Every other Thursday, in its "off-field" section,
20 Minutes
explores new spaces for expressing sport, unexpected, unusual, clever or in full swing.
This week, heading for the Pacific Ocean that Alexandra Lux, Itziar Abascal, Stéphanie Geyer-Barneix, Emmanuelle Bescheron, Marie Goyeneche and Margot Calvet will try to cross, from Peru to Polynesia, by rowing and relay, from the 4 January.
For these six high-level sportswomen, members or former members of the national coastal rescue teams, the human and physical adventure (8,000 km up for grabs!) goes hand in hand with a solidarity project.
"We are not looking for a place or a time, but an extraordinary human adventure", specifies Alexandra Luz, for whom this is not the first major challenge and as a team.
What are you doing, on your side, to start the new year?
Because they are going to row across the Pacific Ocean.
They are six women, all high-level athletes in coastal rescue, from the Landes and the Basque Country, who embark on this XXL physical and human adventure on January 4.
On the menu for these three months at sea, to connect Peru to French Polynesia?
A journey of 8,000 kilometers where these six "Waterwomen" will take turns every hour, on a prone paddleboard, specially designed to move using the arms, in a prone or kneeling position, and therefore different from stand-up paddle.
“In addition to the sporting challenge, since we are going to try to break the world record, it is also a solidarity challenge”, poses Emmanuelle Bescheron, one of the adventurers.
For her, this is a first, unlike Alexandra Lux, Itziar Abascal and Stéphanie Geyer-Barneix, who already have several capital challenges behind them.
The group of six is completed by "two little young people", as they like to call them, Marie Goyeneche and Margot Calvet, 22 and 24, both currently members of the French coastal rescue teams.
"Our adventure is above all to promote healthy sport, daily physical activity, and the importance of sport to feel good in body and mind," says Emmanuelle Bescheron.
There will be no intensity, adds Alexandra Luz.
The idea is to last about 90 days, to make the crossing without a quantified objective and without assistance, at least until the arrival in Polynesian waters.
It is true that at the base, we are competitors.
But for this challenge, we are not talking about timing, speed or distance.
We are not looking for a place or a time, but an extraordinary human adventure.
»
Alongside the six sportswomen, there are five crew members on the so-called assistance boat, including a skipper and his second, a physio-osteopath, a block nurse and Alexandra Le Mouel, the project manager and co-founder. of the association Hope Team East, at the origin of this crossing.
“When you have tasted such adventures, it is difficult to do without them”
“It all started in 2009, when Stéphanie Geyer-Barneix, affected four times by breast cancer, shared her crazy dream of crossing an ocean, narrated in her singing voice Alexandra Luz.
With Flora Manciet, we followed her for a journey in the North Atlantic of 4,830 km in 54 days.
It was important for us to pass on Stéphanie's optimism, positivity and combativeness in the ordeal of illness.
» Then in 2015, again with the passage of Cape Horn alongside Stéphanie and Itziar, this time.
"I think that when you've had a taste of such adventures, it's hard to do without them," smiles Alexandra Luz.
As a result, the Hope Team East association was created to initially support women who had overcome breast cancer in their sporting challenges.
“Then we became moms, shares Alexandra Luz, and Hope Team East evolved with us.
Today, it also allows children and teenagers affected by cancer to carry out their own sporting challenge.
A special attachment to Polynesia
In 2019, Emmanuelle Bescheron invites Alexandra Luz and Stéphanie Geyer-Barneix, whom she knows well for having evolved alongside them in the national coastal rescue team for years, to Watermana in Huahine, an island near Tahiti in French Polynesia.
I participated in it several times, she explains.
It's truly a legendary race for the Watermen, with the motto 'expect nothing, prepare for anything'.
We learn to surpass ourselves, to accept the conditions, to leave without knowing when we will finish, or how many kilometers exactly we will do.
In short, the pure sporting and human challenge.
»
Strengthened by this unforgettable experience and after reading
The Kon-Tiki Expedition by
Norwegian navigator Thor Heyerdahl, the adventure of six men adrift in the Pacific Ocean, they finally saw this course impose itself on them.
Solidarity commitment
As with previous expeditions, the six women have developed a large-scale solidarity project around the physical challenge.
"Our passion sport, coastal rescue, has enabled us to develop values of surpassing ourselves, of knowledge of the ocean, but also of mutual aid, prevention and solidarity", lists Emmanuelle Bescheron.
