Rolex Sydney Hobart Yacht Race: Comanche fights back
by Bruce Montgomery, RSHYR media 27 Dec 2015 07:39 GMT
27 December 2015
As the leading yachts reach the halfway mark of the Rolex Sydney Hobart Yacht Race, the US supermaxi Comanche has made, arguably, the greatest comeback since Lazarus.
She has closed on race leader Rambler, also from the US, and resumed the lead in the race for line honours.
Comanche was in deep trouble off the NSW south coast after midnight, when it appeared she would have to withdraw completely after, as skipper Ken Read put it, she "probably hit something". That "something" all but wiped out a rudder and daggerboard on one side of the boat (she has a rudder and daggerboard on each side).
But in the spirit of its pursuit of this Holy Grail of a Rolex Sydney Hobart line honours victory, Read chose to sail on, albeit with fewer appendages: to continue into Bass Strait and chase down Rambler. It took 13 hours.
"We decided to punch on through. We think we can get to Hobart safely," Read said. "I don't care if we limp over the line. We are going to finish this damned race."
And finish it in style, if she can.
While Comanche is back in the lead, just two nautical miles separates the two boats, and the southerly buster, which has taken out more than 20 per cent of the fleet, is expected to abate over the next 48 hours. On paper, the much lighter conditions expected in the bottom half of Bass Strait and along the Tasmanian coast later this afternoon and tonight favour the less beamy Rambler. So a fascinating duel could develop off Tasmania tonight.
Another great duel is taking place 30 miles astern between Syd Fischer's Ragamuffin 100 and Giovanni Soldini's smaller Volvo 70 Maserati. They are separated by three miles after Soldini took a wide arc around the troubled fleet off the NSW south coast.
The morning has seen a steady stream of retirements from the race, many with rudder and mainsail damage. They include the maxis Wild Oats XI, Perpetual Loyal, Brindabella and the 2013 overall winner Victoire.
At 1330, there had been 23 retirements. They include another international casualty, Haspa Hamburg and her eager young German crew.
Battle of the walking wounded (from Jim Gale, RSHYR media)
Can this 2015 Rolex Sydney Hobart become any more convoluted – is Steven Spielberg directing this thing?
Last night the race was turned on its head when the American super maxi Comanche hit something off the NSW south coast and sheared off most of her starboard-side daggerboard and rudder. This, just hours after the withdrawal of her principal Australian challenger, Wild Oats XI, should have been the defining moment of the dash for line honours.
Comanche's compatriot rival, Rambler, seized the moment, scooting past into the lead, opening a six-mile lead over the pre-race favourite.
Comanche's skipper Ken Read pressed on anyway, determined to at least to "finish this damned race", but surely line honours was now beyond the stricken super maxi.
Except, this afternoon, Comanche staged a dramatic comeback, slowly reeling in her smaller rival, and eventually regaining the lead. What was happening? Had the guys on Comanche pulled off some sort of miraculous jury rig?
Not quite. Somehow, in the vast sweep of Bass Strait, Rambler had found her very own submerged object, twisting and bending her starboard side daggerboard.
"We have no idea what we hit, we couldn't see it," Rambler's Australian navigator Andrew Cape said by satellite phone a short time ago. "It might have been marine life or flotsam, but it was a solid hit. It shook the boat.
"Our port tack performance has been badly affected, and it is all upwind to Tasman Island, so we have a lot of pain to come."
Cape estimates that they have lost about 10 percent of their speed on port tack and, because they can't lift the daggerboard, they are losing a bit on starboard tack as well. "It's tricky," Cape says, "ä serious structural problem impeding our boat speed.
"I don't know what will happen overall. We'll just try to get the shifts right and do our best."
So right now we have an American two-horse race, and both horses are running with broken legs. The same broken leg.
Meanwhile, the last standing Australian super maxi, Ragamuffin 100, is slowly closing in. At 30 miles astern of the race leaders this afternoon, her close duel with the Italian V70 Maserati looked to be a fight over third place. Rags has cut the deficit to 26 miles, and there is still a long way to go to Hobart.
Will the Americans stagger up the Derwent side by side?
Will Ragamuffin 100 pull off a home-town upset? Or could Maserati?
Is there a malevolent sunfish roaming Bass Strait, looking to strike again?
If it was in a movie you wouldn't believe it.
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