Twizzle said:
this race is just getting crazier
3 boats out of the race and 5 people in hospital...................so far
I think they are going to have to start to consider the conditions and to hell with tradition, one answer could be to be flexible with the start dates, like they now do with surf contests
its about time they considered the safety of the competitors imo
Its not that simple mate. The conditions weren't exactly bad last night; the sticks came down in about 25 knots and 6m seas, not exactly extreme weather. Calling off the race once it has started is not the smartest thing to do, the boats are still going to be out there in the weather, and when it comes to the Hobart race, the majority of the time they will be facing in the right direction. When you have extremely large seas the majority of the time you want to be heading in to them, not being pounded on the side or having waves break up your arse where there's a much higher risk of getting knocked down or gear breakage, most of the time its much safer to continue heading across bass straight than it is to turn around and head back to Eden.
Most people don't realise that the 1993 race was actually worse than the 1998 race in terms of conditions, but in '98 the fleet hadn't entered bass straight when it started to get messy, so the closest land mass was the east coast, so many boats decided to try and shelter there instead of continuing. Once they started to head side on into the breeze boats really started to suffer major damage. This wasn't the case in regards to the boats where there was a loss of life, but several others have admitted privately that it would've been safer to continue with the race. Our boat was leading the race in '93 when we suffered gear failure about 120nm south of Eden in about 12m seas and 50 knots on the nose, the decision to continue with the race to Hobart was more to do with safety than it was with being competitive, surfing down 12m waves without sufficient sail area to keep the boat stable would've undoubtedly resulted in further damage to the boat.
My point is that it shouldn't be up to the race committee on whether boats should return to shore or to continue, it must be up to the individual crew who are actually experiencing the weather first hand. The media have absolutely no idea what they are talking about once again ...
