Rolex Sydney Hobart: Doyle Sails finish 1, 2 on Line Honours
by Doyle Sails 16 Jan 2020 01:19 UTC
16 January 2020
Comanche at the start of the 2019 Rolex Sydney Hobart Yacht race - December 2019 © Live Sail Die
The annual Rolex Sydney Hobart Yacht Race consistently brings the best yachts and sailors to Sydney where they all begin their journey south to Hobart on Boxing Day hoping to win arguably two of the world’s most recognisable sailing trophies in the world – the Tattersall Cup for the overall IRC winner and the John H Illingworth Challenge Cup for the boat that takes line honours and reaches Hobart first.
This year a fleet of 157 boats started the Sydney Hobart with a total of five super maxi’s vying for line honours. Christian Beck’s InfoTrack initially took the lead out of the Sydney heads with Jim Cooney and Samantha Grant’s Comanche fighting back hard to take the lead - what followed was an incredible battle between the big boats at the front end of the fleet.
With variable conditions including periods of light air putting immense pressure on the sail selection, tactics and navigation for each of the boats it was Comanche that came out on top and took the overall line honours victory. After a tough battle up the Derwent river where periods of no wind left Comanche becalmed for a period of time, the 100 ft yacht and her crew crossed the finish line in first place in the early hours of Saturday morning with InfoTrack crossing in second place not long after.
Both Comanche and InfoTrack carry complete Doyle Sails Cableless and Structured Luff inventories and have seen considerable gains in performance after moving to this technology in recent years. With the wide range of weather conditions that were seen in this year’s Sydney Hobart and by having Doyle sails on board, these yachts are fitted with sails that are built for a wider range of angles with less load and designed to perform at their peak 100% of the time.
Outside of the top two super maxis, Doyle Sails is proud to have a total of 37 yachts in this year’s Sydney to Hobart race with Alive, Naval Group and URM closing out the top 10 boats to reach Hobart carrying Doyle inventories.