First entries in for 60th Anniversary Race

• NEWS
• 20 May, 2004 09:02:00 AM

First entries in for 60th Anniversary Race

The Cruising Yacht Club of Australia has received the first Application for Entry for this year’s 60th Rolex Sydney Hobart Yacht Race from one of its previous Overall winners - Wild Oats.

The Cruising Yacht Club of Australia has received the first Application for Entry for this year’s 60th Rolex Sydney Hobart Yacht Race from one of its previous Overall winners.

CYCA Sailing Committee Chairman and Rear Commodore Roger Hickman has entered his Farr 43 Wild Oats, the 1985 Admiral’s Cup trialist, two-time CYCA Bluewater Champion and winner of the Tattersalls Trophy in the galeswept 1993 Sydney Hobart Race.

Wild Oats was originally constructed in Sydney by John McConaghy for well-known yachtsman Bob Oatley and has a long history of competitive ocean racing, including eight Sydney Hobart Races with solid results in all.

Wild Oats, the last yacht to win the Tattersalls Trophy under the old IOR handicap system, has been reconfigured by Hickman to compete under the IRC rule.

With the 60th anniversary celebrations and the decision by the CYCA to use the IRC rule to decide the Overall Winner, he believes many boats of similar vintage to Wild Oats will make a comeback to ocean racing in the 628 nautical mile bluewater classic.

Already four yachts have been nominated for the 60th Rolex Sydney Hobart Yacht Race since the Notice of Race was published this week on the official race website – www.rolexsydneyhobart.com

Wild Oats nomination has been followed by three more Applications to Enter – Matt Allen’s champion Farr 52 Ichi Ban, Geoff Hill’s MKL49 Strewth (because of engine trouble she missed the start of last year’s race) and Komatsu A Few Good Men, Shane Kearns’ latest boat, a  Mumm 36.

Because of other plans, Roger Hickman’s long time friend Howard Piggott will skipper Wild Oats to Hobart with his young and very capable crew.

Both Hickman and Piggott hail from the Apple Isle and it is Piggot’s intention to have a solid contingent of Tasmanians in his crew.

“The Rolex Sydney Hobart Yacht Race has always been a goal in my sailing life and I am very enthusiastic about competing in the 60th race and to sailing on the Derwent River in the Sailing South Race Week regatta immediately following the Sydney Race,” Piggott commented (Hobartians often endearingly refer to the Rolex Sydney Hobart as the ‘Sydney Race’).

CYCA Commodore John Messenger believes that having boats like Wild Oats ramping up to do the 60th Rolex Sydney Hobart Yacht Race sends a good message to all owners of both new and old yachts. “The 60th Rolex Sydney Hobart Yacht Race certainly has some interesting initial interest,” Commodore Messenger said.

Wild Oats is a Farr 43 designed and built 19 years ago whilst in contrast Ichi Ban is one of the latest creations of the now US-based Farr design office.  She will go into the 60th Race one of the favourites to be Overall Winner following an outstanding past season that saw her win IRC Division A of last year’s Rolex Sydney Hobart, quickly followed by an IRC Division win in Hobart’s Boag’s Sailing South Race Week and Geelong’s Skandia  Week.

Since then she has won the IRC Australian Offshore Championship sailed out of Pittwater in March and the IMS Division of the Brisbane to Gladstone Race in April.