By Diarmaid Doherty
JASON Black says he is nervously excited as he prepares for his latest grueling challenge which will see him row 5,000kms across the Atlantic Ocean.
The Letterkenny man is part of a unique fundraiser in which he plans to row across the ocean from Lanzarote in the Canary Islands to Antigua in the heart of the Caribbean.
If successful, Jason will become the first person from Donegal to row across the Atlantic.
He will also become the first ever person to complete a unique trilogy of endurance challenges having already scaled Everest and K2 mountains.
The challenge, which will start on January 3 and could take up to 50 days to complete, is being organised to raise funds for Race Against Dementia.
The global charity was founded by Formula One legend Sir Jackie Stewart OBE, to fund pioneering research into the prevention and cure of dementia.
Jason (52) will be joined in the ‘Destiny’s Tide’ rowing boat by British business tycoon Neil Glover and after spending the best part of two years training and preparing for the challenge, he says he’s ready to get going.
“Anyone who knows me will know that this is all completely brand new for me,” he said.
“I have been learning how to read the stars at night and to navigate at sea.
“It’s going to be extremely tough but for me as a mature athlete, what I am fascinated about isn’t the capabilities of the human body, it’s the mental resilience.
“It’s another new opportunity for me to see how far I can push the mind.”
Around twenty people take on the Atlantic challenge every year – but not everyone manages to be successful. There’s no land visible for the 50 days at sea and after 200kms, there is no direct rescue.
“It’s like climbing Everest, there is a way that you can do it,” Jason added.
He only recently returned from England where he continued his training and spent four days rowing around the Isle of Wight.
“There was no sleep,” he pointed out. “I left Avon Marina and rowed around the Isle of Wight which is huge. I wanted to get into the big seas and the waves
“I had a coach on board who has crossed the Atlantic and the Pacific ocean and he was a good help on the navigation. It was all completely new to me.”
Jason has also been to Silverstone where he met racing legend Sir Jackie Stewart and some of the team behind the Race Against Dementia charity organisation.
He attended the Silverstone Historic Festival in August – an event that attracts thousands of motorsport fans every year.
The ‘Destiny’s Tide’ rowing boat was on display over the weekend and Jason said he was blown away by how many people came up to the team to talk about how their own lives had been touched by dementia.
“The stories they told me, face to face, were incredible,” Jason said.
“I went to Silverstone taking on a physical challenge as a sports person but I left with a different agenda.
“To be honest, I’m not really all that bothered about setting a new record anymore. It’s not really about that for me any longer.
“If anyone close to me was to get dementia, I know for a fact there is no cure. That is alarming. It’s the new cancer.
“This has now opened my mind and I am very determined to raise as much as we can.”
Still, there’s no getting away from the fact that he’s facing into another grueling adventure that will test every single sinew. Mentally, Jason expects to be taken to places he might never have been before.
“I’m stepping completely into the unknown,” he said.
“I have never done anything of this magnitude. I’ll be relying on my experiences as a mountaineer and an outdoor enthusiast and having spent much of my life in an unsupported world. I’ll need to draw on my ability to survive and operate on my own without the safety net of life.
“When you are on a mountain, there is no get out of jail card. You are committed to a space and once you pass a point there is no going back.
“And this challenge is the same. Once you pass a point at 200kms off the coast of Lanzarote, that’s the last point a helicopter can get to me.
After that the only rescue that I can have is if a tanker passes by.
Jason Black pictured this week at Ballymacool Park in Letterkenny. Photos: Brian McDaid
“So after five days, there’s no coming back. I have to be fully committed to surviving at sea. There is no land between Lanzarote and the Caribbean. There is no place I can go to, so once I pull the trigger on a certain point, I am all in.”
The ‘Destiny’s Tide’ boat cost £97,000 but is worth probably three times as much with the navigation and transmission equipment installed.
Using the latest Elon Musk Starlink satellite system Jason and Neil will broadcast daily reports from the boat and Jason is hoping to connect with schools and classrooms in Donegal from the Atlantic Ocean, to give live updates on their progress.
They will also carry out an important environmental study collecting daily marine research data for the Michigan State University to help better understand the micro plastic pollution problem in the Atlantic Ocean.
This will all be done while the pair row in excess of 1.5 million strokes during the crossing, burning in excess of 7,000 calories per day.
“I know that I am facing into a tremendous physical battle and a mental battle,” Jason said.
“I know my hands will fall apart and my backside will fall apart. I expect to lose two stone on this trip.”
Jason will spend some time away from home again in November and December and is happy to say that he’ll be at home for Christmas with his wife Sharon and their family.
Sharon, he says, has been a brilliant support – just as she has been so many times before.
“It’s a difficult question to ask, when you have to go back to the well again,” he said.
“Sharon knows what’s involved. She has never stood in my way. She is hugely supportive and always has been.
“I have been training like a lunatic,” he added.
“But I’m at the mercy of nature, no more than the mountains.
“There is an element of this I can control, but an element I can’t and I have just got to accept what we can’t control.
“There is an element of cutting the umbilical cord and leaving Letterkenny.
“I’ll never be left by anyone to the airport. I get Bus Éireann, I have always done it. I just find it easier.
“I do my crying from the bus station in Letterkenny and once I get past the Port Bridge I have to get on with it and be selfish about what I am about to face.”
The team behind the challenge hope to raise €1m for Racing Against Dementia through corporate sponsorship and donations.
Jason is hoping that a Donegal business will come on board to lend their support and he said it would be great to have a local business’s name on the side of the boat.
The crew hope to reach the Jolly Harbour in Antigua in late February and they will be part of the annual C-MAP Atlantic Dash ocean rowing regatta – an event described as one of the toughest endurance challenges in the world.
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