Female US rower completes historic solo journey from California to Hawaii

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026/jul/04/california-hawaii-rowing-solo-journey

by speckx • 11 days ago

325 106 11 days ago

theguardian.com

drsalt2• 11 days ago

great how the article doesn't explain any of the interesting aspects of this

rsstack• 11 days ago

Her rowboat is fascinating: https://yourowkelsey.com/ https://yourowkelsey.com/about/

drsalt2• 11 days ago

then write about it in the article

oatmeal1• 11 days ago

Yeah, it is cool, but this article is not HN appropriate.

justinhj• 11 days ago

There's a good book "The Pacific Alone" about a guy that did this in a kayak

yieldcrv2• 11 days ago

Why do these extreme rowing and sailing boats look so weird

Its always a form factor I’ve never seen before

Where can I learn more about this scene?

thephyber• 11 days ago

It’s an ocean-going row boat with 2 cabins. Most row boats you’ve seen are probably hyper-light and designed for still water.

The model of this boat:

https://www.rannochadventure.com/boats-2/r25

nephihaha• 11 days ago

Because there are big waves in the open ocean and people need to sleep?

yieldcrv2• 10 days ago

is that guess or the answer with a question mark?

jtokoph• 11 days ago

I always assumed it was because they had storm resistant cabins for sleeping and supply storage.

Daily use boats probably don’t need as much in that respect.

bluGill3• 11 days ago

It's about a compromise. You need enough space for all the food and whatever other supplies you need on the way. You want enough stability that it's not going to capsize in whatever waves. Remember that a storm could come up. Her boat has solar panels and a navigation system and other things which are certainly nice to have but not required. I would expect she has some sort of radio on board.

The Polynesians appeared to have used basically canoes with an outrigger to row across the ocean. I'm not an expert on Polynesians, though, and how they got across the ocean. So if someone is an expert, please correct me.

ianburrell• 11 days ago

Later Polynesians used double-hulled voyaging canoes. Calling them canoe is stretching the word since they were large. We would call them catamarans. But can see the progression from outrigger canoes.

vmg12• 11 days ago

I used to row and even the tiniest of waves could make it annoying. You'd slide to the front of your seat and try to insert your oar and catch air instead of water. Then if you overcompensated by trying to insert your oar farther in you'd catch a crab (having the oar ripped out of your control). This is on a lake with tiny waves.

Rowing across an entire ocean is absolutely amazing.

herodoturtle2• 11 days ago

Fellow rower here, affirming the above.

Thought folks would be interested in her boat, built for ocean rowing:

https://yourowkelsey.com/about/

3eb7988a16632• 11 days ago

That page was disappointingly sparse. I wanted pictures of the interior - what does it look like to sleep, how much space when it is fully packed with food, is there any accommodations for the bathroom, or do you just go over the edge, etc.

AlotOfReading• 11 days ago

I wonder if it's as much of an issue with those big boats at sea. The wavelength gets pretty long off the continental shelf, so I imagine it's a lot less adjustment than lake waves, with the exception being storm conditions you should probably avoid anyway.

CharlesW2• 11 days ago

It's kind of buried here, but Kelsey is the fastest human to do this. She beat the male record holder's time by 6 days.

js23• 11 days ago

In endurance running, the longer races become, the more competitive they are for women. Women semi-regularly win multi-day and 100+ mile races, even if women don't have course records at these times/distances. In an event of sufficient time/distance, factors besides strength dominate the outcome.

So, (and knowing very little about rowing), I am not surprised that a woman could take the record here. You can only row so fast. Other factors like weather, currents, nutrition, mental fortitude, navigation, and boat design overcome muscle strength.

All that said: props to Kelsey Pfendler! She definitely knows how to embrace the suck.

Here's a nice diary of her trip:

https://www.kcra.com/article/kelsey-pfendler-record-breaking...

