Living Doll set for a busy year

by Ian Grant on 9 Feb 2009
Victorian businessman Michael Hiatt has more than a passing interest in making sure that the Living Doll fashion label will be successfully exposed in 2009.

The Hiatt Group proud of their Victorian and Australian heritage have sewn colourful cloth into a unique style, allowing young Australians to feel happy, free and confident about their personal appearance and lifestyle.

It is fair to say that Michael Hiatt has a special place for fashion in his professional and sporting career and the prominent Living Doll emblem.

However all the neatly pressed pleats of fashion are cast aside when Michael Hiatt applies the ‘business plan' to continue carrying the Living Doll brand into the rugged wet and windy environment of ocean racing.

Naturally all of his yacht racing rivals understands what the words Living Doll mean as in most cases they have one of their own.

But they will be forced to take a much closer look at the Michael Hiatt owned and skippered new Bruce Farr designed 55 Living Doll which completed an impressive debut last month when she won the Audi trophy during the Skandia Geelong Race Week over the Australia Day Weekend.

This was a personal triumph for the popular skipper and his Living Doll crew who won three of the six races to clinch victory on count back over the equally popular Graeme Wood in Wot Now.

Living Doll has been nominated to contest the 2009 Audi Australian ocean racing championship which includes the Audi Sydney Harbour regatta in early March followed by the Audi Sydney to Gold Coast race in July before heading north to the Whitsundays for important Meridien Marinas Airlie Beach Race Week followed by the championship deciding regatta at Audi Hamilton Island Race Week in August.

In recent years Michael Hiatt has gained significant exposure from making the long trip north with consistent results including Silver Medals at Airlie Beach in 2007 and 2008 plus the Audi Hamilton Island Race Week bronze last year.

Both he and the Living Doll crew expressed their skill and appreciation to race in the winter wonderland of the northern Whitsunday Islands last year when they held what appeared to be a firm grip on the Meridien Marinas ABRW Grand Prix trophy after five races.

But unfortunately an early error when they were forced onto the wrong side of a mark of the course ultimately opened the gate for their Cookson 50 class racing rival Ray Roberts in Quantum Racing to win the final and the 2008 title.

However the new Living Doll has shown the promise to reverse this result when the ultra modern Farr 55 tests her all angle sailing speed off Airlie Beach.