Rob Peake is making waves at the Isle of Man Newspapers by taking part in a prestigious boat race.

The junior reporter (pictured left) is jetting out to Boston, Massaschusetts, to link up with the crew of the ‘Isle of Man’ yacht for the second leg of the BT Global Challenge.

After arriving on October 6, Rob (28) will have just over a week to prepare himself mentally before the team take to the high seas and make their way to Buenos Aires in Argentina.

Rob volunteered to represent his company – which produces the Isle of Man Examiner, Isle of Man Courier and Manx Independent – on board the yacht after taking a ride in a similar boat.

He told HoldTheFrontPage: “I enjoyed my trip on the high-tech yacht so much that when the newsdesk asked for somebody to take part in the BT challenge, I was one of the first to volunteer.”

However, one major hurdle stood between Rob and a place in the most famous team the Isle of Man had ever produced. He would have to first win over a man who had been seriously underwhelmed by Rob two years previously.

Rob explained: “To secure a berth on the yacht I had to be interviewed by race founder Sir Chay Blyth. It was ironic because I had been given the job of interviewing him when I first started out as a reporter. My performance was so poor that day that he walked out on me!”

However, this time Rob was to make a much better impression.

He said: “I had been preparing myself for a tough face-to-face interview where I would have to really sell myself. Instead, the interview was more of an informal drinks evening where Sir Chay just came round and chatted with all of us.”

A week later, Rob, who worked as a chef in Berlin before taking the post-graduate NCTJ journalism course, was informed that he had been picked as a reserve. This meant that he would have to wait for a member of the crew to drop out to get a place on the yacht.

In the meantime, he was booked on to three long weekends of training to prepare him for the race. He was told that if he didn’t eventually make the event, he would be reimbursed for the money paid out for the sessions.

The training was predictably gruelling.

Rob said: “They were basically training us for worst case scenarios, things like ‘man overboard’. I remember that at the end of each weekend I was absolutely exhausted!”

It was during the training sessions that Rob was given the exciting news that a member of the race squad had pulled out, meaning that he was now guaranteed a place on board.

Rob said: “It was brilliant news but it was also quite scary because it suddenly seemed so much more real.”

Now it’s just a few days before Rob links up with the rest of the crew and he is even more nervous.

He said: “I’m going to be on board the yacht for a whole month and the longest I have been on a boat so far is a week. It should be quite a test of character.”

But Rob can’t wait to get started.

He said: “I’m gagging to get away, the rest of the crew are great and genuinely seem to get on. I can’t wait to hook up with them.”

In his month at sea, Rob will travel 5,500 nautical miles, enduring blistering heat as the yacht crosses the equator and inches through the tropics.

On board the yacht is a state-of-the-art media centre provided by BT and the crew is allowed half an hour of ‘e-mail time’ a day. Most of this half-hour will be spent accessing weather and shipping reports but Rob will also use the facility to file regular updates back to his newspapers.

In the lead-up to his adventure, Rob has become something of a celebrity in the area. However, not all of his colleagues are enjoying ‘Peake-Mania’.

Rob explained: “About half of the newsroom are really excited but I think the other half are sick to the back teeth of it all. They should wait till I get back though – I’ll be a complete bore!”

The idea behind the Isle of Man entering its own yacht into the race was to increase the profile of the island. Residents are getting increasingly excited and a set of stamps has even been issued to commemorate the occasion.

The first leg of the race has already been completed and the Isle of Man team holds a respectable sixth place out of a field of twelve.

Yet Rob thinks the team can do better than mid-table respectablilty.

He said: “I would say we have as good a chance as any of the other teams. In terms of composition of crews, BT are very keen to make things equal in terms of weight, distribution and experience.”

Rob also believes that a win for the Isle of Man would be something of a moral victory.

He explained: “A lot of the other yachts are backed by massive multinational companies so they have a bit of an advantage. It would be nice if we could win because we’re more of a community-backed team.”

The race comes to an end in June 2001 in Southampton. By then the Manx flag will have travelled 33,000 miles around the world and if it come home victorious, then nobody will be more proud than Rob.

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