Love these updates:

Day 21: Kelsey gave an update on a lesson learned about her mental state, saying she had beaten herself up for sleeping in. But she realized that wasn't productive thinking. "When you're out here, you're not in control," she said. "You are in control of you." She said she realized that the way to respond to problems is much more important than the problem itself.
Day 44: Kelsey could see O'ahu as she closed in on her goal. "If any part of this made at least one person feel a little bit more powerful in their own skin, I couldn't ask for anything else and I'm happy," she said. "Think about trying to find your own big, hard, scary thing. You might not think that you are strong enough to finish it right now, but you're definitely strong enough to start it and you'll find everything else along the way."

stackghost• 11 days ago

Other factors like weather, currents

I'd be interested to know how much progress she made/lost due to drifting overnight. I feel like that alone would have a drastic impact. It would really suck to check your GPS track in the morning to discover you'd lost a day's progress overnight.

tick_tock_tick2• 11 days ago

I think you're confusing limited participation and what such a small group of people doing these events means for single individuals to "win" an event. Women are more like to win in these events then others because there is less competition overall so you get more anomalous results rather then the male biological differences stop dominating the outcome.

You are right in that "strength" isn't the dominating factor for these events or why males go so much faster/farther but rather VO2 max and for peak athletes males normally maintain a good 10% lead due to biological factors.

The male vs female 100 meter:

9.58 vs 10.49 = female record is 9.5% longer to run

Male vs female 200 meter:

19.19 vs 21.34 = female record is 11.2% longer to run

Male vs female 50km

2:38:43 vs 2:59:54 = female record is 13.35% longer to run

The difference also doesn't really change once we start going really long either

6 hour: 98.5km vs 85km male ran 15% farther

12 hour: 177.410 vs 153.600 male 15.5% farther

24 hour: 319.614 vs 278.621 male 14.7% farther

48 hour: 485.099 vs 436.371 male 11.17% farther

6 days: 1045.519 vs 928.577 male 12.6% farther

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ultramarathon scroll down to the male vs female records.

mariusor• 10 days ago

Same with cycling. Earlier this year, in June, Leah Wilcox's attempt at setting the record for circumnavigating the globe by bike with support was interrupted by the heat wave that hit Europe. She already holds the record for the unsupported circumnavigation and as far as I know she was more or less on track of surpassing Mark Beaumont's record of 78 days and change.

Someone• 11 days ago

It’s quite an accomplishment, but this is done rarely (https://oceanrowing.com/statistics lists less than a thousand completed rows world-wide), and the weather hugely affects how long it will take to do it.

Also, my geographical knowledge may be lacking, but it appears “to Hawaii” is essential here.

https://oceanrowing.com/filter?id=1415 shows a row from Monterey to Hanalei, Kauai in 32 days. That’s in the state of Hawaii, too, but about 200km closer.

swolios• 11 days ago

This was only completed one other time by the male who was doing it for a fundraiser and not to set a record.

CharlesW2• 11 days ago

I'd just note that (1) Rob did set a record whether or not he meant to¹, and (2) Kelsey also did not intend to break the men's record.

¹https://www.guinnessworldrecords.com/world-records/384202-fa...

a-uz• 11 days ago

Kārlis Bardelis has rowed the Pacific, India and South Atlantic Oceans and cycled everything in-between. https://www.guinnessworldrecords.com/news/2025/11/record-bre...

ChrisArchitect• 11 days ago

Previously: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48790512

mobilemidget• 11 days ago

All i think about when people row, kayak or swim these distances in these waters is 'SHARKS'. Which i read and saw enough about that the chances of meeting one isnt that big, but my brain still associates these activities/areas with it.

echoangle• 11 days ago

I thought sharks only attack stuff that looks like wounded animals. Would a shark really attack a boat?

hahahaa3• 11 days ago

They attack surfcraft. Not sure if they'd go for a bigger vessel though.

antonymoose• 11 days ago

Do sharks have a history of attacking small vessels? I’ve had dolphins mess with my kayak over the years so I can believe it.

ludwigschubert• 11 days ago

(I was replying to a child comment on fear of deep waters, seemingly deleted?)

I’ve heard this sentiment before, and can sort of intellectually follow, but man. I love scuba diving, I love the ocean and its varied and alien and multi-scale inhabitants. I’ve spent weeks on a live-aboard boat explicitly to seek out megafauna like sharks and rays (same subclass as sharks).

