Want to know what it’s like to row 5,000 miles from Hawaii to Australia? We managed to catch up with Tez Steinberg, 36, who, on November 19, embarked on a solo row from Hawaii to Australia in his United World Challenge Expedition 2 to help raise awareness and funding for ridding the oceans of plastic. The non-resupplied crossing, the first-ever by a solo rower, is expected to take 115 to 180 days, depending on the weather, and require an estimated two million oar strokes to accomplish. He hopes to arrive in Cairns, Australia, sometime this spring to achieve both a “world-first” and Guinness World Record.
It will be the second time Steinberg has tackled such a gargantuan rowing endeavor. A glutton for blisters, salt sores and other punishment, in summer 2020 Steinberg took a break from his management role in Deloitte’s leadership team to row a 23-foot boat from Monterey, California, to Oahu, Hawaii. Despite having no prior experience and battling a hurricane, leaking storage hatches and a broken rowing seat, he became the first person to ever complete the route as his first ocean row and only the ninth person to ever row the Pacific to Hawaii solo. On it,he aimed to inspire others, protect oceans, and raise funds to pay forward a scholarship that changed his life. That 2,700-mile journey took 71 days, with Steinberg and his team raising more than $77,000 in donations for peace scholarships, raising global awareness about ocean conservation, and funding the collection and recycling of nearly 5,000 pounds of ocean plastic.
Now, after suffering a heart attack in July 2022, he’s at it again, this time making an even longer solo trip to address the crisis of ocean plastics. “After completing my first expedition, I couldn’t forget all the plastic I saw at sea,” he said in a statement after his first expedition. “It was such a pristine environment yet filled with trash from around the world. The oceans are at a tipping point. There was so much plastic, it was heartbreaking. We’re never going to clear microplastics from the middle of the ocean. We have to prevent it from getting there in the first place.There will be more plastic than fish in the oceans by 2048, unless we act now. Effective, low-cost solutions exist. We just need to scale them to the most plastic-polluting regions.”
Reports from the wave-crashing field:
Tez’s Journal Entry: Day 7: At 11:30 AM last Tuesday I rowed out of Waikiki yacht club, serenaded by Hawaiian chants for safe passage. I rowed along the south side of Oahu all day, and as darkness fell, the escort boat that came along with me pulled up to bid farewell. I was sad to see them go.I shouted over, through a lump in my throat, “Go home and hug the people you love!”
First video blog entry: “It’s difficult to adjust to mentally. Very difficult to adjust to and I’ve struggled a lot. But I’m feeling like myself again!”
“5 Points of Resilience” (penned along the blistering way):
Shoulder injury & sun blistered hands: Within the first few days at sea, Tez tweaked his shoulder, and the sun blistered his hands so badly that it hurt to touch anything. Those are probably the top two places you don’t want to injure in the beginning of a rowing expedition. Luckily, Tez’s trainer was able to get him some exercises and he made some fast progress. Turning to the beauty of the ocean and the awe of nature for inspiration was an easy reminder of why he’s out there.
Major tiller arm and oar repairs: A wave hit the boat at night, knocking it to its side, trapping an oar underwater. When the boat righted itself, the oar snapped up and split. Tez was strapped inside the cabin just hoping the repairs would be manageable. He solved this conundrum by using one of his railings as a new oar. Not ideal that an oar was gone so soon into the expedition but a necessary obstacle to overcome. But…the weather of the Pacific wasn’t done testing his mental toughness. Tez was rowing some big waves, up to 25 ft. On one of the big days, Tez was able to get the boat to clip along at 13.5 knots (about 15 mph) “at first it was fun until it wasn’t fun” (Day 29). A wave broke the tiller arm, a key piece of equipment on the boat. It became a headache for weeks, and still to this day presents a challenge for him.
Battling intense weather: A big theme is the weather. Tez never expected to lose his cool about it, but on Day 29, he reached a boiling point. In his video journal post, Tez says: “This week was very hard mentally and physically…and I lost it a little bit. I found myself shouting into the wind on many occasions having lost my temper. My voice said: ‘Hey Tez if this is how you’re going to use me I’m out of here.’ I lost the right to use my voice. Thankfully, calmer minds have prevailed, and my voice and I are getting back together.”
On Day 58, the winds became too strong and too dangerous to continue rowing, and on Day 63 a cyclone hit, forcing him to deploy his underwater parachute anchor. As Day 83 dawned in the Coral Sea, the wind and waves were still too much to row. So, Tez made some figurative lemonade and took care of projects on the boat like sewing, cleaning the deck, and organizing. “All I gotta say about sewing, if you think it’s difficult to put a thread through the eye of a needle, try doing it while you’re rocking back and forth with 20 knot winds and getting splashed.”
Battling intense heat: The heat is tough to deal with also. The rainstorms have a beauty and grandeur in them that Tez is comfortable with and has come to respect and appreciate. Conversely, the heat and the calm seas, he says, are oppresive. It is difficult to cool off because the water is body temperature; jumping in doesn’t bring much relief. The heat is creating so much sweat, Tez is struggling to keep his clothes free from mold but has found some creative ways to kill the mold. By wrapping his water jugs in his wet shirts, he’s able to keep his water a little cooler and use the UV from the sun to kill the mold on the shirts. Two birds with one stone! Tez does have one luxury onboard…his fan. The little power he can spare from his navigation equipment and essential systems goes to his cabin fan. At the start of the row, he couldn’t use it from the lack of sun but now relishes the moments he gets to use it.
