MAXI SHOWDOWN

Four 100-foot maxis will lead the charge for Line Honours in the 2022 Rolex Sydney Hobart Yacht Race: Andoo Comanche, Black Jack, Hamilton Island Wild Oats and LawConnect.

Ask Andoo Comanche skipper John Winning Jr about the pressure of the lightning-fast maxi being regarded as outright favourite for Line Honours in this year’s Rolex Sydney Hobart Yacht Race and he embraces it.

“We have not won a Hobart as a crew; but, the boat has won a few!” replies Winning Jr of the three-time Rolex Sydney Hobart Line Honours winner - 2015, 2017 (in the existing race record time of 1 day, 9 hours, 15 minutes and 24 seconds) and 2019.

“The pressure is great. We put it on ourselves if the boat is seen as favourite. If the crew is 100 per cent focused, I really don’t think anything short of gear breakage will stop us.”

Winning Jr, a three-times Sydney Hobart competitor, believes the VPLP 100 is getting closer to optimal speed.

“She’s as good as ever,” says the skipper who has chartered the maxi for two years and re-named her Andoo Comanche after his family e-commerce business.

“Every time we’ve sailed her, we’ve learned something. The crew is better and their feel for it is better. The crew and boat are falling into line.

“It’s about getting familiar with the boat. We’re a long way off from sailing the boat at our best.

“We’re not the most gelled crew, but the crew with the most opportunity.”

Winning Jr credits Andoo Comanche’s scope of potential to a blend of seasoned world class ocean racing experience with some ‘out of the box’ thinking from newcomers to the crew.

They include Iain Murray, who has joined from one of the three other maxis that will compete in this year’s 77th Sydney Hobart – record nine-times Line Honours winner Hamilton Island Wild Oats

“There is no shortage of legends,” Winning Jr says of his crew that also includes Will Oxley, Colin Beashel, Seve Jarvin, Justin Shaffer and highlyrespected Spaniard Pablo Arrarte.

“We also have some out of the box thinking with some non-yachting sailors who sail her like a skiff rather than sail her like a yacht. But there are still pillars that are a benchmark to work by. It is not as if we are working from scratch.”

Winning Jr says Murray’s experience and broadminded outlook to innovation honed from sailing everything from skiffs, to the America’s Cup and ocean racing has been crucial in this development.

Asked what Murray brings, the skipper answers: “Where do I start? There is his experience … with team make-up, boat design, boat set-up, leadership skills and out of the box thinking.

“There may be an original way to do things, but he will think, ‘What if we do this?’ and we try it and it works.”

Winning Jr says a highlight of Andoo Comanche’s development, which has yielded early success in winning Noakes Sydney Gold Coast Line Honours and an overall win in the Tollgate Islands Race, is the maxi’s progress in handling the lighter conditions.

“We’ve found a way to go in light air better than before. We’re not the fastest in light air, but we’re not giving away as much difference in it as we did”

Mark Bradford, skipper of Peter Harburg’s Reichel/ Pugh 100 Black Jack, which won Line Honours in the 2021 Rolex Sydney Hobart, believes Andoo Comanche is the boat to beat.

He summed up the competition between the four maxis in this year’s race well.

“It is very close for such different boats,” Bradford said. “The idea [for all four maxis in the race] will be to sail your own race and hopefully the weather will then suit your boat and race plan.

“But … it would be nice if we were defending without Andoo Comanche around. That is a seriously quick boat.”

For a race hinged so tightly on unpredictability due to weather conditions, Bradford says the one certainty he feels is that Black Jack will be ready.

“All the other teams had stops and starts during COVID. We never stopped,” he says. “So, she is always ready to go.

“Everyone had a different approach during COVID. Some teams shut down, but Pete (Harburg) always wanted to use the boat. You need to have fun while you can and he did.”

The main change for Black Jack has been in the crew line-up.

“Because of the border closures, crews last year were all Australian (based), but now the internationals are back,” he says. “We have lost crew to Andoo Comanche and Hamilton Island Wild Oats, but some of those were people we borrowed.