"And since we're not the type to make it simple, we developed several operations around our crossing", slips Alexandra Luz.
Thus, they set up "A challenge in my school", in France and in Papeete, which allows classes to prepare a sporting challenge with their teacher.
“And we advise them on mental and physical preparation, providing nutritional advice so that the children all achieve it together,” she comments.
Aware that Polynesia is a territory where the risk of obesity from childhood is particularly high, all six hope to encourage the youngest to turn to sport.
"It's important when the children are healthy, but also when they are affected by illness," adds Alexandra Luz.
They have also set up a program “to bring sport into pediatric oncology services”.
They have already equipped the hospitals of Bordeaux, Bayonne and Mont-de-Marsan with a totem, while such a project should be finalized in Papeete.
“It allows children undergoing treatment to be able to do games and physical activities to put them in a bubble that takes them out of their daily treatment”, she develops.
Finally, via the Hope Team East association, they continue to accompany children after their illness to achieve their sporting challenge.
All for a budget of around 800,000 euros.
At the end of November, they still had 400 km of their crossing left to sell, the equivalent of 40,000 euros to find to complete this financial part.
“We sold our kilometers (100 euros per km) to certain large private partners, other institutions, to a few foundations, and finally to donors”, specifies Alexandra Luz, in charge of the logistics part.
A dress rehearsal in the Mediterranean
Before the Pacific, the six champions tested themselves on the Mediterranean this summer.
“The 1,800 kilometers between Monaco and Athens in June?
“Ah very complicated for me, remembers Emmanuelle Bescheron.
I had given birth only two months before, I was in full postpartum.
In addition, we had difficult conditions, and then the Mediterranean, it's really difficult to navigate there.
But they were able to try out their gear and get an idea of what to bring on board.
“We started off with a very balanced diet.
Except that to row so much, you need pasta and rice, she jokes again.
And then, we come from the southwest, we are good living, so we need food that smells good at home.
»
"To find comfort and mental resources on the boat, food is an essential element", adds Emmanuelle Bescheron.
They also experimented with paddleboards, the kayak that will allow them to take over between the boat and the rower, as well as wetsuits.
"Our partner has created a special anti-UV lycra suit for us because at the end, when we arrive in Polynesia, the water will be around 28 degrees", specifies Alexandra Luz.
It is therefore impossible for the rowers to keep the neoprene suits with which they will leave Peru in water around… 16 degrees.
“The temperature difference is really important, abounds Emmanuelle Bescheron.
You have to prepare for it, just like injury prevention.
Accustomed to this kind of physical preparation, the six women obviously set up rowing training, one part on endurance and another therefore on this aspect of injury prevention.
“We must not forget that we are on a very repetitive gesture.
»
A feminist commitment that does not say its name
“But 80% of the success of the project is the mental preparation, recalls the Waterwoman.
We set out for a long time on hostile ground.
“And we leave our children to dads for three of us, adds Stéphanie Luz.
We had to accept and learn to manage our emotions and apprehensions about going away from our family, leaving our children in complete serenity, without feeling guilty.
For this mother of a 5 and a half year old girl, feminist commitment is not central but it is still important.
"Are men going on the Vendée Globe asked 'But how do you manage to leave your child?'
It's a way for us to show that as a woman and a mother, we can also achieve great things.
To achieve this, all six have drawn up rules of procedure,
If there is a strong gust of wind or swell, it is too dangerous to get in the water or to do the relays, we take the GPS point and we stop while it passes, exhibits Alexandra Luz, who has already experienced this during her Atlantic expedition.
Whatever happens, we will go to the end, even if we no longer take turns at six.
»
Our off-road file
This team spirit and solidarity, the group needs it for such a human adventure, and the crossing of the Mediterranean has already made it possible to note the strengths and weaknesses involved.
“Some are better organized than others on board.
And from this observation, pairs were formed,” jokes Alexandra Luz.
And the lack of sleep in all this?
“We will have a maximum of four consecutive hours of rest for three months, and we risk waking up the nights after arrival to row,” she adds with a laugh.
In the Atlantic, it took the same time as the crossing to return to normal schedules.
No marmots for a penny, these six queens of the extreme just have to get on the board.
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off-road
Peaceful
Paddle
Sport
Peru
French Polynesia
women's sports