5:38 AM Wed 16 Dec 2009 GMT
There is a world of difference between a fang around Sydney Harbour and the 628 nautical mile sprint that the Rolex Sydney Hobart has become for the modern fast maxis, or the gruelling three and four day marathon it has always been for the smaller boats.
Yet this year's 2009 SOLAS Big Boat Challenge served as a timely reminder for every skipper that no yacht race is ever won, or lost for that matter, until the finish line is receding astern.
After a tense match race Bob Oatley's Wild Oats XI appeared to have done enough to claim bragging rights in yesterday's harbour spectacular as she turned around the final mark just a boat length or so ahead of Neville Crichton's Alfa Romeo.
A routine spinnaker hoist and a dash towards the finish line at Fort Dennison was all that was left. The sort of thing Mark Richards and his experienced crew have done a thousand times. But instead of the sharp crack of the giant spinnaker opening to the breeze and the deep groans of the sheets and winches as they took the strain, the groans were coming from the afterguard as they stared at the giant wine glass above them - 100 feet of spinnaker neatly divided by one humungous knot.
Just metres behind, Alfa Romeo executed a faultless set and suddenly it was game on.
Wild Oats XI forced Alfa Romeo upwind as her crew desperately worked to sort out the mess, but as the two giant yachts rushed closer to the western harbour foreshore the huge sail refused to unwrap. With the rocks getting close it was time for Richards to gybe back across towards the eastern side, opening up the course, and a one and a half minute win, to his rival.
It had been a spectacular match race between the two one hundred foot yachts all the way. Neither boat appeared to have the edge in boat speed in the moderate nor'easter, and up to that final mark both crews had sailed flawlessly. Neville Crichton, Alfa Romeo's skipper, never let off the pressure.
With 143 line honours worldwide with Alfa Romeo already to his credit, Crichton has a reputation for meticulous preparation and drilling his team to a relentless perfection. With so little between Alfa Romeo and Wild Oats XI, both Reichel Pugh designs built within months of each other, Crichton is convinced that the crew that wins will be the one that makes the least mistakes.
Mark Richards concurs. 'The boats have always been very evenly matched and always will be, I'd say,' he remarked after the harbour race. 'You've really got to dot all the i's and cross all the t's otherwise you're going to get beaten.'
As for the other 100 foot line honours hopefuls that joined yesterday's fun, Investec Loyal, Lahana and YuuZoo, they have seen that in moderate winds and flat seas they have nowhere near the boat speed of the two favourites. Come the big race on Boxing Day they will almost certainly will be praying for heavier weather to slow the speedsters down. Hoping that the two front runners become so obsessed with covering each other that they forget the others.
Sean Langman, the skipper of Investec LOYAL is a past master of slipping beneath the radar and turning up in Hobart long before he was expected. And YuuZoo's Ludde Ingvall won a line honours victory in 2004 in the same boat, then known as Nicorette, by hugging the coast while his bigger, faster, more fancied rivals looked for heavier winds offshore, and came to grief.
Whatever happened on the harbour yesterday, the impending 65th Rolex Sydney Hobart Yacht Race is a whole new ballgame.
After thrashing around the harbour having the time of his life on Wild Oats XI, Bob Oatley was philosophical as he addressed Crichton. 'You might recall Neville that the first time we challenged one another was in the Big Boat race in 2005. You beat us that day, but we still beat you to Hobart.'
by Jim Gale
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