KEY POINTS:
Close to 70 yachts representing Britain, New Zealand, Italy, Canada, NSW, Victoria, Western Australia, Tasmania, Queensland and the ACT have entered this year's Sydney-Hobart race, with just two days to go before entries close.
Among the favourites for next month's race are the three 30-metre maxis, Charles St Clair Brown and Bill Buckley's New Zealand maxi, Maximus, Grant Wharington's 2003 line honours winner, Skandia, and the defending handicap and line honours winner and race record holder, Wild Oats XI (Bob Oatley).
Mike Sanderson's Volvo 70 ABN Amro One has been nominated as have three of the classics - Mike Freebairn's 1968 overall winner of the race Koomooloo; 84-year-old John Walker and his IOR three quarter tonner Impeccable and Maurie Cameron's Phillips Foote Witchdoctor, which this year will pass Mark Twain's previous record for the most Sydney-Hobarts undertaken by a boat, 25.
