One of the really interesting people we sponsor is Derek Hatfield, skipper of the Spirit of Canada Open 60. Derek’s goal is to represent Canada in the Vendée Globe 2008 sailing solo around the world. Right now he is racing the solo 2007 Transat Ecover-BtoB, a transatlantic sailing race between Salvador de Bahia (Brasil) and Port-La-Forêt (Finistere, Brittany).

Derek is sending us daily updates and today we’ll start sharing those with you. To set the scene they have been hit with some really intense weather which is putting all the entrants to the test. You can hear an interview with CBC Radio on December 5th about some of the challenges he is facing.