On January 3, 2010, Katie Spotz embarked on what is sure to be an amazing adventure. The endurance athlete and clean water activist is attempting a solo row across the Atlantic Ocean. She just shoved off from Senegal in her one-woman rowboat, prepared to cruise 2,500 miles over nearly 100 days alone at sea. Spotz hopes to set shore in Guyana in South America later this spring. She will not see another human being for her entire three months at sea.
If she succeeds, Spotz will, at 22, become the youngest person and the first American to cross an ocean in a rowboat. She will also have raised enough funds to secure fresh water for at least 1,000 people in developing nations.
When she's not out to sea, Spotz works for a nonprofit group in Cleveland, so she knows her way around charity work. Her trip seeks to raise $30,000 for Blue Planet Run, a group that partners with endurance athletes and non-governmental organizations to fund and implement clean water projects around the world.
Rowing across oceans is the new "it" ultra-endurance challenge. The New York Times likens it to climbing Mount Everest, and since 2000, 109 rowboats have succeeded in the crossing. Of course, many athletes have failed due to health, technical, or weather problems. Spotz joins this elite athletic club as an unlikely contender: She was the slow kid on her high school swim team and has only been rowing for two years.
But when it comes to endurance athletics, Spotz seems to have found her stride. She has run numerous marathons and ultra-marathons, and she even cycled across the United States. About a year ago, Spotz swam the entire length of the Allegheny River to raise awareness about the global problem of access to clean drinking water. After her river swim, she told the Times, "Once I finished one challenge, I realized maybe I could do something even bigger."
Motivated and consumed by her cause of fresh water for all, Spotz views her athletic endeavors as meditative acts. Believing the challenge to be as much a mental one as a physical one, Spotz works with a sports psychologist as part of her training.
During the Atlantic crossing, she'll consume 5,000 calories a day, so Spotz will pack lightweight, high-energy foods like trail mix, beef jerky, and energy bars to sustain herself. This goes into the hull of the 440-pound boat, meaning Spotz will be propelling about 1,000 pounds. Spotz will have water as ballast, a cabin to duck into for sleeping, and an anchor to use when fighting strong headwinds.
The Times reports: "In the small but growing sport of ocean rowing, even the smallest sail is considered cheating." Thus, Spotz will row without even a tarp to block the sun, "lest she be tempted to use it to catch the wind." Instead, she'll lug solar-powered electronics like a water desalination machine, a GPS unit, radios, a satellite phone (to text and update her Twitter feed), and a laptop to update her blog. Google Earth will update her website with her location every 20 minutes. Thanks to her satellite phone, she can conduct media interviews while resting along her daily, 30-mile rowing stretches.
(Photo: David Andersen)
(Photo: David Andersen)
(Photo: Lucian Bartosik)
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