Another Duchess leads Hahn Premium Hamilton Island Coral Sea fleet

by Rob Kothe/Di Pearson on 17 Aug 2003 Australia’s winning 2003 Admiral’s Cup team is at the front of the fleet in today’s 83-mile Coral Sea Race. The Royal Prince Alfred team of Bob Oatley and Colin O’Neill won the 2003 Admiral’s Cup sailed off Cowes in England. This was the first Australian win since 1979.

At 12:40pm Bob Oatley and his Admiral’s Cup crew aboard his Davidson 60 Another Duchess was leading the fleet past Edward Island with 40 miles to sail.

The Volvo 60 Andrew Short Marine Djuice was second with the second Australian Admiral’s Cup crew aboard Colin O’Neil’s Davidson 60 Aftershock in third place.

Having an eventful race, the Open 60 Broomstick is a mile and a half wide pushing more current. Early in the race off Dent Island Lighthouse, the big gold-hulled boat had a gear failure with her mainsail dropping to the deck. She also had problems setting her kite at Coppersmith Rock.

These problems cost her second place, and at 1.00pm and sailing way to the right of the course, she was fighting hard to climb back into the line honours contest.

At 1.00pm, the second Volvo 60 Magnavox was enjoying the 20 knot south easter and was match racing the third of the Volvo’s, David Gotze’s Indec from Melbourne. They were in 7th and 8th place on line, just astern of Matt Allen’s Farr 52 Ichi Ban, which had managed to pull away from Warren John’s Welbourne 15.2m Heaven Can Wait.

The Coutts/Butterworth crew on Jim Farmer’s Farr 53 Georgia had bolted out the gate from the 8am Dent Passage start. They separated from the wall of spinnaker’s sailing high on the course to sufficiently to open up a 300 metre gap by the second mark.

The bigger boats did not manage to catch her until they closed on Coppersmith Rock.
George Snow’s Brindabella set the Coral Sea Race record, in 1998. In very similar condition to today’s race. His Jutson 75 sailed the course in 8 hours, 49 minutes and 52 seconds.

This record will be tough to beat today, with strong flooding tide slowing the leaders today as they run north to Hayman. Then as they turn for home, they will have to beat south against the ebb.

At 2.35pm, Another Duchess, with Mark Richards at the helm, had passed Dolphin Point on the north eastern tip of Hayman Island, and Broomstick, helmed by Bernie Case, had caught up to hold second place, their tactical decision to sail way to the right of the course paying off.

Andrew Short’s Andrew Short Marine was sitting in a comfortable third place after a good start and hanging on to second and third places throughout the day. Short had pulled away from Aftershock, which is further back down the track in 4th place, around seven minutes in front of Jim Farmer’s Georgia, which currently holds 6th place on line.

Another Duchess has approximately 19 nautical miles to sail to the finish line and would need to finish by 4.49.50pm this afternoon to claim Brindabella’s record, which is possible, although they are beating home.

The top five have put quite some distance between themselves and Magnavox, Indec, Ichi Ban and Heaven Can Wait, with a huge break to the bulk of the field that includes the handicap chances.


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