Wild Oats on track for treble

As mid-fleet boats fail to pick up time in Rolex Sydney Hobart

In a typical Rolex Sydney Hobart Yacht Race, one of the well-prepared mid-sized boats is generally a good bet for winning on handicap. For this reason DK46 Quantum Racing was seen as one of the strong favourites for this year, but the predominantly downwind conditions have played into the hands of the big boats. Line honours winner Wild Oats XI is looking increasingly likely to add the coveted Tattersalls Cup to Bob Oatley's trophy cabinet.

Despite impeccable boat preparation, along with victory in the Rolex Trophy during the build-up to this race, Ray Roberts could not get close to Wild Oats's handicap time. "I don't think we could have sailed a much better course than we did," said Roberts, "but the hard reaching and running doesn't suit this boat and that's why we weren't up in the money for this race. That's the luck of the draw. We'll be back again with this boat. Typically in this race you get a lot of hard beating and that's what this boat is excellent at."

At one point, however, Quantum Racing was in a lot of trouble. "One of our steering cables broke, and we did a few 360-degree circles in the middle of Bass Strait while we tried to set up some temporary steering. We laid the boat over and trashed a spinnaker while we tried to fix it. That incident dampened our spirits a bit, but the boys did a good job of getting things up and working again. When we got our confidence back in the steering, we had her hammering along nicely."

Another leading contender was Stephen Ainsworth's new 60-footer Loki. Like Quantum Racing she would probably have benefited from a more 'typical' race to Hobart, if there is such a thing. Even so, the conventional keelboat did well to beat other more radical 60 footers into Hobart, including the Open 60 Hugo Boss and the Volvo Ocean 60s Seriously 10 and ABN AMRO. Loki's boat captain Brad Kellett commented: "We knew we could beat Hugo Boss, but we are a little surprised because there's a massive weight difference. They're 8 tons and we're more like 12 tons. We're a conventional yacht. We rely on the crew for weight." Hugo Boss, on the other hand, has a canting keel and water ballast, but Alex Thomson had just 10 people on board. Kellett commented: "I think one of the benefits for us is that we had 16 guys to do all the work when we had things needing dealing with, whereas some of the other boats had much fewer."

All in all, Loki sailed a very clean race, Kellett said. "The hairiest moment was charging along in the pitch black with the kite up. We were doing 28 to 30 knots through the water. The whole boat was underwater at that stage. We took our kite down and went to jib top at that stage. We enjoyed our ride, that's for sure." As with Quantum Racing, the predominantly amateur crew on Loki will be back for another crack at the 628-mile course next year, in the hope that the Rolex Sydney Hobart will be back to its characteristic severity. "This boat was designed to win this race," said Loki's boat captain. "So this year is a little bit frustrating but at the end of the day, that's ocean racing."

Having just completed his 37th race to Hobart, race legend Syd Fischer (below) was again wondering why he continues to come back. "Must be stupid," he shrugged. "I think it's like women having a baby, they forget after a while."



Gerry O’Rourke, Irish owner of the new canting keel Cookson 50 Chieftain reckoned there should be a special line honours division for 50-footers when he crossed the line at 4:38am (local time) today.

To say O'Rourke was in a buoyant mood is an understatement. “Fluky conditions at the start in Sydney, fluky coming into Hobart, but we were very lucky to get a running Hobart and I believe only one in every ten could be a running Hobart,” he said. “The boat suited it so we did well - had a good race, enjoyed it, fantastic competition and great to see Australia and Tasmania. Mind you I’d have liked to see a little more of Tasmania when I came in.” Chieftain passed the great Tasmanian landmarks in the dead of night.

The conditions didn’t quite pan out as O’Rourke had expected. He tacked out about 150 miles off the coast so that he could come into Hobart on a gybe only to find the wind coming from a different direction than anticipated. “We ended up tight reaching in as opposed to running,” he said. "I thought I’d get her planing earlier but it’s good, it’s still all good. Any day you get a running Hobart it’s good, you know. We touched 24 knots at steady periods of time day and night, so that was good going. If we had kept up those kind of averages we’d have done better. We had a few broaches in the Tasmanian Sea. We had gusts of 40 knots, big lumpy seas, very hard to control the boat.” One of the broaches tore the clew out of a spinnaker and damaged the pod that they set the spinnaker from at the bow of the boat.

Meanwhile the smaller boats have been having a hard time in the conditions. At 9.43m LOA, the second smallest boat in the Rolex Sydney Hobart fleet, Tow Truck, this morning reported that last night’s conditions had been frightening at times. “We had some really wild rides last night and yesterday - it was terrifying,” said navigator Brett Filby earlier. “We’ve currently got 30 plus knots of wind from the northwest and we’re doing 15 to 18 knots boat speed. It’s so wet out here and we’ve had a lot of knockdowns. It’s a very confused seaway and we had a tough night - the boys are having a lot of fun but are battered and tired.”

By 1300 hours this afternoon, 23 yachts had crossed the Hobart finish line, with only three yachts retired, the latest retirement being Jeff Otter's Icefire, which sustained damage to its mast. Team Lexus was forced to drop a crew member suffering from injured ribs at the port of Bicheno on the east coast of Tasmania. Crewman Robert McClelland is being assessed by the local medical officer in Bicheno while the yacht and remaining crew have now continued on to Hobart.

While some of the smaller yachts still hold a mathematical chance of usurping Wild Oats XI from the top of the handicap leaderboard, it looks increasingly likely that Bob Oatley is set to claim an historic treble of line honours, course record, and handicap victory in this year's Rolex Sydney Hobart Yacht Race.

Top 10 Line honours finishers:

28th December
1. Wild Oats finished at 08:00 hours
2. Alfa Romeo finished at 09:16 hours
3. Skandia finished at 13:45 hours
4. Konica Minolta finished at 14:46 hours
5. AAPT finished at 17:42 hours

29th December
6. Loki finished at 01:19 hours
7. Coogans Stores finished at 01:27 hours
8. Seriously 10 finished at 01:53 hours
9. Hugo Boss finished at 02:14 hours
10. ABN AMRO finished at 02:34 hours

Provisional IRC standings, recorded at 1400 (AEDT), 29 December 2005
1. Wild Oats XI
2. Alfa Romeo
3. Konica Minolta
4. Chieftain
5. Skandia
6. Wedgetail
7. Loki
8. Hardys Secret Mens Business
9. Quantum Racing
10. Wot's Next