If you’re a member of OWRC, maybe you row a dozen miles a week. Give or take. If you’re Hunter Deuel you’re rowing way more than that. Hunter and her team, Horizon Racing, are preparing to endure the World’s Toughest Row, which will take them from Monterey, CA to Kauai, HI in June 2024.
The race course to Kauai is 2,800 nautical miles. By plane that isn't much. A human-powered boat will require an entirely different mindset. Because we’re optimistic on her behalf, if her team finishes in 33 days they’ll need to row about 85 miles a day, which doesn’t account for things like weather, wind and waves.
But let’s slow down a bit because you don’t just go from rowing a few times a week to wanting to row for a month straight in a tiny boat with three other people. (The teams’ rowing schedule will be two hours on and two hours off. 24/7)
Before rowing, Hunter was a gym rat. She lifted weights, played volleyball and threw the discus. When she didn’t make her high school volleyball team her dad signed her up for Learn-to-Row camp at Oakland Strokes. Hunter burst into tears when he told her. But you know how it is. Being on the water is transformative. “A lot of things came together,” she says. “Having the strength background, knowing how to apply it and my serious love for the water.”
Some of what she encountered may be what many of us experience in our own rowing. Hunter recounts reading “Blue Mind,” which explores why being in, on, or near the water has such a positive effect on our well-being. “For me being close to the water is like a religious experience. I feel the most grounded,” she says.
She loved it all. The process, the cardio, even the ERG. Her dad, who has water on his resume too, suggested she do a 2000k on the rowing machine. “It was addicting. It’s like a video game with high scores.”
Whether kismet or coincidence, the Oakland Strokes coach was also Cal’s rowing coach. Hunter attended UC Berkeley for an undergraduate degree in geography and rowed for the team throughout her four years. To reference another water book, “Boys in the Boat,” which centers on how eight men came together to win Olympic gold, for Hunter it was the same. “You individually earn your spot to be on the team. The team aspect is the end goal,” she tells me.
Hunter with her Horizon Racing teammates, Hannah Huppi and Philip Hoyle.
After university, Hunter strayed from rowing and found other ways to stay fit. Somehow, she got a call from a woman looking for an alternate rower for an endurance race. When she found out it was a three-month gig, she said, “No way.” But her name stayed on the list. When Hunter got another call, she was ready to say yes.
Hunter wanted to do something more endurance based, and she really wanted to do an ocean crossing. Some of it was from her childhood memories. Her dad did the “Transpac” yacht race in 1995. He was on the communications boat. Another good reason? “I didn’t think there would be a lot of times where this might crop up and I could do it.”
Maybe she’s also still young enough to do “crazy” things like this, but she’s not doing it lightly. “I love the aspect that if it’s important to you it’s important to me. I’m not going to be two minutes late to my shift,” she says. Those two minutes add up when you’re rowing every two hours.
Hunter and her teammates are taking sea survival courses, completing certifications, and entering long-distance races. They have an ocean rowing coach, and mental headspace coach. But there’s so much more. Horizon Racing is looking for more sponsors and Hunter is always looking for new people to train with.