Derek Hatfield


Derek Hatfield was a Canadian sailor, and the first Canadian to race solo twice around the world.

Biography

Hatfield attended Nackawic High School in Nackawic, New Brunswick, and then graduated from York University with a degree in Business Administration. He joined the RCMP in 1971. There, he rose to become a fraud investigator. In 1986, he was hired by the Toronto Stock Exchange to lead their auditors, as Manager of the Compliance Department.
Hatfield competed in several short-handed long-distance races around the turn of the century, for example:
Hatfield invested most of his pension monies in his 40-foot Spirit of Canada yacht, which he built himself along with friends and family.
Hatfield won Sail Canada's and Ontario Sailing's Sailor of the Year awards in 2003, after finishing first in class and 10th overall in the Around Alone race, and that after he had wasted nearly a month in Ushuaia, Argentina repairing the mast, which had snapped in three places during a storm off Cape Horn.
Hatfield was the subject of Adam Mayers's 2006 book Sea of Dreams: Racing Alone Around The World In A Small Boat.
In 2008 Hatfield became the first Canadian competitor in the Vendee Globe, but was forced to pull out when a large wave broke two of the mast spreaders on his new Open 60-class boat. The keel of the new boat had been laid in October 2004, and the boat was estimated to need 18,000 man-hours to complete. At the time, he had planned to compete in the 2006-07 5-Oceans Challenge. The hull, Canada's first Open 60, was indeed launched in Cobourg, Ontario on 9 September 2006. At the time, the keel, mast and rigging were scheduled to be assembled by spring of 2007.
At the age of 57, in 2010 he placed third in the VELUX 5-Oceans single-handed around the world race.
Hatfield lived in Mahone Bay, Nova Scotia, and he was involved in the Broad Reach Foundation for Youth Leaders, which aims to teach at-risk youth to sail.
Hatfield's death was described as "sudden", and being due to an infection acquired after surgery for throat cancer, which had been diagnosed in February 2016.

Achievements