Yachting: Wild Oats takes Sydney-Hobart triple honours

SYDNEY - Australian supermaxi Wild Oats has become the first yacht in 60 years to take the Sydney-Hobart triple honours of race record, line and handicap trophies, officials said today.

Wild Oats broke the race record by more than an hour when she she won line honours in the 628 nautical mile race on Wednesday, but had to wait until Friday to also be named handicap winner as the oldest boat in the fleet tried to snare the handicap trophy.

"It reinforces the strength of the handicap system. Any well-sailed, well-founded boat has a realistic chance of winning this race," Geoff Lavis, commodore of the Cruising Yacht Club of Australia, said in a statement.

Australian yacht Rani is the only other boat to take out triple honours and that was in the first Sydney-Hobart in 1945.

Wild Oats, a recently launched hi-tech carbon fibre 30-metre yacht with canting or swinging keel, set a record time of one day, 18 hours, 40 minutes and 10 seconds for the race.

The previous record set by Nokia in 1999 was one day, 19 hours, 48 minutes and two seconds.

The usually gruelling bluewater classic proved to be a race of navigational tactics in 2005 with light, fickle winds at one stage seemingly robbing the big boats of a race record.

In 1998, six sailors died and dozens were rescued after a terrifying storm slammed into the fleet.

Under a major rule change for the 2005 race there was no upper speed limit, enabling boats unrestricted use of sail area, water ballast, canting or swinging keels and mast heights.

Wild Oats skipper Mark Richards said the supermaxi, which hugged the coast picking up favourable winds shifts, clocked speeds in excess of 30 knots.

In the past, an upper speed limit was imposed for safety reasons but with improvements in yacht design, race officials have dropped restrictions on the use of new technology.

- REUTERS