Making Waves: Maddie Difazio-Wright's Experience Rowing the Atlantic and as a Woman in Property

RED Construction Group interviews Maddie Difazio-Wright , Vice-Chair of Women in Property South West, about her recent Atlantic rowing adventure detailing challenges, eco-conscious efforts, and reflects on being a woman in property.

What inspired you and your team to row the Atlantic?

We all love challenges and adventure in our own way. Grace is an athlete and had set herself a hat-trick of ultra-events for 2023, undertaking this row alongside completing Marathon de Sable and qualifying for the KONA Ironman World Championship. G is a water baby and grew up sailing ,so for her, rowing was the next adventure. For me, I’m always curious to learn something that I’ve never done before.?

What the most the challenging thing you had to overcome?

The race start date wasn’t confirmed until the day before we left. We were in the Canary Islands 2 weeks before the race start, preparing our boats, undertaking final tests, and checking our safety and communications equipment. Around a week ahead of the anticipated start date, we were told that the weather system approaching the Canary Islands may mean that the race start would be brought forward by 5 days. The weather system was so unpredictable that we ended up leaving a day later than the planned date and rowed straight into what we have since been told was one of the most technically challenging weather systems the race has ever seen.?

We were facing waves up to 15m high within days of starting the race. This was much easier to navigate during the day but was quite challenging at night where there were no moon or stars to help you see the oncoming waves. To give you an idea of speed, usually we’d be travelling at around 2 nautical miles per hour. There were times in our first few weeks where we got up to 17.9 nautical miles per hour! We got very wet!

During the first half of the race, we felt slightly dispirited that other teams seemed to have seen much more wildlife than we had. That was until New Year’s Eve when we were visited by an Atlantic Marlin approximately 4m long in full predatory mode hunting the yellow fin tuna fish that were sheltering under the rudder of our boat! The Marlin accidentally speared the hull of our boat creating 3 holes that water immediately gushed through, filling our hatches. The next few hours were spent on and below the boat trying to mend the holes and reduce the amount of water our boat was taking on. We did a good enough job patching the holes to continue with the race towards our finishing line in Antigua. We celebrated our DIY and welcomed in the New Year looking at the stars whilst sharing a bottle of champagne and a bar of Tony’s Chocolony.

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How did you minimise your impact on the ocean when you were out at sea?

The row was entirely human powered, and we always approached the challenge with the mindset that our adventure would not negatively impact the environment. From day 1 we could see the damaging impact of global warming on the unpredictability of the ocean and weather systems.?

We used a second-hand boat and we limited our use of single use plastic by using compostable plastic where possible and by using aluminium, which is more easily recyclable than plastic for our emergency water. We re-used as much second hand equipment as possible, and we collected ocean plastic enroute to help tackle the world ocean plastic and climate crisis.?

Even since being back on land, we all think twice about buying something wrapped in plastic since seeing first-hand how much plastic makes its way into the ocean.

What is your most memorable experience as part of being a woman in property?

The genuine support and encouragement I’ve received before and after this adventure! Being part of an industry who champion others, regardless of gender, is such a privilege. I’m lucky enough to be Vice-Chair of Women in Property South West this year.?Whilst gender is what currently defines our committee and membership, we don’t want it to define our industry reach. There’s so much more to all of us than gender - our ethnicity, culture and socio-economic backgrounds paired with our life experiences and hobbies all make for a richness and diversity that is critical to achieving.

Do you have any advice for women wanting to start a career in property?

I’ve been fortunate to have worked in a few industries and my advice regardless of gender or industry would be the same; aim to be curious, self-reflective, and pragmatic. Curiosity feeds learning, self-reflection helps you to carve your own path and pragmatism gets things done.