When I start my descent, I love to turn around and see my exhaled air bubble up, up towards the sun rays in the top layer of the water that slowly fade further away as the pressure on my ears builds and I enter the unknown ocean. It’s the most relaxing feeling, and I often remember it to go to sleep.

How beautifully individual our preferences can be. :-)

openasocket• 11 days ago

Curiously, I relate to both. I have a certain degree of fear or trepidation of sharks when swimming in the ocean. I feel vulnerable, and keep imagining a shark coming up under me or behind me. But I’m also a certified diver and have exactly none of those fears when diving or snorkeling! I think it’s because I have reduced awareness of what’s around me when swimming in the surface. In a sense it’s coming from the same place as a fear of the dark.

jjcm7• 11 days ago

One fun thing you get to do in long distance outrigger canoe races in hawaii is crew changes.

Generally, outrigger races have 6 people in the boat and a 9 person team. An escort boat will hold your reserve people, and then drop them in front of the canoe when you need to swap people out.

The problem is that you need to drop people around 200m in front of the canoe so the canoe can have enough time to prep for the crew change, but with that distance, the wave height can obscure the crew from the person steering.

The solution? If you're the one being dropped, you're expected to splash violently. Create as much splash as possible so the canoe can see you, even behind a wave.

The fun part is what gives signal to the canoe is the same thing that gives signal to sharks. Our coach used to say the adrenaline helps us in the race.

anamax• 10 days ago

I wonder why a balloon or an extra-long safety sausage wouldn't work.

shellfishgene• 11 days ago

Watching the videos on the race I was surprised that "Marlin strike", where Marlin fish poke holes with their bill in the hull, seems to be a problem at least now and then. There was a scene where they epoxy the hole with part of the bill still sticking into the vessel.

jjav2• 11 days ago

This boat isn't your regular kayak, it is larger than a great white shark (although certainly not heavier).

ProjectArcturis• 11 days ago

I wonder what was going on in her life that made her say, "I want to spend the next 43 days rowing alone across the ocean."

lkjdsklf• 11 days ago

This isn’t the first time she’s done it.

She spent 41 days making the same trip with 2 other people

fuzzfactor• 11 days ago

I admire the ambition which likely preceded the trip over a long enough term to make the conclusive 43-day journey end up as the smaller amount of calendar time.

But that which obviously means the most from the standpoint of fulfillment :)

rr808• 11 days ago

Usual answer is to get away from the wife (or partner), but she doesn't seem married so I'm baffled...

bluGill3• 11 days ago

If you're young and not married, it sounds like a fun trip I'd love to make. I've done various canoe trips through like the Boundary Waters, but I've never been able to take off enough time from work to pull this off.

This is one of those cases where getting started is hard, but once you get started you probably can do more if you want it because you get a reputation and people will sponsor you. You end up in a lot of cases your job is to get sponsors for this trip and you live in the meantime cheaply just earn enough money that you can afford to take off a couple months to do these things.

That said, it probably isn't all that expensive. You do need to get a canoe, but those are not terribly expensive. You need enough food to last this long. The ideal way is if you're living with your parents or some other situation where you can just stop paying rent while you're on the trip. A large part of living expenses are things that she would not have when she's out on the ocean. Also, if th if this is your goal you're probably living for that so you might be working two jobs to raise money for the trip and then you quit both jobs, take your trip and then you go back to work.

fasterik• 11 days ago

"Because it's there"

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Mallory

Some people are just driven to do things for the accomplishment. I don't think we need more psychologizing than that.

hahahaa3• 11 days ago

I'd look at evolution. Some people need to explore the new terrain in search of resouces while others keep the camp running.

dsign• 11 days ago

A few years ago I bought a SUP and there was a motto on it "life is easy: just add water". I've done enough with that SUP to learn that the motto is actually true. I can imagine some people take it to the "life is great: just add an ocean" extreme.

mailship• 11 days ago

kelsey still holds the record btw, but yeahh another runner up is insane

reenorap• 11 days ago

I happened upon her via Instagram around day 10 and watched her every day. It was really interesting watching her go through this every day and her authentic posts about what she was feeling. It’s truly great seeing people achieve their goals like this, she is amazing!

koolba• 11 days ago

That’s incredible.