Managing mental health: Tez knew the mental hardships of being solo for so long were going to be hard. The three main things that have helped him have been: Focusing on what is within his control: “I can’t change the wind and waves just how I react to it”; finding things to stay productive and focusing on micro goals: “I am focusing on getting the next ¼ minute west”; and creating a mantra ‘this will have a happy ending’: “With conditions that are downright scary, I can go in with some more confidence, courage, and optimism. I can quit, but not today!”
Saving the Ocean from Plastics
He also has the mission of ending the flow of plastic to the ocean. When Tez started United World Challenge it wasn’t only about setting goals and inspiring people to overcome the barriers we put up in ourselves, but to bring awareness to the issue that concerns every single living person on Earth…the crisis of plastic flowing into the ocean.
Along the way, Steinberg plans to gather critical data for ocean research, including ocean temperatures and their impact of the ocean plastic crisis for researchers at Scripps Institution of Oceanography; eDNA data to help show the impact of microplastics on marine health; and information to help answer the mystery of where most ocean plastic goes (up to 90% of ocean plastic is categorized as “missing”). His United World Challenge nonprofit is also running a global crowdfund to invest in infrastructure projects with partner Sungai Watch to prevent the flow of plastics into the ocean in Indonesia.
The mission of United World Challenge (UWC) is to accelerate solutions for the ocean plastic crisis and inspire a more courageous world. Partnering with Sungai Watch, the world’s leading river barrier catchment solution, donations to UWC goes to building effective, low-cost solutions to plastic pollution.
“We take great pride in supporting Tez on this mission, as he not only navigates the vast expanse of the ocean but also carries with him a crucial tool for marine research – the SeaKeepers’ Neuston Net,” said Jay Wade, president of sponsor
Every dollar donated to United World Challenge stops 30 bottles worth of plastic entering the Pacific Ocean. Tez has seen more plastic than marine life on this Expedition. He’s rowing 5,000 miles to raise awareness and build solutions to this global crisis. Donate to United World Challenge today and help secure the future health of our oceans. https://unitedworldchallenge.givingcircles.io?r=media
The Steinberg Backstory
The Steinberg Backstory
Steinberg’s journey to cross the Pacific a second, longer time in the name of saving the ocean from plastic is almost as long as the expedition itself. After suffering from depression in college, a friend invited him to join him in his first-ever triathlon. He did so with gusto, over the next 10 years competing in two Ironmans, 46 marathons, a 145-mile non-stop ultramarathon, and a solo bicycle tour of the UK and Ireland. At the same time, he became one of the youngest-ever delegates to attend the World Economic Forum, earned an MBA from London Business School, and became a Fellow of the Ellen MacArthur Foundation and member of New York’s Explorers Club. In 2016, his father committed suicide, inspiring him to row across the Pacific from California to Hawaii in 2020.
He refers to his craft of weaving adventure, business and storytelling as “endurance art,” saying that navigating each challenge in his life, both professional and personal, has propelled his drive to make the world a better place. “I believe we all have an ‘ocean’ to cross, and the United World Challenge is my mission to inspire others to find their ocean and the courage to cross it,” he said as part of his mission statement.
He admits that this crossing will likely be more harrowing than his first one to Hawaii; it’s nearly twice as long and even more exposed. He anticipates facing towering waves, tropical storms, and temperatures hitting more than 100 degrees F. for months on end. A few things he’s bringing on this trip that he didn’t on the last include a wider diversity of food to maintain better nutrition, a desalinator so he can drink the ocean, and an Automatic Identification System (AIS) that displays other vessels in the vicinity to help avoid collisions. While he’ll be alone the whole time, he plans to document the journey for a film on the endeavor while also sending out blogs, photos and videos in real time for his followers.
But his work is cut out for him. “It’s definitely a bigger step into the unknown,” said Denver-raised Dave Shively, former editor of Canoe & Kayak magazine and author of “The Pacific Alone—The Untold Story of Kayaking’s Boldest Voyage,” detailing Ed Gillet’s 1987 first-eve, 63-day, solo kayak crossing from California to Hawaii. “Only a few unsupported, solo rowers have ever launched to successfully cross the Pacific west and south from Hawaii—and only making it as far as Tarawa and the Marshall Islands. Though a handful have made the full, 7,000-plus-mile crossing from the North American mainland to Australia—three in the last eight years since Peter Bird’s 294-day crossing in 1982—I think that’s a testament to the technical advances of the boats and on-board navigation and communication systems.”
And he points out that while Gillet made his crossing to Hawaii in a modified stock kayak with no functional communication system and using a sextant to navigate, today’s efforts are taking place in customized, built-to-spec, sleep-aboard “super crafts.” In the last four years, he added, the once seemingly untouchable solo paddle to Hawaii has been done in a super craft kayak (2022, Cyril Derreumaux in 92 days); SUP (2019, Antonio de la Rosa in 77 days); and even a kite-like inflatable wing (2022, Chris Bertish in 48 days). “But all that being said, even with the support of connected and super-capable craft to help stack the chances in his favor, Tez has got to pull every single time on the oars, care for himself physically, and weather every storm, externally and internally, to cope with the daily mental struggle to stay motivated and problem solve,” he said. “It’s a fascinating drive to want to go that much farther having accomplished his initial goal. I’ll certainly be following his efforts.”
And potential records or not, Steinberg’s main purpose remains plastics over any sort of paddling pedestal. “Research shows that unless we change course, we’ll have more plastic in our oceans than fish by 2050,” he stated after finishing his first trip, stressing a goal to raise funds to build river barriers in the world’s most polluted regions, preventing plastic from flowing out to sea. “The ocean plastic crisis is a monumental threat, not only to marine life, but to our entire world. It feels insurmountable, but like I remind myself, one oar stroke doesn’t seem to make a difference, but two million strokes will take me across the Pacific. Consistent, tiny actions show that no ocean is too great to cross.”