Derwent Sailing Squadron member Duncan Hine has skippered the Reichel/Pugh 66 Alive to second across the line and second overall under IRC and PHRS handicapping in Queensland’s major long race, the 67th Brisbane to Gladstone.
However, Alive has won the ORCi handicap category overall.
Alive, owned by DSS member Phillip Turner and skippered by Hine, finished early Saturday afternoon, just over three hours astern of Blackjack.
Blackjack, a Volvo 70 round-the-world racer, proved faster in the south-easterly trade winds than the smaller Alive, leading the 30 boat fleet from soon after the start on Good Friday until the finish in the industrial port of Gladstone.
On IRC corrected time, the coveted Courier Mail Cup has gone to Blackjack from Alive by a margin of just under an hour. Any chance the smaller boats had of beating the two leaders faded with the breeze on Saturday night.
Alive had looked well placed to repeat her clean sweep of handicap wins in last year’s race, but Blackjack moved up a gear in the last few hours of the race up the Queensland coast.
Blackjack’s elapsed time of 24 hours 09 minutes and 27 seconds was outside the 11-year-old race record held by Skandia, but it was an impressive performance by the Volvo 70 that finished fifth across the line in the 70th Rolex Sydney Hobart Yacht Race.
Blackjack, owned by the previous owner of Alive also beat the Tasmanian yacht across the line in that event, but Alive finished higher on corrected time.
Following the Sydney Hobart, Alive remained in Tasmania to take line honours in the Lexus King of the Derwent, the Betsey Island Race (in record
time) and the Bruny Island Race.
Peter Campbell
5 April 2015
