BRUNSWICK (AP) – The sailor who hocked his house and ran up hundreds of thousands of dollars in debt preparing for an around-the-world solo race returned to Maine on Thursday to visit schoolchildren who followed his every move.

Bruce Schwab, who became the first American to complete the Vendee Globe with a ninth-place finish last month, said during a visit to Brunswick High School that he was proud of completing the race despite the debt and fatigue.

“It’s one thing to do a sailboat race if it’s just for yourself. But to know that people are getting something out of it, well that pretty much closes the circle on it,” said Schwab, a 43-year-old yacht rigger from Oakland, Calif. “And once I set a goal for myself, I went around every corner and turned over every stone.”

The Vendee Globe began Nov. 7 in France with boats sailing south to the Cape of Good Hope before heading into the treacherous Southern Ocean. The route took the sailors south of Australia and within a few hundred miles of Antarctica before rounding Cape Horn for the final run back to France.

Teachers and students used the Internet to follow the Vendee Globe and track Schwab’s sloop, Ocean Planet.

The Bigelow Laboratory for Ocean Science in Boothbay Harbor created Web-based classroom lessons based on the race.

Operating on a barebones budget and without insurance on his boat, which ultimately demanded that he sail “very conservatively,” Schwab said he and the nonprofit foundation setup to finance the race now owe about $450,000.

“I wound up having to seek individual support, and that grew more into just asking people for money. It grew into really bringing them along,” said the suntanned Schwab. “But I really want to get back on even footing.”

In the meantime, the personal experiences and connections to the students during the race have made the race rich in payoff, he said.

Alicia Young, a 12-year-old from Wiscasset, watched Schwab on the Web and corresponded with him over e-mail during the 109-day venture.

“The best was watching him sail and to finally see him finish,” said Young, one of about 200 students who listened to Schwab’s presentation in the high school auditorium, where a large banner read “Awesome Job Bruce.”

Before the race, Schwab became a fixture in Portland, where he made refinements to the wood-and-carbon fiber sloop at Portland Yacht Services. He plans to sail the vessel back to Maine in May or June, when the weather warms up.

Prior to Schwab, the only American to make a nonstop solo circumnavigation was Dodge Morgan of Harpswell, Maine, who did it in 1985-86 in 150 days.

Schwab’s trip came 13 years after fellow countryman Mike Plant was lost at sea during the race. Plant’s overturned Coyote boat was found by a container ship in the North Atlantic in the inaugural Vendee Globe in 1989-90.

Although it has limited following in the United States, the quadrennial Vendee Globe is watched closely by tens of millions of viewers worldwide. This year’s winner was Vincent Riou of France, who finished Feb. 2 in a record 87 days.

Schwab said he wasn’t sure whether he would sail the Vendee Globe again but has already turned his attention toward the Transat Jacques Vabre, a race from the western coast of France to Brazil.

“I have an open mind,” Schwab said.