TAKING THE FAST TRACK

Five years ago Oleg Mikhaylov had no sailing experience. Then came a life changing moment – deciding to buy a boat. And in this winter just gone Oleg topped many people’s dreams by sailing the 2023 ARC aboard his own first boat, Contest 67CS Opus Next, and doing it rather well!

It’s fair to say that at 20-metres and 14th longest in the 156-strong ARC fleet, one might expect a reasonably fast passage. Opus Next excelled, though, crossing the Atlantic’s 2,700 nautical miles from Gran Canaria to Saint Lucia in just 16 days, to finish 19th across the line, amazingly of multihulls as well as monos. Impressive, indeed, and consider in this the low 12 engine-hours, and that of the small, four crew, two were virtual novices. In conversation, at this recollection, Oleg offers a sassy smile, suggesting perhaps his own surprise as well as obvious happiness at this outcome. Yet this wasn’t the result of chance. From the moment in 2019 when the thought of boat ownership first dawned, Oleg has sailed and sailed, building the miles, the experience, the confidence, and interestingly doing this mostly alone. “When first I thought of buying a boat, I thought it would be a catamaran, for a base in Genoa away from our home in Milan. While looking I did courses and a lot of charter, always on the bigger boats, 50 to 57ft, you can’t get much bigger in those fleets, and sailed Italy, Croatia, Montenegro, France, Spain, the Caribbean. Many places, many miles. I spent a lot of time on board.”

IT HAD TO BE By the time of his first Cannes boat show, inspecting both multi and monohulls from leading yards, Oleg’s less keen on sailing wife suddenly took the lead. Finding themselves on board a Contest 72CS, admiring the interior, Elena declared, “If you are going to buy a boat, it must be this, a Contest. It’s fantastic!” “So, that was that!” laughs Oleg. Discussion led to the 67CS with Oleg taking delivery in 2021 and the voyaging as owner beginning immediately, sailing the newly named Opus Next down to the Med on her own bottom with some challenging Channel work but a smooth and easy Biscay crossing. Then turning through the Straits, it was on up towards Genoa and chosen home port, Varazze, this quaint Ligurian sea town gaining its name from the medieval term ‘Varagine’, appropriately meaning ‘a place where ships are launched’.

BUILDING THE MILES From here Oleg set off on increasingly frequent and ever longer tours of the western and central Mediterranean. Indeed, in the five years leading to the ARC, Oleg had already totalled in excess of two years aboard boat, logging close on 7,000 miles, just within the Mediterranean, and mostly sailed alone. “My wife prefers the coast in sight and the marina shorelife. Me, I like being at sea!” Oleg comments. “And this is a very easy boat to sail alone. Some ask how that can be. But it is. I started with chartering big boats, as I big as I could, but this is easier even than those 50/57footers. At sea the systems make it very simple. Marina manoeuvring was at first interesting but with the displacement and configuration she manoeuvres very easily, even in 30/35 knots of wind. And if the wind is too big, 50, well, you try not to go in!” So, what of the ARC? For this, Oleg sailed with experienced first mate and friend Ivan, his son Rost and friend Stas, these last two having minimal sea time between them. Yet it worked so well. Two-man watches were run on an unusual six-hour cycle with, when necessary, everyone on deck for the bigger exercises, night or day, but the bigger winds tended to come calling by night. “So, most days finished with taking the gennaker down,” says Oleg, “and the crossing, it was absolutely fantastic. The weather, it was very good and only the first two days without much wind.”

BLUEWATER DELIGHTS Sailing into Saint Lucia in a continuing good breeze with Opus Next looking fresh and as if she’d only just left the shipyard, the celebrations for first ever ocean crossing began. Sailing a dry ship: no wine, no beer, and with a good diet shows good wisdom … that as soon as ashore could be cast aside, and the welcomed transocean weight loss quickly regained! “Twelve kilos each way,” Oleg says with a nautical mile-wide grin. Would he do this again? Absolutely. Next time, though, independently; it’s a bit more of a challenge, Oleg says. And he has unfinished business. An important part of the original plan had been Oleg skippering Opus Next also on the tougher eastward crossing back home to the Med in the spring but regrettably circumstances meant he had to stand down, leaving the return passage to others. So, he’s now even more determined to complete the ‘double’, and he’ll likely be doing that with son Rost who has absolutely caught the bluewater bug and is now on the fast track, too!

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