What does one eat and drink on a trip like this? The article talks about her cooking. With a fire or one of those little butane stoves?

Can a small canoe carry enough water for a trip like this or do you rely on rain water too?

bluGill3• 11 days ago

I don't know how to verify it, but I've been told that drinking seawater is acceptable to do and is just enough to keep you alive.

If I were to do it though, I would invest in some water filters which are fairly cheap and can remove a lot of things that you wouldn't want to be drinking.

varenc• 11 days ago

This is false. Sea water is >3% salt and human kidneys can't produce urine with that much salinity or greater. Since they need more water to extract that much salt, the net effect is dehydration. This rower probably had a desalination machine, or just a big reservoir of fresh water.

(Though there might be some obscure edge case, and if you're about to die of dehydration that a little bit of seawater will buy you a minuscule amount of more time? doubt it)

eichin• 11 days ago

I recall one article mentioning that there's desalination gear on board (that's what the solar panel is for?)

Izikiel432• 11 days ago

No, you die faster if you drink seawater.

Every account of people stranded at sea that survived points to them getting hydrated through rainwater, or fish/turtle blood that they hunted, or even dirty non salty water enemas.

FeteCommuniste• 11 days ago

Portable desalinators exist.

hahahaa3• 11 days ago

Solar and pump based options I think

edm0nd2• 11 days ago

its not small at all. its 21 feet long.

she also has solar panels on it. probably just a lil stove she has somewhere.

mcpherrinm2• 11 days ago

She posted a video of her food loadout on instagram. It looked like a lot of dehydrated meals, and also a lot of peanut butter and tortillas.

Here's a video of a day's food: https://www.instagram.com/reel/DZd8V8BtGbH/

She said she has two desalinators - one hand-pump and another electric, plus emergency water bottles to last a few days.

SwellJoe2• 11 days ago

My first thought on hearing about this was, "what's that boat like? I wanna see the boat."

Not to take away from Pfendler's incredible achievement. She's amazing. But, I'm the kind of nerd that immediately went to "surely that is a logistical nightmare, how are you going to carry enough supplies for months at sea in a boat that a human being can propel across the ocean at a decent speed?" It's a bigger boat than I imagined, at 21 feet long and 5.5 feet wide, and 730 pounds. It also has cabins at either end for storage and sleeping.

She gives a brief tour of the inside of the boat here: https://www.instagram.com/p/DZBUJ2VJvp_/

And, she also discusses some of the technical problems she had in some other videos in the series, like not being able to run her desalination machine because not enough sun and having to dip into her emergency water rations.

The athletic side of a thing like this is incredible, but I always want to know the logistics.

mikelowski• 11 days ago

She should've brought sunscreen.

3eb7988a16632• 11 days ago

Until that video, I was thinking, "Yeah, this would be a really cool thing to do." Then I heard that awful racket of the navigation system bringing constant misery to the entire experience.

Also, it was adorable seeing her stuffed animals. Whatever it takes to stay sane over six weeks.

SwellJoe2• 11 days ago

I would have replaced the stuffed animals with enough insulation to stuff in that compartment to make the autopilot reasonably quiet. That's no way to live for that long. If it were a regular sound, it'd be miserable but at least you'd get used to it, but it's just randomly heaving and wheezing all the time with no rhythm at all. The worst kind of noise.

MYEUHD• 11 days ago

How does a small boat cross the ocean without sinking when waves can be over 30 meters tall[0]?

[0] https://recon.sccf.org/parameters/wave-height

clort• 11 days ago

sealed compartments. harness and tether for outside equipment and personnel.

jjcm7• 11 days ago

I've done open ocean crossings in canoes between the hawaiian islands, so I can answer from experience.

Don't think of these waves like the ones you encounter at shore. Open ocean waves are moving mountains.

