Punta del Este

At last, I get some down time to write to you all. It has been a roller coaster since we arrived in Punta last Sunday. I cannot believe that I have been on land already 4 days. I am sitting in a nice cafe in Punta del Este, with a superb espresso, a nice fluffy croissant and a small glass of sparkling water. As Mark, Martin and Ned know, these are the only things I need to relax and enjoy life!

When I last talk to you, I mentioned that I was quite glad to land in Punta to rest and nurse my ribs ahead of the Southern Ocean ride.

So I went on Monday to the local hospital. I was amazed how modern and clean, professional it was. So much better than our European hospitals! There, I got an X-ray of my ribcage and an echography of the soft tissues. The results were some encouraging news: while I had a small 3.2 cm hematoma on my liver, it did not look like there was any bleeding, no displacement of the ribs and no apparent damage to the lung. So seemingly, I could resume the race after a week of rest here and making sure that I did not doing anything strenuous the first week at sea. A bit aspirational but possible. After getting a second opinion from my cousin Astrid in the US, she suggested that I do a CT-scan of the soft tissue to confirm all this. So I arranged this via Dr Juan, our local medical attache here in Punta, who also suggested that while I was doing this, we should add a CT scan of the rib cage to clarify the extent of the damage to the rib (that was not apparent on the X-rays).

So I went back to the same awesome hospital on Tuesday and got my CT-scans. By then, I was getting known there and the process was supper smooth, super professional, very friendly. I came back to my hotel to wait for the results. Around 6pm, Dr Juan called me and the results were not what I would have wished them to be. On the positive side, the scans confirmed that no lasting damage has been done to my liver, that I had no fluid/bleeding and no issues with the lungs. So nothing that rest will not naturally heal. On the not so positive side, the scan revealed that I had made quite a fair bit of damage to my rib cage: As you probably know, we have 12 ribs on each side and guess what: I had managed to damage 8 of them on my right side. Yep 8 ribs damaged out of 12… The clear consequence of this is that my ribcage is not stable and should I fall or get a shock on it right now, it would not protect my organ. Now leg 2 is a long downwind descent in the southern ocean and pretty serious weather is to be expected. So a fall or bang is not just possible but frankly quite likely. This was all confirmed by Astrid in the late evening, who basically told me that sailing now would be playing with my life, while resting a few weeks will put me back in shape with no lasting damages.

So skipping this leg is the right call. Hopefully, after a few weeks of healing, I should be able to rejoin the race in South Africa.

That is obviously a real bummer and I initially got quite down. Part of it is actually stopping and skipping part of the round-the-world trip; another part is leaving the team after these last weeks spent building a very effective watch. As I went thru the past 2 days, it is a weird feeling to now be on the sideline of something that occupied my mind pretty much fully these past 6-12 months. I have become an observer of sort: I am still meeting the others for meals but they are going about their jobs, fixing this, buying food for Leg 2, repairing sails, checking winches, cleaning the boat, etc… My crew mates and skipper are very supportive and I got a lot of nice messages from them that keep me up, but still this is a big interruption on the project. I felt also like I was letting you all down somehow: you got quite invested in my project and I am now telling you that the dream is put in suspended mode. That is probably why I did not write yesterday with these news. And all that for a stupid fall while on a flat see under the sun, under engine, not even while facing crazy stormy conditions in the bay of Biscay!

My mood is evolving today for the better. I am starting to realise that this setback is actually to be expected when doing something that big. This round the world race is violent, it is hard, and I should expect to hit bumps along the way. While at sea, the bumps were the disappointment with the low level of readiness of the yacht that as a crew we had to remediate or cope with, now it is this forced stop where I say good bye to the team for a while. These are all part of the deal actually. I just hope that while I am away, my desire to rejoin and keep going is not going to drop. We will see. For the time being, I will take it a day at a time, focus on getting between, go back to be with Utami and maybe follow her other Asia for a bit.

Thank you all for the unwavering support and the attention you are giving me in your daily lives. This means the world,

Henri

And we were the third at last!

Punta del Este, 16 October 2025