Three Tasmanian catamarans put on a nail-biting finish in the final sailing leg of the 20th Hydro Tasmania Three Peaks race.
Skippers Phillip Marshall, Don Kidd and Terry Travers did everything possible to gain an edge on the competition, sailing boat-for-boat up the Derwent River in a five-knot south-easterly.
Marshall and Travers have seven previous Three Peaks Race titles between them and neither was keen to give the other’s runners a head start up Mt Wellington.
Sixty-four seconds will be all it takes to win the 20th Hydro Tasmania Three Peaks Race
Because 64 seconds was the time that separated the first three boats to arrive in Hobart at the end of the Three Peaks Race’s closest-ever sailing leg, the 100-nautical mile passage from Coles Bay to Hobart.
Westbury-Mersey Pharmacy made a dramatic arrival at the wharf, smashing its port bow into Constitution Dock at a rate of knots.
``It doesn’t matter,’’ cried ecstatic skipper Terry Travers as he ushered runners Andrew Kromar and Michael Wheatley onto the dock.
Shearwater Pure Sprouts’ runners jumped onto the wharf 21 seconds later and sprinted up to race control as Jailhouse Grill’s crew hailed for room at the jetty to drop off its own runners.
Paul McKenzie and Mark Guy of Shearwater Pure Sprouts ran straight over the road, dodging traffic to catch up with their opponents.
By the top of Davey St McKenzie and Guy had run Kromar and Wheatley down and were surging ahead, proving that they would not suffer the same fate as in the 2004 race when they were beaten by Travers’ team by one minute and 26 seconds – the closest race to date.
At the Fingerpost track turnoff to Mount Wellington is an army of Travers’ pink-clad supporters.
The atmosphere is intense; Kromar and Wheatley are now almost three minutes behind the Shearwater Pure Sprouts team.
Mark Padgett and Tim Piper from Jailhouse Grill – who left race control 64 seconds after Kromar and Wheatley – are now almost six minutes behind the front-runners.
by Holly Ranson
6:24 AM Mon 24 Mar 2008 GMT
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