It isn't this: /(

It's this:

        .,-~^^~-,.    
  ___.-/          \-.__

_doctor_love• 11 days ago

Seriously credit to you on that ASCII art. I grew up sailing and you captured it beautifully. Well done.

xyst• 11 days ago

Impressive feat. I doubt hn readers could last a single week in wilderness let alone a couple months at sea.

jjcm7• 11 days ago

This is no joke. I've done the crossing from Moloka‘i to Oahu (~45 miles) in a canoe several times, and those open ocean waves can get very nasty (largest I've dealt with were around 15m tall). I can't imagine the mental endurance required here, let alone the physical. My longest crossing took 9 hours, and I was completely drained by the time I touched shore. 44 days is absolutely insane.

Such a huge accomplishment.

amelius• 11 days ago

I mean, it's 1/10th of the circumference of the entire planet. Crazy.

gpm5• 11 days ago

Canoeing 15 meter waves!? I've bailed off of lakes at like 2 foot waves for fear of swamping (admittedly fully laden canoes, but still).

Are you just using standard open canoes you'd use on a lake (potentially with some air bladders to keep from swamping?), or something special for this?

moab9• 11 days ago

Large rolling ocean waves CAN be very gentle, especially compared to lake chop. I've done both in very small craft. Chop is scary.

Izikiel432• 11 days ago

Not 15 foot, 15m. 15feet ~ 5m, so 45 feet ~ 15m

jjcm7• 11 days ago

Quoting this comment: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48875676

Don't think of these waves like the ones you encounter at shore. Open ocean waves are moving mountains.
It isn't this: /(
It's this:

        .,-~^^~-,.    
  ___.-/          \-.__

The canoes are outrigger canoes specifically designed for open ocean wave surfing. They're made to ride these mountains. There are air bladders in the front and the back, and the canoes are easily recoverable when (not if) you flip.

This vid shows off the canoes on a small ~4' wave: https://youtu.be/deIpUyBp_6Y?t=251, but the mechanics are the same.

WalterBright• 11 days ago

Putting an outrigger on your canoe will make it much more seaworthy.

jjav2• 11 days ago

Ocean swell height doesn't matter much, the period does.

A 10ft swell on a 30 second period is nothing, a 10ft swell on a 5 second period you're going to have a bad day.

discordance• 11 days ago

This guy has rowed from America to Australia, SE Asia and I think he has just reached the Seychelles in the last few days:

https://www.instagram.com/adventureaaron/

duxup• 11 days ago

A lot of these long crossings seem to involve a serious amount of chance as far as conditions go.

KellyCriterion2• 11 days ago

How does it work when she needs to sleep and not loose track?

jfaat2• 11 days ago

I saw some of her videos on instagram during the journey. There's a rudder that keeps the boat pointed in the right direction without propulsion while she sleeps.

KellyCriterion2• 11 days ago

But doesnt it "drift away" if there is no propulsion?

wolvoleo2• 11 days ago

I have to watch that. I can't comprehend how someone can live in a canoe for 44 days let alone bring enough supplies to survive.

edm0nd2• 11 days ago

its not a standard canoe you see people going down rivers on. She has a heavily modified one and its kinda large

pic of it: https://imgur.com/eiESZzT 21 feet long

wolvoleo2• 11 days ago

Oh ok wow. That makes rowing that behemoth all the way there even more impressive

dmix• 11 days ago

News coverage showing her boat: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-D5XrFQHCuE

trashface• 11 days ago

This rower also has some best-in-class publicists since I have been reading headlines about it for a week

LastTrain• 11 days ago

Rowing across the Pacific Ocean faster than anyone has ever done it is some pretty good PR on its own!

plorg• 11 days ago

It is interesting to see this comment section be both more upset about a perceived threat to bioessentialist stereotypes and specifically more sexist in assumption than the reddit thread I saw the story in.

advael• 11 days ago

All I'll say is that this is the place on the internet I have seen the largest percentage of people who have an opinion on OOP at all also have that opinion be positive

Coincidence? You decide

hereme888• 11 days ago

“Think about trying to find your own big, hard, scary thing. You might not think that you are strong enough to finish it right now, but you’re definitely strong enough to start it, and you’ll find everything else along the way. I’m going to go finish my big, hard scary thing.”

Female US rower completes historic solo journey from California to Hawaii

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