FatChanceRow Update June 22

(Sami) It's our fifth day on the ocean. Initial shock (this is impossible!) is over and we are getting used to the life here. It's uncomfortable, different and slow (any little task takes 10x the time it'd take on land eg changing clothes) but it is where we are now. And each of us rowing 10-14h/day. "Getting used to" also means that I washed myself the first time today. Disgusting but we were too scared to even try it"on deck" earlier.

Roosevelt is treating us we'll and handling the rough conditions like an armored army vehicle. Pic here through the cabin window as I'm writing this: 20knot+ winds and ocean waves breaking due wind. Who knew rowing could be an extreme sport!

Five days into our expedition, and so far we've had zero reasons or time to worry about the things we thought would be toughest: 1. Sun burn - we are basically bundled up in storm weather gear while rowing. And still wet and occasionally cold. California summer!? 2. Sore butt - maybe a little, but our setup is working well even for 12h continuous rowing shifts. We do worry abt being wet nonstop... 3. Sleep rhythm - while we haven't slept very deep (we are paranoid about container ships and check radio etc all the time at night), we decided to cover the stormy weather by rowing together, 12-17h per day and avoid solo rowing at night. We thought it's too dangerous not to see the waves coming in. It also takes too much time to change clothes several times a day in the stormy weather. 5. Severe seasickness - neither has thrown up yet and I consider that as a major success! Our appetite is a bit messed up, but I think thanks to our diet (no sugar or processed carbs) we've felt strong and energized with very little food so far.

Instead, here's what has occupied my mind and focus: A. I re-learned that I married the most bad ass and kindest person. Meredith's been strong both physically and mentally and has operated our tools like an expert seaman. B. Stare waves and estimate their attack angle while rowing and trying to dodge the worst ones. When it gets dark this whole thing feels likes videogame with our little row boat jumping all over in the massive ocean. As we are now taking the wind in a downwind angle, we managed to catch a few waves and Get our rowing speed from 3knots to 6knots for a short ride. C. Rope tricks, deck work and operating our friend Big Bertha (para anchor), Arnold (our autohelm system) "strong arm", Sally the Salmon (our drogue) etc. D. How the heck do we get to Hawaii in 20knot headwinds. We've got the best weather forecasting support, but even they couldn't change the high pressure pattern so we are now pushing to our only possible direction: south and tiny bit west where possible. If this strategy fails, our arrival party might be in Peru...

Sami

And our divorce-o-meter is still at zero!

FatChanceRow Update June 21

Today is our fourth day out on the Pacific, and we are making slow, but steady progress- unfortunately, not in the right direction! Each day we have see strong (15-20 knot) head windows. On the first day we rowed for 17 hours straight together to try to get as far west as possible. Since then we've been lucky if we can just go south. The waves have been very high, with some looking more like giant walls coming right at you than something you would row over. Yesterday's winds were close to thirty knots and the waves were breaking on our deck over and over. Sami proved his worth once again by grabbing me as I got washed off the boat, not once but twice. Luckily the only thing that was really damaged was my poor rain pants, which are now ripped in half (I still wear one leg of them to protect me from splashes). My legs are taking a beating and shoulders are as well, from getting slammed into the side rail of the boat. Needless to say, we are going to continue rowing together until the conditions are less dangerous. We also came close to capsizing twice, once while we were rowing and once when we were attempting to sleep. Our cabin is absolutely wet and so are we! We've also named our equipment...I guess we really are getting bored! Big Bertha, our sea anchor, has saved us every night. Our drogue, Sally Salmon, is out now, trying to keep the waves from crashing over us sideways. When we get a particularly huge wave, Sally leaps our of the sea behind us, which isn't very comforting. We love her none the less. For now, our plan is just to try to keep going south, and if we're lucky, a slight bit west. We're on the lookout for sea life, so far we are pretty sure that we saw two sharks! I keep threatening to make Sami clean the bottom of the boat, but I do owe him after his quick grabs for me in the waves. As for our food, we're still glad that we packed what we did. We haven't been able to eat very much yet, since we've both been sea -queasy. Strangely enough, we've both been craving (and eating) our salmon (supplied kindly by Vital choice) . Sami has also been eating the Nutzo Peanut butter and Mario Olives. I stowed some apples on board, but we ate the last of them today. I guess it's time to start fantasizing about fresh fruits and vegetables! We also have seen two container ships quite close to us. I tried to engage with them, but they weren't very chatty. Though the conditions are rough, we are in good spirits, and the divorcometer is at 0.

FatChanceRow Update June 14

Everybody keeps asking: when will you push off?

The only correct answer is: (1) when we are ready and (2) when we get a favorable weather window to escape the California coast. As of now, it looks like weather gods are giving us a 48h chance starting Tuesday June 17th. If so, we will be ready. And in those 48hrs we need to make enough progress out to the Pacific to escape next batch of westerly winds that would force us back to shore.

Here's the control center of Roosevelt (and sleep cabin), which I'm trying to finalize today.

Sami

Thank you: $200,000+ and counting to support the fight for better food

The expedition is early and we are yet to start our Pacific crossing (in a few days, we hope!), but thanks to you our many supporters, we’ve now raised more than $200,000 to support the fight for better food. All of the proceeds go DIRECTLY to Institute for Responsible Nutrition, whose goal is to eliminate childhood obesity and type-II diabetes … (and yes, sugar has a lot to do with that!).

