing, but “in the absence of anything better” a 

family man had to seize the opportunity. Here there is 

reason to emphasize, that as the project proceeded my 

hunger and enthusiasm grew and now I wouldn’t give 

away the experience for any price. 

Goals and expectations 

In late April, as we launched the yachts, it was time to 

start getting acquainted with the crew and to plan the 

making of a team spirit and common goals. At an early 

point I decided that the most important goal would 

be a “happy crew”, sulking would not get us through 

the game with our honor intact. With me in this plan I 

got Interpersona and Mats Kockberg, who promised to 

defray my own communication expenses and operate 

as my personal coach and to survey the atmosphere 

in the crew before the race and after each leg. After 

weekends and discussions together with the crew we 

set up as our goal to sail the entire race with the same 

basic crew, safely and having fun; as result target we 

had a final placement among the top three and at least 

one leg win. 

The strategy and how it was carried out 

In my own mind I came to a strategy, which in the 

beginning aimed to stake on emphasizing safety, building 

self-confidence and team spirit and as the race 

proceeded to race at full stea m. I told my crew that 

we had to get to Wellington safe and sound and as a 

united crew first, from there on the race for the points 

would begin and the victory would be decided during 

the last three legs. I believed that the two tough legs 

on the Southern Ocean would take their share of the 

crews and the yachts and I stressed the difficulty coefficient 

of the points on these legs. As each leg gave the 

same points I found it most sensible to spare the yacht 

and the crew in the storms of the Southern Ocean and 

The outside circumstances where demanding at the circumnavigation 

race. 



26

The lack of wind could be nerve wrecking. 

especially stake on the legs after Cape Town, where 

the points would be given for smaller sacrifices. Injuries 

would seriously crumble the team’s moral and we 

couldn’t afford loosing sails, as new sails only were 

given with heavy penalty points. A factor in our strategy 

which I emphasized a lot was to sail a shorter route 

than the others, conservativeness was our guiding star. 

Afterwards one can state that our strategy was quite 

right. The crew who won both legs on the Southern 

Ocean didn’t arrive among the top three in the final 

results. Serious injuries ruined the race for three crews. 

Protests and penalties took their share of the results for 

three other crews. Many had sails in poor conditions 

when we arrived in Cape Town. On each leg SAIC La 

Jolla was among the three crews who had sailed the 

shortest distance and in the entire race our log had 

fewer miles than any other crew. On the toughest leg of 

the race (Sydney – Cape Town) we sailed the shortest 

distance with the slowest average speed and it brought 

us a fifth placement, satisfactory for that leg. During the 

last three legs we lead the race for the longest time by 

far, but due to many factors and a bit of bad luck we 

didn’t arrive higher than to fourth placement in any of 

these legs. Second place in the third leg (Wellington 

- Sydney) remained our best placement, half-way we 

lead four legs (1, 5, 6 and 7). 30 hours before the race 

was finished we were leading the final leg and still hanging 

on to the second place in the entire race, but as 

we fell down to fourth place in the leg in the capricious 

winds of the last night we finally ended up on the bitter 

fifth place. The differences in points, as well as in time, 

were ridiculously small in the top. 

Surprises 

One of the greatest surprises was the fabulous first leg 

of the youngest skipper of the race and the Barclays 

crew, the fact that they won it and above all their spurt, 

which raised the very sympathetic Stuart Jackson and 

his crew from the estimated weaker end to the second 

place in the entire race. The level of the race and 

the small differences on each leg were surprises for me 

personally. The weather conditions were unpredictable 

and in many parts of the world the so called prevailing 

circumstances were conspicuous by their absence. 

The sailing qualities of the Challenge 72 yachts were 

absolutely a positive surprise despite their majestic 

weight (when empty 43 ton). I also expected much 

more difficulties with internal conflicts in the crew. My 

own precautions, the entry of Interpersona and attending 

to the matter carefully from the first minutes ahead 

evidentially gave the desired result and so I dealt with 

that quite easily. 

Disappointments and ordeals 

The crew of 18 people were both men and women in different 

ages and of different nationalities 

The final result was of course a great disappointment. 

We definitely had every chance of succeeding better, 

even of winning the race. Particularly bitter experiences 

were loosing the leading position in the first leg in the 

capricious winds of the equator as well as loosing the 

first place in the final halves of the last three legs. The 

last day of the race was wormwood to us. During the 

last night we had lost our leading position in a local 

wind hole and the top three that sailed pass us less than 

a sea mile from us were within sight until the goal line. 

As we waited for the festive escorting to the Gunwharf 

harbor I had to build up all my strength in order to be 

able to say at least a few words of encouragement. The 

crew listened in silence, we took a pull at a bottle of 

brandy we found in the navigator’s bag and decided 

to arrive as a happy and positive team in front of our 

supporters, families and friends. And so we did. 



