Big boat line up

Peter Campbell has a look at today's maxi showdown on Sydney Harbour

With only 13 days to go to the start of the 2005 Rolex Sydney Hobart Yacht Race, the battle for line honours in the ocean classic begins on Sydney Harbour this afternoon (Australian time) when three of the biggest boats in the fleet go head to head in the Big Boat Challenge.

This unique event, sailed around marks within the Harbour, will see the world’s two newest and fastest ocean racing maxi yachts, New Zealander Neville Crichton’s Alfa Romeoand Australia Bob Oatley’s Wild Oats XI, racing against each other for the first time.

The two multi-million dollar state-of-the-art yachts are 30-metres long, created by the same US design team of Reichel Pugh. They both have highly advanced canting keel and twin rudder systems.

Also competing is another 30m maxi, New Zealander Stewart Thwaites’ Konica Minolta, which finished second in the fleet in the 2003 Rolex Sydney Hobart.

Alfa Romeo, Wild Oats XI and Konica Minolta head a fleet of 17 boats, including the wellknown AAPT, Brindabella, Wild Joe, Loki, Vanguard and four former round the world race 60-footers, ABN AMRO, DHL, Ericsson and Seriously Ten.

Sailing her first race in Australian waters will be the British entrant for the Rolex Sydney Hobart, Hugo Boss, skippered by former solo round-the-world sailor Alex Thomson. The boat’s celebrity guest will be triple Melbourne Cup winning jockey Glenn Boss.

The Cruising Yacht Club of Australia’s Big Boat Challenge starts at 12.30pm off Steele Point, north of Shark Island, and takes the fleet on a course that includes rounding Fort Dennison, passing Bradley’s Heads and down the Harbour to near the Heads before finishing back near the Opera House.

The forecast is for a freshening 13 to 18 knot north-easterly sea breeze ahead of a southerly change late in the afternoon, giving the promise of a couple of spectacular spinnaker runs back up the Harbour from the first windward mark, the Junction Bell buoy near the Heads.