After five weeks of frenetic repair work, sometime around-the-clock, the supermaxi yacht Wild Oats XI has been declared ready to race in the Rolex Sydney-Hobart race on Boxing Day. The declaration came from the skipper, Mark Richards, after the 30-metre long, silver-hulled racer completed a compulsory 24-hour qualification course off Sydney this week. “We went into race mode for that trial and returned to our base more than pleased with what we had experienced,” Richards said. “We couldn’t fault a thing.” Richards and his team are now turning their attention to putting sails and equipment aboard the yacht, and watching a very unusual weather pattern that is developing off Australia’s east coast. Incredibly, the pall of bushfire smoke enveloping Sydney…

The supermaxi yacht, Wild Oats XI, will today take another significant step forward in its challenge to be on the start line for this month’s 75th annual Rolex Sydney-Hobart race. Little more than a month ago the 30-metre long sloop suffered major structural damage while contesting the 180-nautical mile Cabbage Tree Island race out of Sydney. The yacht’s 45-metre high carbon fibre mast fractured at deck level and as a result a large part of the deck structure failed. Miraculously, through great skill, the crew was able to stabilise the broken mast and reach shore before the yacht suffered any additional damage. Subsequently, during the past five weeks Wild Oats XI has undergone a major rebuild at its dock in…

The international effort to have the 30-metre long supermaxi yacht, Wild Oats XI, repaired and on the start line for next month’s Rolex Sydney-Hobart  race took a major step forward today with the replacement of a large part of the yacht’s damaged deck. Highly qualified composite construction specialists took much of the day to fit an 8 x 3 metre section of deck. The pre-fabricated structure replaced the deck area between the forward hatch and aft hatch which was damaged when the yacht’s mast broke during a trial race two weeks ago. A local and international effort swung into place immediately after the incident in a bid to have the record-breaking yacht on the start line for the 75th Hobart…