27

Among the toughest experiences by far was the separation 

from my family. At sea time passed by better, racing 

and sailing constantly gave me something to think 

about and there wasn’t that much time over for missing 

them. Life was more difficult on land, especially when 

families and friends of the crews arrived at the harbors 

in vast crowds. Our medic fell sick during the second 

leg and taking care of her in rough seas in the middle of 

the Southern Ocean was quite an exercise as well. Giving 

injections to oranges and rubber arms in classroom 

is quite easy after all, compared to taking care of a living 

human being. It required quite a few attempts and 

useless holes in the arm of poor Karen before we could 

start the intravenous antibiotic treatment, when doctor 

(Menge-) Lehtinen got into full action. As result we 

had a patient who resembled a Dalmatian but luckily 

the patient recovered as well, and so only a couple of 

days after we arrived at Wellington Karen in her familiar 

way appeared as first conductor in the yacht club bar... 

When I became ill myself (the surgery I underwent 

before the race didn’t keep the old trouble away) in the 

fourth leg was a really tough ordeal, the circumstances 

couldn’t have been worse and being a convalescent 

for almost three weeks in the storms of the Southern 

Ocean was not the most flattering experience. On the 

other hand even this struggle had its positive side – the 

crew had to manage on deck on their own and a more 

efficient team exercise is hard to find! 

Highlights 

Eero Lehtinen was a 

respected skipper, says the 

crew feedback 

For my own part arriving in Cape Town in April was 

the absolute highlight. As we approached the goal line 

of the fourth leg my children’s shouts in the darkening 

night in Cape Town with the festive atmosphere of illuminated 

Table Mountain was an unforgettable experience. 

When I finally had all three of them in my arms 

and Tonya next to me, I was certainly the luckiest man 

in the world. Other highlights were surely arriving in 

Sydney and the second place after a tough fight. Leaving 

Cape Town was besides sad also very impressive, 

we were leading the fleet in the increasing wind pass 

Robben Island and a great spinnaker sailing of three 

weeks had begun. We held top placements the whole 

time and the feeling in the yacht was great. The stop in 

Wellington was also unforgettable. The always friendly 

Kiwis did everything exactly right, they took wonderfully 

good care of us and I got lifetime friends from my 

host couple (volunteers from the local yacht club, who 

lodged me in their house). Kenneth Peränen and his 

son Jope with girlfriend Susa flew there from Finland 

and we spent two splendid weeks traveling around the 

South Island. New Zealand is a magnificent country, 

even if a bit far a way... 

What we learned 

During the Global Challenge the participants sailed 

around the world in the wrong direction. Westwards. 

This project has taught me more than any work experience 

before in my life. It has taught me human relations, 

leadership, project planning, sailing technique, 

navigation, meteorology, different cultures and above 

all I have learned very many new things about myself. 

After this experience I believe and hope that I will find 

it easier to put things in order of importance in my 

own life, that I can appreciate the things that are truly 

unique and important. I know myself better; I know 

my limits and can share the responsibility before I get 

crushed under the pressure. Knowledge of human relations 

skills will surely be of use various times in different 

occasions. 



28

Personal relationships 

Maybe the most valuable thing that this experience has 

brought is the numerous personal relationships. My 

own crew, skipper colleagues, technical support groups, 

some of the sponsors and the friendly and helpful supporters 

we met along the way will surely be seen and 

heard in my life in many ways. Before we started the 

race I told my crew that I want to receive a Christmas 

card from as many of them as possible still five years 

after the race. Judging from the SMS, email and phone 

traffic of the moment there are good chances for this. In 

South America, New Zealand, Australia, USA, Ireland, 

Holland and Great Britain I can find useful and friendly 

contacts any time. I’d believe that also Cape Town will 

have its fair share of visitors in the next years. 

Powers behind the scene 

The teamwork between 

the crew has to function 

without problems 

Except for my own share the realization of this project 

has greatly depended on backers so great in number, 

and among them one rises above the other. My wife 

Tonya was the one to convince me to take part of the 

whole thing. She has also been the one to have a decisive 

and positive grip on the hustle and bustle of the 

day. Never did I get a cold reception when I called from 

all over the world; when I complained that I missed 

them she has always seen the positive side in the situation 

and encouraged me to continue fighting. Alex, 

Edu and Hanna have bravely been part of the project 

as well, always eagerly telling me the news of the day 

on the phone and in Cape Town proudly assisting the 

maintenance work of the yacht. 

