As Paul Ridley ’05 flies from New York City to the Canary Islands today (Dec. 10), he will be looking down on the ocean that he’ll be rowing across in a solo transatlantic expedition that ends in Antigua.
On Dec. 20 Ridley will embark on the 2,950-mile journey in the hopes of raising more than $500,000 to fight cancer through Row for Hope, a nonprofit organization dedicated to his mom, who passed away in 2001 from malignant melanoma.
If successful, the 25-year-old will be the youngest American to row across any ocean solo and unsupported (with no chase boat or means of re-supply).
Ridley’s custom-made 19-foot boat, Liv (“life” in Norwegian), has two watertight cabins: he will sleep in the aft cabin and store supplies in the fore cabin, including enough dehydrated food for his 8,000-calorie-per-day diet.
Solar power will provide energy for his electric water desalinator, GPS, and other equipment.
During breaks from the 10 to 12 hours of daily rowing, Ridley will touch base with land by checking e-mail on his laptop, calling his team and the media via satellite phone, and blogging on www.rowforhope.com. The website will also show his position on the water, updated several times a day from the boat’s tracking beacon.
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| Paul Ridley ’05 sits in the boat he will use for his solo transatlantic expedition to raise money for cancer research. The 19-foot boat has two watertight cabins for sleeping and storage. |
To stave off boredom, he is bringing a 160-gigabyte iPod full of music and books on tape — everything from Into the Wild to Chaucer.
Ridley admitted that the biggest challenge will be mental. To prepare, he’s spoken to numerous ocean rowers, consulted a sports psychologist, and practiced yoga.
“I’m doing what I can, but a lot of it will be adjusting when I’m out there,” he said.
Ridley works for Greenwich Associates, a financial services consulting firm, based in Stamford, Conn. He was a rower at Colgate, where he majored in economics.
Although he has the potential to be only the third American to complete this row and to set a U.S. record by crossing in under 80 days, he said that setting records is not a main goal.
“The focus for me and the team at Row for Hope is to measure our success based on funds raised,” he said.
The nonprofit has partnered with Yale Cancer Center to fund cutting-edge research. This has been an important cause for Ridley and his sister because after losing their mother to cancer, their father, the Rev. Mark Ridley ’72, was diagnosed with prostate cancer and was successfully treated.
“We have two examples of very different outcomes with cancer diagnosis, and through all of this, we want to have more cases like my dad’s and fewer like my mom’s.”
Right now, though, he is focused on the task at hand.
“This is really a war of attrition — the way to make my way from one continent to another is to be in the rowing seat all day, every day. A lot of my motivation will come from knowing there are lots of people at home following what I’m doing.”
To support Ridley’s efforts and to keep track of his journey across the Atlantic, visit www.rowforhope.com.