Robin Hewitt veteran skipper of the yacht Yoko was competing in the race for the 25th time, 25 consecutive races all in the same boat, and had commented prior to the race that he has never seen the same weather twice, ‘it is always different, to win you must get the right conditions for your boat, if you do it often enough eventually you will.'

This year Matt Hannaford, No Fearr, won line honours in what was one of the most competitive races seen in many years but none of the competitors felt that this was their ‘right' weather. ‘We got parked three times and had to restart the race and when we did have wind it was always on the nose,' said Hannaford.

Starting from Portsea, Port Phillip Bay, in squally damp conditions, on the 27th December the fleet experienced 20 knot South Westerlies and a 2metre swell. The conditions were never going to trouble this experienced fleet and the expected leaders quickly stamped their intentions on the race.

Hannaford's Cookson Farr 39 No Fearr lead out of the heads with Laurie Ford's Varta Spirit of Downunder on their transom. David Phillips' Sydney 38 Hasta La Vista is believed to be the first Sydney 38 to contest the event and was already chasing down the leaders as was Jeff Otter's Mummery 45 Icefire.

This was to set the tone for the race at the first sched the three leading boats were still close together though Ford had gone west of the rhumbline. He had admitted prior to racing that the conditions would not suit his Cameron de Lange 12m. The most unusual aspect of Varta Spirit of Downunder is the " reverse engineering " aspect in that she is designed around Gary Cameron of Mt. Eliza' Australian designed International 1 Metre radio controlled model yacht. Gary's hull design is still winning top places in these model yacht regattas around the world.

Spirit did drop back in the field in the conditions and didn't regain their expected position until near the end of the race.

No Fearr, Hasta La Vista and Icefire sailed within a short distance of each other for most of the race, at times in such close proximity they could almost smell each others dinner. Frustration was high for them as they would make gains on the fleet only to have the wind drop out and the fleet catch up.

After two days of hard and cold racing Hasta La Vista had taken a slight lead from No Fearr and Icefire with Rookie Skipper Sally Rattle's Archambault 35 Archie snapping at their heels. Hasta La Vista had driven hard all night and now with each other in sight they played a cat and mouse game down the coast.

With the winds dropping out to nothing the strange west coast currents began to play an even bigger role. Most of the boats were hugging the coast searching for that elusive zephyr of breeze to give them a lift.

Sally Rattle's Archie was rock hopping as their local knowledge came into play. Although Rattle is new to ocean racing and has only been in the sport for five years her crew contained hardened west coast sailors and fishermen. The experience was beginning to tell as they avoided the current that was sucking the bigger yachts backwards and picked up the smallest puffs as they came off the shore.

Unusually for the west coast the winds were so slight that Don Fraser aboard his Beneteau 47.7 reported having difficulty holding steerage and had dropped his main and poled out the headsail simply to hold some shape.

As they approached Maatsuyker Island the winds had again kicked in but as expected were once again on the nose, with Paul Heyes from No Fearr reporting ‘the sea state is ugly very short sharp and bumpy.'

David Dow, Lighthouse Keeper at Maatsuyker spoke to race control to report seeing a group of five yachts almost on top of one another.

Hewitt on Yoko was reporting east north easterlies of 30 to 35 knots and with the first six boats still within four nautical miles of each other as they prepared to round South East Cape the match racing across the southern end of Tasmania began in earnest.

Over night Hasta La Vista was dealt a critical blow when they shredded their mainsail and had to spend the next 12 hours travelling on their trysail.

It was no surprise at the 5am sched to find that Hannaford and No Fearr were again in the lead but the surprise packet was the 35 footer of Sally Rattle's right on his tail. With the tricky Derwent River stretch ahead and a boatload of locals within shouting distance Hannaford adopted a more conservative strategy to make it to the finish.

"We had a plan to be first in and we had the jump on them and we knew we had the right boat for the conditions. It really freshened around Maatsuyker Island, got in front of them and just changed back half a gear and just managed to stay in front.

We weren't stressing the boat, every other time we had bolted on them and pushed the boat and pushed the crew the wind would just make us start again. So we just thought we would just stay in front and keep it all even.'

No Fearr crossed the line at 9:45 the crew tired, sunburnt and elated, they had put some distance between them in the river with Archie crossing at 10:37.43. The local entry received an emotional welcome as they docked at Elizabeth Street Pier.

Jeff Otter's Icefire was third across the line and Laurie Ford's Varta Spirit of Downunder, having made gains in the latter stages of the race was fourth. Despite being under trisail Hasta La Vista had a tacking battle with Elektra up the river managing to cross the line just 2 seconds ahead of Don Fraser.

At 13:52.30 Eddie Ragauskas and Martin Vaughn steered their Cavalier 350 SL across the line to find that they had taken out all three handicap divisions.