Tops and flops of the Sydney-Hobart between records and disasters. Photostory

As it does every year, the Rolex Sydney-Hobart great end-of-year offshore classic signals the trends taking place in the world’s great cabin boat sailing. In six photostories, we tell you what happened in the edition that saw the record collapse, aided by a strong northeast wind that pushed the 88 boats at the start (10 retired) for the 628-mile course from Australia to Tasmania. From the jaw-dropping average of the winner to the millionaire flop of the favorite, via the stunning octogenarian 9-meter woman who finished the regatta in glory.

1. WIN AT AN AVERAGE OF 17 KNOTS
That’s how you win the Sydney Hobart, the most important offshore race in the Southern Hemisphere, in real time, crushing all records by covering 628 miles in 37 1/2 hours at an average of nearly 17 miles per hour, aided and abetted by strong headwinds. Take a good look at where the duty crew of the 100-foot Perpetual Loyal stood, all hanging from the aft pulpit. And look where they placed the sails, all in the cockpit. All of this is to shift as much weight as possible aft so as to keep the bow higher while trying to avoid the always lurking risks of gagging when gliding at more than 25 knots with an immense Code 0 and a jib with a backward point of tack on the bow. We are talking about hundreds and hundreds of square meters of sail!

2. BEING 80 YEARS OLD AND NOT FEELING IT
Here is Maluka of Kermandie, the smallest and oldest of the boats competing at the Sydney Hobart. To cover the 628-mile course this only 9-meter boat built 80 years ago took 3 days and 19 hours to finish 76th in real time, edging out seven much newer and larger boats that came to the finish line after her. Fifty-seven hours separate the 9-meter Maluka of Kermandie and the first-place finisher, the 30-meter Perpetual Loyal, at the finish line.

3. WHEN TECHNOLOGY IS NOT ENOUGH
That it was not a good race to win for the 100-foot CQS, which finished only seventh on elapsed time, had already been seen at the start in Sydney Bay, when it suddenly lay on the water while sailing upwind. Surely some of the devilry installed on board did not work. Of course! This 90-footer this year was equipped by spending hundreds of thousands of dollars with two side appendages sticking out of the hull (DSS aka Dynamic Stabilty System), a Keel cellar (canting keel), a forward Canard (movable blade to restart the bulb), sail area increased by 20 percent, bowsprit 4 meters long. This very expensive makeover is the work of New Zealand designer Brett Bakewell-White. But something evidently did not work in reality compared with theory.

4. ITALIAN IN NAME AND IN CREW
Here is Giacomo, the overall winner of the Sydney-Hobart. This Italian-named boat is none other than the old VOR 70 Groupama, winner of the 2012 Volvo Ocean race. Thirty feet or 10 meters shorter than the real time winner Perpetual Loyal arrived only two hours later at the finish line, second overall ahead of a 100-footer, Scallywag. Favored by the strong wind at the carriers, he was able to express his best gliding skills. On board to serve as navigator was 45-year-old Italian Francesco Mongelli. The owner, Jim Delegat, is a New Zealand wine producer.

5. WHEN SPI IS A PROBLEM
This is what happens if you still use the old spinnaker instead of the gennaker or Code 0. This 37-footer named Dark and Stormy was one of the few boats in the race that was not equipped with a bowsprit and therefore with wind-bearing sails to be used without a plate. At the Sydney – Hobart most of the boats, even the not-so-first-timers, had in fact equipped themselves with the addition of a fixed dolphin trap integral to the hull, so as to facilitate the fixed installation throughout the race of Code 0 with whip. The facts proved those who adopted this solution right. For the record, Dark and Stromy is a 2011 project of Australian sailing great Ian Murray. He ranked 68th in real time.

6. OH GOD, HERE COME THE CHINESE
UBOX, a Cookson 50, was one of two Chinese-flagged boats entered in the Rolex Sydney-Hobart that placed excellent 13th. The other was TP 52 named ARK323 which had an all-Chinese crew of 14, while aboard UBOX out of 11 crew members 8 were Chinese. This Chinese presence is a sign that offshore sailing is catching on in China and that a generation of experienced sailors is being formed even on the larger boats, after they have already been competing on par with the rest of the world in dinghies for years.