By Ian Grant.
Neville Crichton’s super-maxi Alfa Romeo sprinted to what promises to be a possible line and handicap double in the Rolex Sydney Hobart Race overnight.
Just after dawn this morning Alfa Romeo was tracked at speeds in the high teens with her position reported as 22 nautical miles east of St Helens Point with 158 nautical miles to sail.
Her crew including experienced big boat sailors Michael Coxon, Noel Drennan, Stu Ballantyne, Bruce Clark and Peter Merrington held a vice-like grip on the line honours trophy leading the English challenger and Rolex Fastnet Race line honours winner the Mike Slade skippered ICap Leopard by a runaway by 33 n/mls while Wild Oats Xl trailed by another .4 of a nautical mile.
Alfa Romeo is expected to continue making full use of the fast spinnaker sailing conditions with the North West breeze controlled by a high pressure ridge combined with a weak cold front promising to boost the breeze to 25 knots off the Tasmanian East Coast today.
These conditions will also favour Wild Oats Xl to outrun the heavier Icap Leopard while only rig damage or spinnaker ‘blow outs’ appear as the only threat to Neville Crichton and his Alfa Romeo crew from winning line honours.
Meanwhile the race for the more prestigious Tattersall’s Cup has heated up with the new weather change favouring Alfa Romeo when the spinnaker was hoisted earlier this morning.
They ‘wound back the clock’ surfing the building ocean swells to a peak of 22 knots while the smaller challengers were almost ‘glued’ to the sea surface in soft winds and confused seas.
However the Bureau of Meteorology have issued a gale warning for the Tasmanian East Coast and Bass Strait with vigorous North West winds providing the smaller yachts including the 1998 winners Ed Psaltis and his Queensland navigator/tactician Bob Thomas to again press a claim for corrected time honours.
The 2008 Performance Handicap class champion the Leo Rodriguez skippered Whitsunday Sailing Club Volvo 60 Merit remained in contention to defend their title with 16th place on line honours this morning while Another Fiasco was the next best placed Queensland entry at 52nd with Ray White Spirit of Koomooloo 62nd and Charlie’s Dream 86th in the remaining fleet of 95 racing towards Hobart this morning.
Mondo suffered rigging damage and Pippin Queensland’s other two entrants had retired.