Sitting down with Charlie Dalin

Shirley Robertson

In this episode of Shirley Robertson’s Sailing Podcast, the double Olympic gold medalist and host Shirley Robertson tells the dramatic story of French offshore sailor and Vendee Globe winner, Charlie Dalin. On January 14, 2025 Dalin sailed across the finish line of the non-stop solo round the world marathon in first place.

It was a feat he’d already achieved, but in 2021, having crossed the line first, redress saw him finish as runner up. For the offshore sailor, the win in 2025 put him at the pinnacle of a very elite group, but it was the start of a whole new challenge.

Robertson sat down to talk with him almost a year after that Vendee win. It’s been a year since winning the biggest title in offshore sailing, but for Dalin, it’s been a complicated time, because a year before crossing the Vendee start line, he was diagnosed with cancer.

He chose to keep it a secret and raced under the remote supervision of a cancer specialist, and he still won. The toughest solo offshore challenge in sailing. And in doing so he set a new monohull solo circumnavigation record that took a stunning ten days of the existing record.

While they do discuss the cancer diagnosis, this is not the defining part of Dalin’s story. His early life is one of a young boy, then man, obsessed with the sport of sailing. His stories of chasing the dream are enchanting, from dusting the snow off the boats in the dinghy park, to a miscommunication with a complete stranger in the Yacht Haven in Cowes.

“So I thought I was going to go for another twilight sail, so I met him late afternoon….and he started showing me all this safety gear. I knew British people were into their safety, but I thought that was a bit much for a Friday night event.

“At the end of the safety tour of the boat, he picks up a sailing map, deploys it and says ‘so we’re here, going there!’ and that’s when I realized I was going to sail double handed with him to Brixham! I thought I was going to be back in my tent two hours later but no!!…. I thought I’d be back on Friday night and I was back on Sunday in Cowes!”

The duo discuss his route into the IMOCA world, via the Figaro Solitaire circuit, and eventually discuss his two Vendee Globe campaigns. For the sailor interested in offshore sailing, this is a must listen chat. Dalin has sailed two back-to-back Vendees and crossed the finish line first in both of them.

From repairs to setting record breaking pace around the world, Dalin’s Vendee stories are compelling. Of his repair in the southern oceans, he compares the fix to that of Apollo 13’s, as his team gathered around the available spares of his boat at the team base back in France to figure out a fix.

“Everyone here in Mer Concept, they gathered; it was a bit like the Apollo 13 mission you know, they had a list of everything I had on board, and they said ‘right, he’s got this on board, what can we do’, and they sent me this repair program with so many steps to make this replacement bearing for the foil!”

His first Vendee Globe was then heavily affected by redress time given to other competitors involved in the dramatic rescue of PRB’s Kevin Escoffier. It meant Dalin took the runner’s up spot by a matter of hours, despite crossing the finish line first. It’s a result he’s not at all bitter about, and readily admits focusing on how he could have regained those lost hours, rather than the negative thoughts of a lost win.

And so, in Part Two, the duo move on to his illness, his diagnosis for cancer, and how he managed to still sail in, and win the 2024 Vendee Globe. It’s a touching and somewhat sad tale, of a man used to balancing risk and reward being faced with something he has little control over.

But control it he did, as he set a blistering pace around the world. He beat the race record by almost ten days, setting that new sixty-four-day solo monohull circumnavigation record.

“The last part from Brazil to France was exceptional. I didn’t do a single gybe or tack from Brazil to Brittany, so it was just crazy, you know. Just one single tack for days and days and days, not a tack or gybe in the doldrums, nothing. You know, just one tack from Brazil to Brittany, just crazy you know!”

The duo discuss his win at length, but also then revert to the big secret Charlie carried around the world with him. Only his medic and closest family knew his situation. His team, and the hundreds of thousands of Vendee Globe fans watching his remarkable progress, were oblivious to his struggle.

So, when he finished the race, he was very quickly in surgery. He revealed his diagnosis and then released a book detailing his story – “La Force Du Destin” (The Force of Destiny). It’s an emotional tale, with the highs and lows you’d expect from a career leading up to a Vendee win, but punctuated, rather sadly, by an ending that is still yet to fully play out.

Part One:

Part Two:

Shirley Robertson OBE made history by becoming the first British woman to win Olympic Gold Medals at two consecutive Olympic Games. Shirley Robertson’s Sailing Podcast, produced and edited by Tim Butt of Vertigo Films, is available via most popular podcast outlets, including Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcast, and aCast.