The Oldham Man & The Sea

- (Narrator): There are some things you'd expect to find

-in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean:

an endless horizon,

pods of whales,

-rolling fog, and towering waves.

What you wouldn't expect

is a 70-year-old from Oldham.

- Do you think I'm too old for that?

That might help.

I get soft, don't I?

Faster!

Go!

My name is Frank Rothwell.

Whoa!

This year, I'm going to be 70 years old.

Backwards.

And to mark that,

I'm going to be rowing 3,000 miles

across the Atlantic Ocean…

solo.

Can I take my glasses off?

Because I don't think you should be interviewing me

with glasses on.

A day in which nothing is learnt is wasted.

I met this girl in the pub,

and she said she wanted to meet me

because her mate is rowing the Atlantic.

I said, "Get out of here. She's doing it single-handed."

I said, "She's crackers."

I get home. I can't sleep.

All I think about is rowing the Atlantic,

and I start looking it up.

What's it all about?

When's the best time to do it?

Who does it?

Do you do it single-handed?

Is it part of a race?

All that type of thing.

That was it. I was hooked.

-- (Narrator): Frank has always been an adventurous soul,

but at the point in life

-when most take their foot off the pedal,

-he went into adventure overdrive.

I met a bloke in 2000

who had just sailed the Atlantic.

I thought, "Wow!"

I thought you had to be really clever to do things like that.

I didn't think somebody like me could do it.

So that was it.

We went to Baltimore, set of, and sailed

across the Atlantic and carried on around the world.

-- (Narrator): But Frank being Frank,

-he had to sail around the world his way.

- Only 10 men in the world have ever done that.

But only one man has ever done it

in a figure of eight, and that's me.

-- (Narrator): He even shared a few gentle words of wisdom

to Bear Grylls

on Channel 4's "The Island."

- In life, it's always the same people

who stand in the door.

It's always them that fall over.

It's always them that crash the car,

skint on a Friday night going out with their mates.

It's always the same bloody people.

But also in life,

it's always the same people that do things.

Hey, give us a hug, you big man.

Would I do it again?

I would definitely do it again.

But don't tell my wife.

Judith!

Judith!

When I met Frank,

which was in 1967,

he had one pair of underpants.

I was the eldest of five children

in a working-class background.

We know what it's like to have to do without.

- Because his parents had no money whatsoever.

-- (Narrator): Frank didn't have money,

and after leaving school at 14,

-he didn't have qualifications either.

-But what he did have, in generous supply,

-was a tireless can-do spirit.

-Armed with self-taught engineering skills

-and a mind that rarely sat still,

-he built a string of successful businesses,

-from sleeping cabins for building sites

to pop-up car parks.

Through the '80s and '90s,

-Frank poured his heart, soul, and every spare hour

into his work.

But when he turned 50,

something began to shift.

- There were four friends who did the London Marathon.

Out of those four friends,

Frank was diagnosed with prostate cancer.

We had a friend die of cancer,

we've got a friend with leukemia,

who's also got dementia now,

and out of the four of them,

there's only one that's not been ill.

Life's too short, so do it while you can do it.

So I knew you when you were 50.

Obviously did the London Marathon

when he was 60.

He was sailing around the world, etc,

and then I knew that he was looking for something

when he was 70,

so this does not surprise me.

-- But while his previous achievements

are no doubt impressive,

rowing across an ocean

-is a whole different challenge.

-No one even thought it was possible until 1966,

-when two army paratroopers shocked the world.

- She'd made it.

-English Rose III had brought two daredevil paratroopers

-safely across 3,000 miles of ocean,

-from Cape Cod to Inishmore Island

off the Galway coast.

-When after 92 days of battling the gray Atlantic,

-a hero's welcome had been laid out for her crew—

-Captain John Ridgway and Sergeant Shea Blyth.

-For the two men who conquered the Atlantic in a rowboat,

it was certainly a long haul.

-But the daring twins' first words

on stepping ashore were,

"Oh boy, what a trip!"

-- (Narrator): To understand the true scale of Frank's challenge,

-since that momentous crossing 60 years ago,

fewer than 800 people

-have successfully rode the Atlantic,

-far fewer than have climbed Mount Everest.

-Held every year from early December,

solo rowers,

-or those in teams of two, three, and four,

set off from the Canaries

-in what's now known as the world's toughest row

-and race west for 3,000 miles en route to Antigua

in the Caribbean,

-an almost unimaginable test of strength and endurance.

-The entrants will be competing to achieve

-the fastest crossing in their class

-and, if conditions are kind to them,

a new world record.

I want to be in with the mix.

If I can achieve being the oldest man

to ever row in an ocean,

that'll do for me.

I'm not out there to win it.

I just want to complete it, not compete in it.

-- (Narrator): But before Frank can think about rowing anywhere,

he'll need a boat.

- I found out there's one real maker

of ocean rowing boats called Rannoch.

- Frank knocked on the door and said, "I want a boat."

He turned up on his three-wheeler motorbike

with his wife on the back, and it was hilarious.

- He came down and told us how to build the boat.

- I could see that this was going to be

a good thing to do.

Sometimes he's very direct.

"I want this, I want that."

- If you're not used to the northern mentality,

it could be taken badly.

He's a very confident person.

He knows what he's talking about.

- Frank definitely has that kind of DNA that Charlie and I had.

And crazy, crazy mad.

- Some of the things he was saying

definitely were relevant for him,

but I would never do myself.

- The boat are designed like gliders,

not like rowing boats.

The underside of it is as smooth as a baby's bottom,

and it's extremely light.

The finished boat is less than half a ton.

- They're reliable, and they're fast.

That's what I went along with.

-- (Narrator): With his boat being assembled,

-there's something else Frank needs to whip into shape—

himself.

- So I've been introduced to a bloke called Gus Barton

in London,

and I have a training regime which he has given me.

He says, "You're moving around all the time."

"You're moving around."

"Well, we've got to get your core strength."

So I'm doing all kinds of things, stretching,

all kinds of things on my hands and knees.

If it hurts and it's hard to do,

it's good.

I want to lose a bit of fat, and I want to gain muscle.

I'll tell you what I can feel.

It's when I come to a road junction,

and you've got to go right back.

I can see traffic now,

so I'm really, really happy with the way I'm coming on.