Team members: Robert Maddison
Hometown: Forestville, CA, USA
Race vessel: Weta Trimaran
LOA: 11’6″
Human propulsion: Pedal-powered propeller
TL;DR: Pending nuclear war and… actually, that seems like enough.
If you are reading this we must still be alive, or at least you are, and maybe us too as long as our ironic references to R2AK’s “high command” and “HQ Bunker” haven’t been picked up by some web-crawling AI-bot and risen to the Russian nuclear top 5,000 list and/or hacker collaborative. Feeling a little exposed here.
Regardless of your shuffling relationship to your mortal coil, the internet, and your stores of canned food—well done. Pending forced Rapture aside, if you are reading this you are the portion of the population who is still alive in our off-Broadway reprise of the Cold War, “Nuke To Alaska” reality scenario that has all of the laughs of the first one but without any of the pop culture coping mechanisms. This one snuck up on most of us.
Back in the original-cast nuclear crisis, we had plenty of pop culture to help ease our nation’s nerves shredded and raw from now nearly 80 years of knowing that there is a finger tapping on a button that could end us all before climate change gets a chance. From the Dr. Strangelove black and white macabre absurdism, to the Top Gun/Iron Eagle war porn of the 1980s, there were decades of onscreen coping mechanisms to transform our existential dread into a matinee’s worth of entertainment. We didn’t need to freak out, we had Rambo, Goose and Iceman, we had the A-Team.
The A-Team: a ragtag group of mercenaries with hearts of gold. The Brady Bunch with gold chains and explosives, A-Team episodes had a reassuring rhythm. A problem would have to be solved, a plan would be created, Mr. T would weld something, refuse to get on a plane, then kick ass in pursuit of truth, justice, and humanity. Despite the global nuclear arsenal that could turn the world to dust 5 times over, for one hour of primetime a week there was order in the world. The A-Team had problems on lock. Things were going to be ok.
Call it a consequence of the post-Weinstein era, but if the Russian buildup was a surprise to the defense forces of the Ukraine, the North American creative class was caught with their pants completely down. 6 hours of back-to-back Law and Order spinoffs got nothing on the surprise re-emergence of thermonuclear war.
Shine the bat signal, sound the alarm. We need a hero, we need a distraction, the A-Team is long dead and retired; we need Team B Team.
Lucky for us, the team’s sole crewmember has been prepping for the role since he learned to sail the El Toro dinghy as a kid. Since then, he’s sailed the hell out of the Pacific Cup as crew in the 90s, commercial fishing in Alaska in the two thousand-teens (2013-19), and owned and sailed a Valiant 32 before a vessel reduction surgery reduced him to a 4.4M Weta trimaran.
Weta whata?
Fair question. Short version:
The Weta 4.4 is a tiny yellow splashy day sailor that he should have sense enough to leave for laps in a relatively protected and supported waterway rather than a quest to escape the holocaust and/or save the world. The Weta 4.4 is a triple missile trimaran developed to be a full send the family day sailing trimaran. Named after a New Zealand insect that looks like a cross between a cricket and a cockroach, Wetas have been sailed in such hallowed drag races as the Everglades Challenge, and by such hallowed sailing demigods as Meade Gougeon. If you know, you know.
To prep for taking Team B Team for the R2AK, Robert has been campaigning all pandemic on San Francisco Bay. While it’s not the comfort and seakeeping ability of his normal sailboat (cabin, toilet, roof, etc), while its high-viz nature makes it pop for rescue workers and photojournalists, the Weta’s size flys under the radar—both figuratively and actually in case of surface missile strikes. Assuming he’s outside of a blast radius when shit goes down, he’s going to be just fine.
Tiny trimaran developed as a warm water daysailer and named after one of the few species that might survive a nuclear winter? We’re not sure if you’re the hero we deserve, but we are beyond grateful that you are the hero we have.
Welcome to the Race to Alaska Team B Team. We are honored to be the first part of your two-step plan to save the world.
- Step one: R2AK
- Step two: Save the world