We hope that this is just the beginning, so if you can, please join the fight for better food and donate here.

Meredith & Sami -- the aspiring ocean rowers

How Meredith's getting some extra blood cells for the row

Meredith decided to warm up and do her final rowing preparation at Mt. Everest Base camp and run (a marathon) down straight to the row start - with a few flights in between.

We are both hoping that she’ll come back with a 10% increase in red blood cells...

Meredith, Sami and 1 Million Calories

One of the most frequent questions that we are asked about our row is what food we’re going to eat on the boat. This post should clear that up!

Between the two of us, we’ll need about a million Calories on board. Sami will be consuming 6,000 - 8,000kCal per day, and I’ll be consuming a girl's diet or about 4,000 - 6,000kCal per day! That is a lot of food! Our criteria for choosing the expedition food options were the following:

1. Real food: As close to whole food as possible with no added preservatives or sugars.
2. Long shelf life: we’ll be without refrigeration for 2+ months in Pacific temperatures
3. Palatability: we’re going to be loosing weight even if we eat our entire ration; if we can’t eat our rations - we’re in trouble!
4. Local: we want to support local and high quality providers of our supplies and were careful in choosing who to work with.
5. Fat for fuel: we wanted to choose foods so that our primary extra fuel source is fat, not processed carbohydrates or excessive protein.

We ordered samples of all foods and chose the highest quality suppliers.  We also created several blends of our own nuts, fruit and protein mixes in a cluster format that we’ll be taking with us. A huge ‘Thanks’ goes out to all of our food suppliers for their support and quality products! Here's a non-exhaustive, alphabetical list of our chosen food suppliers:

Artisana Coconut Butter

Single-serving coconut butter packets.

Why? This was an easy decision since we eat this product (out of the jar!) at home. We’re also taking some of their pecan butter as a treat. Fat is our primary fuel for energy and coconut butter is optimal for fueling in room temperatures and has low Omega-6 content.

Bare Fruit

Plain and cinnamon freeze dried apples.

Why? The unsweetened blends are just real fruit and spice. It’s hard to argue against that and they taste fantastic.  This product was the closest to "a real fruit" that we could carry on the boat. Besides, we love their CEO!

The chocolate Garage

Organic, unsweetened dark chocolate.

Why? Dark chocolate (without added sugar in any form or other sweeteners) is both a perfect treat and a fantastic energy source for us. The Chocolate Garage only carries small-batch chocolate manufacturers who work directly with growers. 

 

Mario Snack Olives

Pitted, seasoned snack olives.

Why? These are in snack portions already and don’t come in liquid, so they are great for a journey like this. They also come in several flavors, so I’m not afraid we’re going to get sick of eating them!

 

Nuts.com

Roasted salted macadamia nuts, sprouted almonds, cheesy salad booster,  sprouted spinach pesto mix, Cilantro lime pistachio & pepita, spicy mango goji nut mix, among other things!

Why? We were able to get bulk nuts from Nuts.com, which was important given that we ordered more than 150lbs of nuts.  Sami is eating mountains of macadamia nuts and sprouted almonds; I’m eating the sprouted nut mixes. I also used their salad booster seasoning in my vegetable bags. Last, we’ve packed some of their raw energy squares (without honey or added sweeteners) for a treat.

 

Nutzo

Crunchy (really, really crunchy) 7 seeds blend.

Why? It’s delicious and nut free (we have enough nuts!), not to mention that it comes in an individual serving size! To pack calories and fat, we needed more palatable and quick to eat options and this was a great addition.

 

Thrive Freeze Dried Vegetables and (Fatty)Beef

Freeze dried broccoli, spinach, tomato, zucchini, asparagus and beef and beef fat.

Why? We’re eating 10’s of servings of veggies per day, and it was crucial to have a good variety. Thrive is the ‘go to’ for freeze dried supplies. We experimented with various beef and beef fat options, but ended up choosing a freeze dried option for taste and shelf-life.

 

Our own mix

Clusters of nuts, egg whites and dried fruit seasoned with vanilla and stevia.

Why? We couldn’t find anything packaged that met our nutritional needs (as well as convenience, taste and shelf-life) that wasn’t ‘single ingredient’, so we created our own!

 

Vital Cho

Wild Caught Salmon and Tuna Packets (6oz.)

Why? This was another easy choice since we already eat their products when we don’t feel like cooking.  They taste well seasoned even though they are only salted. Fatty fish is an excellent source of protein and fat with lots of Omega-3 fatty acids.

We will follow up with a more technical post about our diet, macronutrients and micronutrients after our expedition is completed. At that point we'll know exactly what we ate and what we couldn't!

Wanna row an ocean? Here's our training plan behind the scenes!

Preparing and training to row across an ocean takes a lot of endurance and strength training. But, in our experience, something else takes even more time in order to be ready to row FAST as well as SAFE. 

Here's how it happens behind the scenes for our team!

Training skills that will hopefully never be used

Sometimes it's a good idea to train skills that you hope you'd never need. In our effort to minimize risks and prepare for any kind of situation, we spent a full weekend practicing ocean survival skills.....that will hopefully never be put into practice!