Of the rest of the supporters I could write a list as long 

as a newspaper, but on the Finnish side Interpersona’s 

Mats Kockberg and Suunto have of course played their 

important part. Suunto’s dry suites functioned marvelously 

and as a good expression of our valuable colla- 

boration was the dry suites we sent on service from 

New Zealand. They were returned to Sydney on time 

before the second long and tough leg in the waves of 

the Southern Ocean. Fiskars’ and Gerber’s knives, scissors, 

sheath knives, flashlights and multi-tools made our 

lives easier in many ways and our competitors green 

with envy. We had to take both Suunto’s dry suites as 

Fiskars’/Gerber’s products onboard on top of all the 

equipment given by the race organizer, but we didn’t 

hesitate or regret it for a moment – a tough job requires 

proper tools! 

For the crew the circumnavigation race meant an unforgettable 

adventure and a unique experience—but everyone 

also learned a lot of new and useful matters for the 

future. 

The feelings afterwards and what I would do 

differently... 

During the last crew dinner together in Portsmouth I 

could sense that the goal of a ”happy crew” had succeeded 

brilliantly. Also when we transferred the yachts 

to their home harbor in Southampton we caused raised 

brows on the other yachts, when we left Portsmouth 

with a full yacht (the other yachts picked up transferors 

along the wharves as the majority of the crews disappeared 

already in Portsmouth). And we were the only 

yacht to set sail and once more enjoyed a speed over 

ten knots in a proper side wind through the Solent. 

Finally I had to leave the yacht before I got the last 

members of the crew to take their bags on shore; otherwise 

I would have missed my flight to Helsinki on 

my way to the six meter World Cup in Sandhamn. The 

hugging and weeping continued through the last night, 

it seemed very hard to face everyday life again. 

What would I do differently then, if I would have the 

opportunity (lucky enough the skippers cannot longer 



29

participate in this race more than once)? - Probably 

nothing really, maybe it would be easier to sail the yacht 

faster already on the first legs the second time, but our 

conservative strategy seemed to work quite well. Perhaps 

slightly braver route choices would have brought 

better results on some legs, but this is the famous hindsight 

talking. A sponsor with a bit more enthusiasm for 

the project would also have been welcome, last time 

I heard from them was in Boston! It’s good to have 

an efficient coordinator and a Jack-of-all-trades of the 

crew on land – I should definitely have been allowed 

to influence on the choice of person. Now a person, 

of whose presence we had no actual gain or pleasure, 

followed us around the world. Paying for weather 

reports was quite useless, as we didn’t get any extern 

help during the race. The benefit of long term statistics 

and forecasts for a few days after the start was almost 

nonexistent. That money should have been spent on a 

few good crew parties or a couple of extra nights in a 

nice hotel! 

Eero Lehtinen 

Cape Town, November 2005 



30

Core Crew 

Eero Lehtinen 

(Skipper) 

Race Skipper 

Finland 

Julian Colls 

Pre Sales Consultant 

UK 

Alina Frost 

Employee 

Communications Manager 

UK 

Karen Jones 

Paramedic 

UK 

Jeremy Message 

Group Facilities Manager 

UK 

Geoff Allen 

Student 

Canada 

Larry Deshler 

Retired 



US 

Sarah Hooker 

IT Trainer 

UK 

David Laws 

Accountant 

UK 

Vince Nevel 

Managing Director 

England 

31

Core Crew 

Anne Phillipson 

Self-employed IT Training 

and Change Mgt Consultant 

Holland 

Jim Walker 

Satellite Communications 

Engineer 

Ireland 

John Wilkinson 

Civil Engineer 

UK 

Leggers 

Andrew Watson 

Optometrist/Partner 

UK 

David Lewis 

Supplier Relationship 

Manager 

UK 

Greig Taylor 

Chartered Accountant 



UK 

Mike Wallace 

IT/telecomm lawyer 

US 

Steve Wotton 

Financial Analyst and 

Accountant 

Scotland, UK 

Sam Howe 

Project Manager 

Switzerland 

Dominic Falvey 

Utilities Technician 

Ireland 

32

Leggers 

Annie Norris 

Customs and Excise 

Officer 

England 

MJ Moran Sr. 

Real Estate Attorney 

Tim Perree 

SAIC Systems Engineer 

Richard Tuckwell 

Owner of small construction 

company 

Gloucestershire 

Jane Smith 

Licensee 



UK 

Jeff McCooey 

Environmental Analys 

Helen Sugden 

Advertising Agency 

Director 

Belfast 

33

About the race, racing schedule & route 

The 2004/05 Global Challenge is the fourth ocean boat 

race of its kind to be run. The first one was the British 

Steel Challenge in 1992, followed at four yearly intervals 

by the BT Global Challenge. The Global Challenge 

2004/05 race will cover over 30,000 nautical miles, 

150 days at sea, 50-foot waves and winds over 70 miles 

per hour - conditions that truly make the Global Challenge 

the challenge of a lifetime. 

On Sunday, October 3, 2004, 12 identical 72ft 

ocean racing yachts set sail from Portsmouth in the UK. 

