4 residents to row across Atlantic, study plastic footprint in ocean

Four adrenaline junkies in the UAE will row across the Atlantic Ocean in 27 days or less to break four world records and highlight the plastic problem damaging the marine life.
The rowers will set sail for the 'Row4Ocean' initiative on December 14 and will travel from Dakar to Paramaribo - a 2,305 nautical mile (4,268km) journey - and collect water samples every 100 nautical miles to analyse how much micro-plastic is present in the ocean.
The event, organised by the DP World, will have Patrick Bol, Andrew Ruinoff, Lews Knollman and Matt Wilds as the rowing team. They will sail onboard a custom-made carbon fibre and nomex boat, which has been named 'Year of Zayed'.
Rowing for a cause
"Why I'm doing this is because I don't like plastic in the oceans. I love the ocean and I've gotten to know it quite well when I sailed across the Pacific. The plastic in the ocean has become food for the fish and it's poisoning our environment. It's happening right next to us in the Indus River in Pakistan and it's polluting our fish from the Arabian Sea," Bol, who works as the director of global operations at the DP World, said. 
"We will bring back water samples laboratory tubes back home and we will find out how much micro-plastic we find in the ocean. I think some areas the results will be decent and surprising in other areas. There are 10 rivers that are causing 90 per cent of the plastic pollution in the world. We should raise more awareness about it."
Keeping healthy onboard
Each rower will be required to consume 5,000 calories every day in order to maintain the good health that is needed to row for continuous hours each day. 
Wilds said: "The food is a tough one but I think we have the right blend. The food is broken down into protein, carbohydrates and fat. The key with all of this is to have ideally a really high fat content, so nuts and fish. If you want to go for a record and be as efficient as possible, the best thing to do is have as much fat as possible. We need to have a lot of carbs after working out in the gym, protein for recovery and, obviously, fat. We have four to five freeze-dried meals. It's already cooked and you can put cold water and put it in the sun or you can add hot water into it. It actually tastes pretty good. There's a variety of different foods, curries and pastas."
sarwat@khaleejtimes.com