An Evening of Conversation with Cole Brauer
We are thrilled to host an evening with the incredible Cole Brauer! We will discuss her new book, First Light, which recounts her remarkable story of 130 days spent alone at sea as the first woman to sail solo around the globe.
The event will include an interview followed by an audience Q&A.
Tickets: $28 (admission w/ book), $17 (general admission)
Note: Tickets are non-refundable but can be transferred, if you are unable to attend.
About First Light:
“Cole Brauer’s story is a must-read for every young woman with a dream. It’s an inspirational look at navigating challenges and life-changing adventures.”
—Billie Jean King, sports icon and equality champion
In 2024, Cole Brauer became the first American woman to race solo around the world, in a forty-foot sailboat named First Light. For 130 days, she navigated mechanical breakdowns, debilitating food poisoning, and the Southern Ocean’s extreme cold. Yet, amid the isolation, she found breathtaking sunrises, impromptu dance parties, and a life-changing sense of peace.
First Light recounts the intimate details of this historic circumnavigation, but it isn’t the typical story of conquering the elements. Instead, it is a memoir of a woman who moved into the most remote environment on Earth and made herself a home. For years, Brauer navigated the rigid hierarchies of a traditionalist sport, facing a relentless tide of skepticism from a world that often tried to ground her before she even left the dock. Out at sea, she didn’t just race 27,000 miles; she proved her critics wrong, reframing one of the world’s most grueling solo races as an act of joyful resistance.
First Light is a reckoning with what it means to belong—in a male-dominated field, in a high-speed world, and within yourself. Unfiltered, exhilarating, and deeply personal, it is a testament to the resilience required to stay true to yourself when the world wants you to stay small. Brauer invites us all to find presence in a noisy world, believe in the impossible, and see the horizon not as a boundary but as a hearth.
About Cole Brauer:
Cole Brauer is a record-breaking American professional sailor who finished second in the grueling 2023–2024 solo race around the world. Brauer and her work have been featured in The New York Times and on Today and CNN. A University of Hawai‘i graduate, she is a sought-after speaker for companies and organizations ranging from PJT to Kaiser Permanente, known for her candid storytelling and a philosophy of unvarnished grit. When she isn’t sharing her story on land, she is back on the water as a co-skipper for an IMOCA 60 team.