Skandia w/ broken rig.
Rosebud
Rosebud
Rosebud
Quatum Racing Photos by ROLEX / Daniel Forster
Handicap waiting game continues as Rosebud moves to the top
With the line honours trophy again going to Bob Oatley's Wild Oats XI after her close, race-long duel with Mike Slade's UK-based City Index Leopard, the focus in the Rolex Sydney Hobart Yacht Race shifts to an intriguing contest for the sailors' most prized trophy, the Tattersall's Cup for the top yacht on IRC corrected time.
At 7pm today local time, five yachts were positioned to win the Cup, according to computer calculations by the Cruising Yacht Club of Australia, as a hot nor'west wind, which has sent the temperatures soaring to more than 34 degrees Celsius, swept the next group of yachts at high speeds under spinnakers down the Tasmanian coast.
The American yacht Rosebud (Roger Sturgeon), first of the new STP65 box-rule class to be launched, currently sits in first place overall on corrected time. But her position wasn't guaranteed until the boat crossed the finish line. Less than two hours earlier, Rosebud dropped from the first place she held earlier in the day, as she slowed in light patches in the nor'wester in Storm Bay. - regattanews.com