“With the borders open, the internationals are back. No disrespect to those we lost who helped us last year, but our frontline crew is back.”

New faces in the Black Jack crew include America’s Cup Hall of Famer Dean Phipps, a Kiwi, and Brazilian Jao Signorini, who can, Bradford says, “drive a boat as quick as anyone. The Rolex Sydney Hobart is like Bathurst where you switch drivers all the time.

“The secret is getting guys who know how to drive the boat fast.

“You also have to keep rotating to keep people fresh and the boat fast.”

Mark Richards, the skipper of the Oatley Family’s Reichel/Pugh 100 now named Hamilton Island Wild Oats (formerly Wild Oats XI), is bursting at the seams to return to the race for the first time since 2019.

During his absence from the Rolex Sydney Hobart, Richards has been busier than ever with work.

However, he admits to missing the race: “I was in a big, empty hole. But I am now so motivated. I am so involved in the boat business; the Rolex Sydney Hobart is the most talked about race on the planet. At every boat show it is the race they talk about, whether at Cannes or Rhode Island.”

For Hamilton Island Wild Oats’ return to the blue water classic, Richards says the 18-year-old boat will have new sails and continual tweaking for extra speed.

“We’re stripping down everything that we can, to get her weight down as much as possible,” he said.

“There are still a lot of changes we can do.”

The crew lost Iain Murray to Andoo Comanche, but American star Stan Honey has come on board as navigator.

Richards says the maxi is as ready as ever for its long-awaited return.

“She is as fast as she ever has been,” he said. Tell me a boat that has done what she has done.

“She’s the most iconic yacht in the history of ocean racing. She’s still very fast.

“We’re going to have our work cut out against Andoo Comanche. She’s a very fast boast. She was dominant in the northern series [in the Noakes Sydney Gold Coast Yacht Race and Hamilton Island Race Week], but there were perfect conditions for her there.

“The Rolex Sydney Hobart is a different kettle of fish … We’ll race to our strengths, as Andoo Comanche will race to her strengths.

“If there is a nor’easter she won’t be able to touch us. In light air, she won’t touch us. If it is [heavier] conditions that suit her, we’ll just have to deal with everything thrown at us.”

The spirit of the boat’s former owner Bob Oatley, who died in 2016, will be there.

“There’s a lot of Bob on her. Every time I sail on her I think of Bob, what he has done to keep it going, now with [son] Sandy,” says Richards, adding that the Oatley’s famous walking stick will “definitely” be on board.

And forget any notion that Hamilton Island Wild Oats is aiming only for Line Honours. A repeat of its Line Honours and Overall doubles in 2005 and 2012 is on Richards’ mind.

“We’ll also be trying to win on handicap,” he says.

“You have to win on the line first to do that, but if we can get the right conditions we can win on handicap … We have before.”

Christian Beck, owner/skipper of the Juan-K 100 LawConnect, is primed to go one step further on the boat he bought in 2017 from Anthony Bell and initially raced as InfoTrack

LawConnect was runner-up in last year’s Rolex Sydney Hobart. A Line Honours win has eluded Beck, but the boat has one win – from 2016 as Perpetual Loyal when it was still owned by Bell.

Beck is confident LawConnect still has what it takes to win, so long as the weather conditions suit; that being, on the nose and hard.

“It’s a very strong boat,” he says. “It has run very well in our last three Hobarts. We sail it hard. It is a very reliable boat. Knowing that helps.

“There are still times when we have to pull the throttle back … when the conditions require it.”

Beck says since last year a lot of work has been done to make LawConnect about 300 kilograms lighter.

“We’ve made a range of refinements,” he says, citing the galley and general interior below deck as some areas that have been stripped.

“We added a larger bowsprit last year. Unfortunately, there were light conditions and we didn’t win. This year, we will still have it, but hopefully we get the conditions to make it effective.”

Beck’s plan was for LawConnect’s crew to assemble for its final preparation at the end of November. The program will once again be headed up by sailing master Tony Mutter.