Dream and Believe, but stay clear of the 'Grundig Triangle'

by Rolex Media Centre on 29 Dec 2003 Sean Langman the skipper of the 66-foot pocket maxi that finished third over the line in the Rolex Sydney Hobart Yacht Race is convinced there is a ‘Grundig Triangle’ off Green Cape where he has suffered misfortune in this race many times.

On the first night following Grundig AAPT was leading the fleet until she hit a sunfish that rendered one of her two rudders useless.

‘The sunfish hit the leeward rudder and jammed the bearing,’ said Langman this morning. This meant they had to disconnect the second rudder and rig up a jury system.

The loss of one rudder made steering upwind extremely difficult, especially as the effective one was mostly out of the water on our starboard tack. ‘It’s a 638 nautical mile race and 600 of it was upwind. We would have been a lot closer [to the leaders] if it hadn’t happened.’

The problem also meant that the boat was no longer watertight.

‘We only had a crew of eight and every hour someone had to spend a full hour bailing.’

Minimal crew weight is something Langman trialled successfully in this year’s Sydney Gold Coast Yacht Race and he adopted the same strategy for the Rolex Sydney Hobart Yacht Race.

However, this morning he admitted that in the final stages of the 628 nautical mile race the ‘sense of humour on board was waning.’

Some of the crew sustained injuries on board. Joseph De Kock suffering a suspected broken rib and Adam Barnes suffering swollen ankles

Overall, though, Langman he was delighted with the performance of his yacht and crew in achieving third place over the line, and certainly believes that his kind of racing yacht can match it with the super maxis.

Langman admitted that he has ‘unfinished business’ and is conceptualising a new 75- footer based on the ‘skiff’ technology he has developed on Grundig. ‘I have a belief in this kind of technology; that bigger is not always best.’

‘Our performance is something for dreamers and believers,’ Langman said shortly after docking his 66-foot downwind flyer.

An hour behind Grundig AAPT, George Snow steered Brindabella across the line, followed by Andrew Short Marine (Andrew Short) a further 40 minutes behind and Seriously TEN (John Woodruff), forty minutes later.

The next boat due to finish shortly is Skip Sheldon’s US entry Zaraffa.