Big Wild Thing Mast goes in today

3:52 AM Tue 1 Dec 2009 GMT

'Cranes lift the hull back into the water - Wild thing yachting' Jeff Meyers

>Preparation of the Wild Thing Supermaxi for the Rolex Sydney Hobart is in full swing this week after the successful installation of the new keel at Westgate Ports in Melbourne yesterday.

Today's job is the very large mast, which the Wild Thing crew were assembling on the dock at Mornington Pier this morning, before a 90 tonne crane was due to arrive this afternoon to delicately manoeuvre 41 metres of rather expensive carbon fibre into its sweet spot in the deck of the 98 foot boat.

Grant Wharington standing bside his new 7 metre keel yesterday - Wild thing yachting - Jeff Meyers

The new 7 metre keel is an integral part of the 2009 modifications to the Don Jones designed 98 footer, and skipper Grant Wharington has worked intensely with Don over the last 12 months to determine the advantage that the changes will give the boat over the other big boats chasing line honours.

With a sail configuration that has been put together to maximise speed, together with the new keel, Grant is predicting that he and his crew, given the right conditions, will be able to take 5 hours off their time from last year's race, where they led the highly favoured Wild Oats XI for most of the 628 nautical mile course. Wild Oats XI was the eventual line honours winner.

'Last year we had everything set up for the best possible handicap, and we surprised ourselves with how well the boat went - so Don and I went back to drawing board to figure out where and how we could extract some more performance' he said.

With his trademark cheeky grin very much present, Grant stated that he thinks it's going to be a VERY interesting race...

And for one lucky company, the media and marketing benefits will be very interesting.

The Wild Thing team has been working feverishly on a project called the Amazing Naming Rights Opportunity, where companies of all sizes have been joining the team for a $10,000 Corporate Sail, which gives them the opportunity to win the place of Naming Rights Sponsor of the boat until mid 2010, which of course includes the start of the 2009 Rolex Sydney Hobart - an event that attracts massive national and international exposure.

The winner will be drawn live on air by Ross and John on 3AW breakfast on Tuesday the 8th of December, with the draw to be scrutineered by Yachting Australia President, Andrew Plympton.