Each yacht has a crew of seventeen ordinary men and 

women drawn from a variety of different backgrounds, 

ages and abilities. Led by a professional skipper, they 

have one common objective, to achieve something 

extraordinary and to win the prestigious Princess Royal 

Trophy on their return. 

The race will take them around the world the wrong 

way, against the prevailing winds and currents, stopping 

in Buenos Aires, Wellington, Sydney, Cape Town, 

Boston and La Rochelle before returning to Portsmouth 

in the UK to a heroes welcome some 10 months later. 

Conditions will range from the unpredictable calms of 

the doldrums to the immense seas of the southern oceans, 

where the crews will encounter icebergs and gale 

force winds. 

The event itself is a multifaceted experience with a 

large business community both sponsoring and supporting 

the race - over 120 organizations can participate 

in the event through a variety of sponsorship 

and partnerships. A global audience of spectators will 

also be supporting the race, visiting the ports of call, 

following the event on the race web site and through 

coverage in the world’s media. 

The Race Schedule 

Racing Schedule & Route 

The fleet left the UK on October 3, 2004, to race across 

the Equator to Buenos Aires in South America. 

From here, the boats set sail for the infamous 

Cape Horn, encountering the winds and waves of the 

Roaring Forties as they push on to the next port of call, 

Wellington in New Zealand. This is the longest stopover 

on the race, as the yachts are taken out of the water, 

repaired and prepared for the second part of the Southern 

Ocean. 

Leg 4 is a sprint to Sydney, Australia. The fleet will 

then enter the Southern Ocean once more heading for 

the Cape of Good Hope and Cape Town. 

The crews will then head across the Atlantic on the 

longest leg to Boston in the US. After the stopover, they 

will depart for the UK, with a short stop in La Rochelle, 

France, to complete their 30,000-mile journey, arriving 

back in the UK in the summer of 2005. 

Leg From To Days at SeaBetween 

Miles Leg Start Dates 

1 Portsmouth Buenos Aires 31-35 6,200 3 Oct 2004 

2 Buenos Aires Wellington 36-41 6,100 28 Nov 2004 

3 Wellington Sydney 7 1,250 6 Feb 2005 

4 Sydney Cape Town 35-41 6,200 27 Feb 2005 

5 Cape Town Boston 34-38 6,775 1 May 2005 

6 Boston Northern Europe 13-17 3,000 19 June 2005 

7 La Rochelle Portsmouth 4 420 13 July 2005 

Finish Date 17 July 2005 



34

The Saic La Jolla 

The SAIC boat is one of twelve identical sail boats 72ft long, 18ft wide, has a draft of 10ft (from waterline to the bottom 

of the 12-ton keel), a 90ft high mast, and weighs approximately 43 tons. It is made out of steel. Ten of these boats were 

made in the Devonport Dockyard in Plymouth, England, and the other two were built in China. 

Crash bulkhead There is about 6 feet of bow behind this watertight crash bulkhead, just in case of accidents. 

Sail Locker Holds a complete wardrobe of sails - all of which are enormous! That’s three Yankees, Staysail, 

Genoa, three spinnakers, storm staysail and tri-sail. As well as two anchors and their associated 

chain and warp. (Here’s hoping we don’t have to use them.) 

Sail Areas Sq Feet 

Mainsail 1,206 

Spinnaker 3,723 

Fore Sails 1,195 

Heads There are two heads (that’s toilets to you land lubbers). Each is a combined, toilet, shower and 

washing facility. 

Mid Cabins Holds a complete wardrobe of sails - all of which are enormous! That’s three Yankees, Staysail, 

Genoa, three spinnakers, storm staysail and tri-sail. As well as two anchors and their associated 

chain and warp. (Here’s hoping we don’t have to use them.) 

Galley With 18 hungry people to feed, the galley is well equipped with a five-burner gimballed hob 

(that means it tilts level as the boat heels over), a small oven, two sinks and lots of storage 

space. Notable items missing: refrigeration, microwave, dishwasher, washing machine and 

tumble dryer! 

Saloon On the other side of the galley is the saloon, which is an area of comfortable bench seats 

around a table. This area is also home to the stereo system (the main source of entertainment). 

The table can double as an operating table, if required. 

Nav Area This is the area just down the steps from the deck. It’s home to the Navigation Station, where all 

the instruments, communications and charts are kept. Basically, it is the Skipper’s office. 

In this area is also the “foulie locker,” where all the waterproof clothing and the water maker are 

stored. 

Perämajoitus The back of the boat from the companionway steps aft is filled with 14 bunks, with space for 

14 yellow storage boxes and lots of other storage for spares etc. 



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1 SAIC LA JOLLA STORY from Interpersona ... - Interpersona Oy

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