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| ?I'm still relatively young. You only get one crack at life and I want to experience as much as possible in my career.? |
Senior bankers who quit their jobs on the pretext of pursuing new interests often quickly emerge in a similar role. Not so Manfred Schepers, who left UBS last June after 17 years. He said he was leaving to consider new banking roles but that his first priority was a good break. He meant it.
Last autumn, instead of managing hundreds of people as vice-chairman of European fixed income, rates and currency at UBS, he was crewing on the 60-foot racing yacht Spirit, crossing the Atlantic from Gran Canaria to St Lucia in the ARC race.
?We were lucky as we had no bad weather but we had 16 on board working in two shifts and sharing eight bunks, so it was a bit smelly and wet,? he says. ?And because dehydrated food weighs less, I managed to lose seven kilos.? It was worth it ? Spirit won the race in a record time of 11 days, 12 hours.