Charlie Dalin established himself as a leading figure in offshore racing when, this past January, aboard the IMOCA Macif-Santé-Prévoyance – a 60-foot monohull – he won the 10th edition of the Vendée Globe − a solo, nonstop, unassisted round-the-world race − and set a record time of 64 days, 19 hours, 22 minutes and 49 seconds. In La Force du destin ("The Force of Destiny"), to be published on Thursday, October 9, the 41-year-old sailor and naval architect recounts his journey and how he raced while undergoing treatment for a gastrointestinal stromal tumor, a cancer for which he underwent surgery in the spring.
Two years ago − five days before the start of the Transat Jacques Vabre 2023 and a year before the Vendée Globe − I had to get an emergency CT scan because I had been experiencing abdominal pain for a month or two that wouldn't go away, even with painkillers I was taking day and night. I had lost four or five kilograms. It was a huge shock to discover I had a gastrointestinal stromal tumor, a GIST attached to the outside of the small intestine, which, given its size, had probably been growing for several years.
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