Kiwi sailor Oakley Marsh took a huge gamble in his final major race of the 2026 Figaro season, L'Aventura, unsure whether he and English co skipper Joss Creswell could make it pay.
For most of L'Aventura's second leg, the 783 nautical mile passage from Lagos back to Île d'Yeu, he and English co-skipper Joss Creswell were sailing at the back of the 20-boat fleet.
"We had a really bad start to our leg," Marsh said. "We made a bunch of bad decisions at the start of the race, and we actually ended up at the back of the fleet. When you're at the back of the fleet it's quite hard to come back, because all the boats in front of you are beating you to the right decisions, to the correct wind shift, to the right side of the course. You're kind of playing catch up, looking for little opportunities."
Yet the two co-skippers found enough opportunities to fight their way back into the pack by Cape Finisterre. Their position close to the Spanish coast, rather than offshore with the fleet leaders, then forced a rethink. The safer route home ran north across the Bay of Biscay, longer but backed by the more confident weather files. Boxed in against the Spanish coast, Marsh and Creswell instead committed to a shorter middle route that only held up if the forecast played out.
"It took a bit of guts, as other sailors said at the finish, to make this call," Marsh said. "We saw it as an interesting opportunity to test our knowledge, to test our skill, and to test this route." Only one other boat in the fleet took the same gamble, close enough on the water that the two crews drew confidence from each other.
With the rest of the fleet strung out beyond AIS range to the north, neither Digilab nor their rival could see where they stood against the other. "We didn't know where we were going to end up compared to the other boats," Marsh said. "It wasn't until about three hours before the finish that we actually found out that we're looking in pretty good shape."
Digilab crossed third on the leg. That lifted Marsh and Creswell to seventh overall in L'Aventura's 20-boat fleet, up from a leg one result that had them well off the pace into Lagos.
It's the last big Figaro race of Marsh's 2026 season, a season that started with a second-place finish at Le Défi Paprec in May, decided by 18 seconds after four days of Atlantic gales. In between, he became the sole Kiwi on the start line at the Tour de France à la Voile for the first time in 25 years, finished second overall on IRC aboard Palanad 4 in the Round Britain and Ireland Race, and turned around for L'Aventura within a fortnight of stepping off that boat at Cowes. Marsh rates the season for what it says about international sailors in a fleet that's still overwhelmingly French. "For an international to come over here and kind of beat the French at their own game, it's a really big achievement," he said.
Creswell has been alongside him for most of it, a partnership that now runs through Spi Ouest-France, the Tour de France à la Voile, Round Britain and Ireland, and L'Aventura. Through Round Britain and Ireland the pair sailed opposite watches, waking each other for handovers, and between the campaigns have logged around 15 days at sea together on the Figaro Beneteau 3 alone. "It's good to get in some training when you can," Marsh said.
With the Figaro season done, Marsh's focus shifts to the goal that has shaped his whole route into offshore sailing: a berth on an Ocean Race boat. It goes back to childhood, watching Mike Sanderson sail the Volvo Ocean Race into Wellington Harbour. "That's where the dream was created," he said. "For sure, everything I've done since then is going after that." He sailed the last edition as technical shore crew and rigger aboard Team Malizia, working the boat down the dock at each stopover rather than sailing it out. "Pushing the boat off every time didn't really sit right with me as a sailor," he said. Watching who made the crew lists that followed, most of them sailors who'd come up through the Figaro circuit, told him what he needed to do next.
He's not counting on any single door opening. Existing connections through the fleet, word of a new team he's keeping an ear out for more detail on, and the ordinary networking that offshore sailing runs on are all in play as he looks to be the Kiwi sailing into Auckland when the fleet next comes through. If a seat on an Ocean Race boat doesn't come together in time, the fallback is a return to the Figaro, solo this time. La Solitaire du Figaro, the class's biggest single-handed event, is next on his list, and Marsh, following in the footsteps of fellow Kiwi sailors Conrad Colman and Ben Beasley, would be only the third New Zealander to take it on, chasing the fleet's rookie title, the "Bizuth".
For now, the diary is open for the first time all year. Marsh is ready to travel for whatever comes up next, an Ocean Race leg or medal series berth, or a seat on a Sydney Hobart entry if one appears.
