Sydney to Hobart race 2021: Two-handed fleet create history as Disco Trooper claims top prize
The Sydney to Hobart went from sheer hell to heaven for this double-handed team from Sydney who have claimed a historic victory in the famous race.
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Before the 2021 Sydney to Hobart, Jules Hall described the prospect of sailing to Tasmania with just one mate as a “Covid inspired harebrained idea’’.
It was also a winning one.
With the race now over following the arrival of the last boat to Hobart - the timber stunner Solveig on Saturday morning - Hall and Jan ‘Clogs’ Scholten wrote their names in history as the first winners of the new class double-handed class debuting in the 2021 Sydney to Hobart and received with enthusiasm by competitors and the sailing community at large.
Of the 17 two-handed boats that started the race 10 finished with Hall’s J/99 Disko Trooper winning overall.
Tasmanian duo Rob Gough and John Saul’s Sidewinder claimed line honours.
“We got along OK, no problems between us. We stepped out to be the best we could. I feel we didn’t leave anything on the table,’’ Hall said.
“I found it rewarding. There are some exceptional sailors in this fleet. I feel honoured to come out so well in this competition. I feel very fortunate.”
“I would definitely do the race again with Clogs, yes. And it’s definitely really special to be part of the inaugural event.”
The boat was named for the lead character in Rudyard Kipling’s Captains Courageous, Disko Troop.
“I think I have a friendship here with Jules for life – and I trust him. I know can go down and sleep and trust him that I will be OK.
“A lot of money, investment and safety was involved in preparing. I enjoyed the lead-up and making the boat ready. I enjoyed being forced to learn new things and I enjoyed the adventure,’’ Scholten said.
Disco Trooper won from the Crux (Carlos Aydos & Peter Grayson) with Euphoria II (Marc Stuart and Richard Combrink) third.
DECEMBER 29: It’s the moments that make bruised, hungry and fatigued sailors forget about the 30 hours of sheer hell they have just endured and start planning their next Sydney to Hobart campaign even before they have stepped ashore.
A starry night followed by blues skies, a bit of wildlife and flat waters in Bass Strait.
Two-handed sailor Wendy Tuck on Wednesday described it as “pure heaven’’.
“It’s just beautiful out here. This is why we do this,'' said Tuck, the first Australian and woman to win a Clipper round the world race in 2018 and is racing with co-skipper Campbell Geeves on the 32-footer Speedwell.
“I’ve got 10 knots of breeze, blue, blue skies and it is gorgeous.’’
No too long before she and Geeves had 30 plus knots of wind, steep seas and blinding rain - conditions which have since ended the campaigns of almost 40 boats in the 76th edition of a race cancelled a year ago due to Covid.
“It was a really nasty sea state, there was blinding rain. It was pretty horrible,’’ she said.
“But the boat survived and now we are really happy with how it is going.’’
Tuck and Geeves are among the first two-handed fleet ever to race in the Sydney to Hobart.
On Wednesday, 10 of the 18 double-handed boats that started on Boxing Day were still racing to Hobart despite the brutal conditions.
The supermaxi Black Jack claimed line honours early on Wednesday morning from LawConnect and Scallywag.
They will be packed up and their crews back in the own beds by the time Tuck and Geeves step foot on land in Hobart.
And that doesn’t faze the Sydney mates one bit. They reckon they are lucky to get more bang for their buck by being at sea a few extra days.
Tasmanian Rob Gough’s Sidewinder is likely to be the first yacht in the two-handed decision to finish the Sydney to Hobart on Thursday.
Tuck and Geeves are hoping for a finish well before New Year’s Eve on Friday.
“It's going to be great,’’ she said.
DOUBLE THE FUN FOR TWO-HANDED FLEET IN FIRST SYDNEY TO HOBART
DECEMBER 26: There’s a gadget Wendy Tuck and co-skipper Campbell Geeves will alway wear round their neck when on deck in the Sydney to Hobart this year.
It’s a remote control which can position their boat head to wind and stop it sailing away if one of them falls overboard.
It’s a worse case scenario but in the infamous Sydney to Hobart you prepare for the worst.
It’s why the pair also have another piece of technology which will sound an alarm loud enough to wake the other if they are a certain distance away from their boat Speedwell - in simple terms, in the ocean.
For Tuck and Geeves these are important safety tools as they have only each other to look out for them.
They are part of an 18-strong double-handed fleet racing in the Sydney to Hobart for the first time and while two-up sailing has its own hazards and challenges, it also has big rewards.
“This is something special, a challenge like we’ve not had in the Sydney to Hobart before,” said Tuck, who grew up at My Druitt and was a late convert to the sport in her 20s.
In the lead-up to the Sydney to Hobart, Tuck and Geeves headed out to sea with a life-size dummy to practice their man overboard manoeuvres and procedures.
With just the two of them aboard, they wanted to be slick and ready for any eventuality the race might throw at them.
“You want everything to go perfectly,’’ Tuck said.
Life aboard a two-hander will be vastly different from a fully crewed yacht.
There will be long stints where crews will sail alone, even less rest than on a fully crewed yacht and much closer proximity to each other than on larger boats.
“You have to get on, you have to like each other,” said Tuck, the onwater operations manager for the Making Waves Foundation and an experienced Sydney to Hobart skipper.
“Campbell and I did our first Sydney to Hobart together in 2006 and now we are doing a second.
“You snap at each other, you have to let it go. You can’t hold a grudge.”
Tuck said it will also be physically challenging without crewmates to help lug and change sails.
The pair, who hope to be in Hobart by December 30, or at worst December 31 in time for a shower before the New Year, will sustain themselves with freeze dried food and snacks.
Eating and drinking regularly will be vital to keep energy levels high.
Sleep management will be crucial with a watch system in place from the start which will see both Tuck and Geeves sailing alone at times during the 628 nautical mile race.
Tuck, who now lives at Elizabeth Bay, claimed a piece of world sailing history in 2018 as the first female skipper to ever win a round the world race.
She was also the first Australian to win the Clipper Race which sees an ever-changing crew of mostly novice sailors jump aboard for different legs of the year long race.
“I think I sailed with 50 or 60 people in the Clipper race and now it’s just with Campbell,” she said.
“It’s so exciting after the disappointment of the cancellation last year.
“I love this race so much. The start, the welcoming committee in Hobart, being out there in the elements. I have missed the ocean so much. I can’t wait to be out of sight of the land.”
Tuck and Geeves are hoping their little 35-footer with punch above its weight when it comes to the handicap honours for the two-handed division.
“There’s great camaraderie in the two handed but good competition as well,’’ Tuck said.
BEST STORYLINES: Of sailors in the race
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