I rowed from Lanzarote to Antigua at age of 70 – this is what it was like

Telegraph

30-04-2025

Bad weather, technical issues, exhaustion… Janine Williams and her crew-mates experienced a plethora of challenges on their 3,200-mile row from Lanzarote to Antigua, but she is unequivocal about the worst one.
'What I hated most was being on deck at night when there was no moon,' she reflects, a few weeks after reaching the finish line. 'I hated that shift. It was pitch black so you couldn't see what the waves were doing and I was in constant fear that I would injure my body.'
Yet it was also a night-time shift that provided the highlight of her 53 days at sea. On this occasion there was a full moon, phosphorescence glistening in the water, a shooting star in the sky and an electric storm on the horizon. 'It was magic, amazing,' she says. 'I'd never had an experience like that.'
Rowing across the Atlantic is a tough task for anyone but what makes Williams' feat even more impressive is her age. On reaching Antigua, the 70-year-old became the oldest woman to ever row an ocean.
Williams is keen to push back against the idea that people should slow down as they get older, and having spent much of her life on the water, either sailing dinghies or rowing in Celtic longboats off the coast of Pembrokeshire, she had often been asked about taking part in an Atlantic row. When it was proposed again three years ago by a team-mate at Neyland Rowing Club, she decided to bite the bullet.
'People over the years had said, 'Do you fancy doing the Atlantic?' and I just thought it would be horribly difficult and uncomfortable, but this time I thought, 'If I don't do it now, I won't ever do it',' she says. 'I just happen to be the oldest woman to do it – that wasn't the reason for doing it, I did it because I wanted to.
'Probably the best piece of it is seeing people's reactions and how older and younger people are really inspired by an older person doing something like that. If I'm able to inspire other women to carry on doing amazing things they didn't think they could do, that is cool.
'Something in society gives us the message, especially women, that we should slow down as we get older, but there is no reason to do that as long as you're sensible and careful. I'm part of a healthy-ageing research project and that shows the importance of keeping active.'
Williams was not the only person to set a record among her crew: Sophie Pierce, 32, became the first person with cystic fibrosis to row an ocean. With 24-year-old Miyah Periam and Polly Zipperlen, 50, completing the foursome, who have raised £20,000 for the Cystic Fibrosis Trust, Paul Sartori Hospice at Home and Emily's Entourage, there was a wide range of ages taking part.
However, the physical struggles they each experienced were similar, including muscle wastage from not being able to walk for more than 50 days, and weight loss.
Yet the toll the row has taken has not put septuagenarian Williams off undertaking another long-distance challenge. She is already planning to take on a EuroVelo route, which involves cycling nearly 3,000 miles from the Atlantic coast in France to the Black Sea in Romania. The expression 'age is but a number' has never felt more apt.