Wind Shift, previously known as Salt Lines, returns for a fourth shot at the race having finished last over the line last year on 1 January just after 10am. She was given the warmest welcome to Hobart, which the locals reserve for the last boat home. It is special.

In 2023, she retired with sail damage. In her first tilt at the 628 nautical mile Rolex Sydney Hobart in 2022, Matthew Harvey’s Shipwright 70 finished 11^th in PHS. The crew will likely have a slow but comfortable ride again on this attractive steel-hulled, 30-ton, ketch-rigged yacht that was launched as John Laing in Poole, UK for the Ocean Youth Trust.

Harvey bought and renamed the yacht, relocating her to Australia to join the Ocean Sailing Expeditions fleet.