Rolex Sydney Hobart- Wild Oats rounds Tasman Island
by Richard Gladwell, Sail-World.com on 28 Dec 2014
Rolex Sydney Hobart Race Start - Wild Oats XI Design: Reichel Pugh 100, Owner: Robert Oatley, Skipper: Mark Richards Rolex / Carlo Borlenghi
http://www.carloborlenghi.net
Seven time race winner, Wild Oats XI (Oatley family) looks set to take her eighth win, after rounding Tasman Island just before noon, local time.
The supermaxi rounded the landmark with a ten mile lead over the US supermaxi Comanche and has about 35nm to sail in a direct line to the finish line off Hobart.
Even displaying the reaching superiority seen at the start of the race, there is no way that the US supermaxi can catch her Australian counterpart.
He best hope is that winds fade in Storm Bay and the final approaches to the finish.
The course optimization using four different weather feeds, shows four different routes as winds drop into single figures.
The most direct route and the one that shows the shortest time to the finish is the high-risk, with light winds down as low as 2.4kts for the first 90 minutes after Wild Oats XI rounds Tasman Island before she picks up speed and hits 13kts the rest of the journey to the finish.
The finish time for Wild Oats XI is predicted to be between 3.30pm and 4.00pm.
Comanche rounded Tasman Island about an hour later at 1.00pm local time.
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