11 Sep Tom Dolan Battles Injury to Finish 6th in First Leg of the Solitaire
Irish solo sailor Tom Dolan has completed the grueling first leg of the 2025 Solitaire du Figaro in an impressive 6th place, despite suffering a hand injury just one hour into the race he persevered to complete the 638 mile course.
Sailing from Rouen to Morlaix via a complex course of several demanding passages across the English Channel, Dolan completed the leg aboard the Figaro Kingspan in 3 days, 19 hours, and 45 minutes. His finish puts him just 46 minutes behind race leader Alexis Loison, winner of the 2025 Rolex Fastnet Race.
“I’ll certainly take that!” said Dolan, reflecting on how close he finished to the leader. “When I woke up from a short rest with my hand throbbing in pain, I knew I wasn’t going to be at 100% for the rest of the leg. So I made the call to keep things simple, no crazy manoeuvres, no 50 gybes, just stay with the fleet and focus on making the clearest decisions I could.”
Dolan moved anywhere from 3rd to 20th place in a very tightly packed fleet through the duration of the leg, with a shut down just off the coast of France that created close to a restart in the race as the fleet compressed due to strong spring tides.
“Yeah, it was a good old Figaro leg,” he joked. “Pretty much a race restart after 48 hours of racing, mental stuff. And they’re not joking when they mark ‘Hazardous Seas’ on the charts. Wind against tide…it was tough”
With two legs still to come and the overall result based on cumulative time across all three, it’s still all to play for. The second leg being the stage in the 2024 edition that Dolan made the title-defining move that ultimately won him the overall title.
The second leg is currently scheduled to depart from Morlaix on Sunday, 14th September, though forecasts of extreme weather may cause delays. A postponement could work in Dolan’s favour, allowing him valuable time to rest and recover from his injury. Although, this won’t halt preparations as the Kingspan team dive into strategy, analyzing the forecast for Leg Two as early as tomorrow.
