Every year about Boxing Day when I hear the news on TV or radio I cringe – I really do cringe. I cannot believe the lies that the TV stations put out about the Sydney Hobart Yacht Race – year after year after year.

They continually make announcements about the yachts entering Bass Strait, or crossing Bass Strait, or involving Bass Strait somehow. This year an announcer on Ch 7 said they were entering Bass Strait. Somehow I always assumed Ch 7 was a Tasmanian station – they do have the best local Tasmanian news. But now I gather they have no idea where Bass Strait it – amazing.

 On the Saturday a twit made the statement on ABC TV that the two leading yachts were racing each other across Bass Strait. I thought to myself what a bloody idiot. If I was in charge of the ABC TV that bloke would be looking for another job.

 I had a look at the race tracker to see where the yachts actually were. This was part of it. The blue line was there, the rhumb line. If a yacht comes out of Sydney Harbour and turns right and heads straight for Tasman Island, its next turning point it will sail down this line. The red line I have put on – this is the eastern boundary of Bass Strait. A line between Gabo Island off Victoria, and Eddystone Point on Tasmania’s NE Coast. This is defined internationally.

The two leading yachts are well out in the Tasman Sea, well east of the rhumb line even. They are about 135km east of Bass Strait. How on earth can that dummy say they are racing each other across Bass Strait – the mind boggles.

 I sometimes wonder if this all stems from the Cruising Yacht Club of Australia, trying to make the race seem harder that it is. Bass Strait has got a reputation – is the CYC trying to attach that reputation to the Sydney Hobart Race? Who Knows?

 The Sydney Hobart Race is raced entirely in the Tasman Sea from Sydney Harbour to Tasman Island, where they turn right into Storm Bay and then up the Derwent River.

 And yes I do know quite a lot about sailing and ocean racing. I built a sailing dinghy when I was about 14 and sailed it all over the Derwent River. When I was 18 I worked for Jock Muir – Australia’s’ best boat builder, in Hobart. At that time a lot of Tasmanian yachts were being sold to people in Melbourne – and Jock and I would sail them across to Melbourne for their new owners. Up the East Coast of Tasmania, through Banks Strait, and then across to Melbourne – just the two of us.

 Later on when I was married and living in Hastings (on Westernport Bay) in Victoria I raced in the yacht Carina. We did two Queenscliff Devonport races, (we won one race, I think the 1967 one) and sailed one Queenscliff Waratah Bay Race. The Queenscliff Devonport Race was part of the Rudder Cup series, the oldest yacht race in Australia. At the Hastings Yacht Club I also raced Flying Dutchman (Olympic Class), and Lightweight Sharpies.

1907 The Rudder Cup begins – Australia’s First Ocean Race

Beginning in 1907, the Rudder Cup was initially awarded to the winner of the 198-mile Melbourne to Launceston race. The Rudder Cup is the oldest ocean race in Australia and the fifth oldest ocean race in the world. The Rudder Cup predated the Fastnet Race by 20 years and the Sydney to Hobart Race by 45 years. The first race winner was HBYC yacht Thistle (Mr. Edgar Newlands), a 14.7 m Yawl with a crew of 10 people. The Rudder Cup is currently awarded to the winner of the 195-mile Melbourne to Devonport race. 

The inaugural race was run from Port Phillip Heads to Low Head at the mouth of the Tamar River, a distance of 198 nautical miles. This first race was won by the 14.6m yawl Thistle skippered by Edgar Newland with a crew that included his wife and daughter. The trophy was intended to be an annual challenge cup, but conditions were reported to be very rough, so much so that Mrs. Newland thought that yachtsmen should never again be tempted into so dangerous a race and she refused to relinquish the cup the following year.

The race continued using alternative trophies, including the Doc Bennell Perpetual Trophy, funded by the Royal St Kilda Yacht Club.

In 1968, the original Rudder Cup trophy again came to light and was presented to the Cruising Yacht Club of Victoria, now known as the ORCV, by Edgar Newland’s son. The Rudder Cup Perpetual Trophy is awarded to the measurement handicap winner of the race across Bass Strait to Northern Tasmania – typically Devonport or Low Head at the mouth of the Tamar River.

Twice I have come within a hairbreadth of being wrecked in a yacht and probably losing my life. The first time was with Jock Muir – we had just entered Banks Strait. Jock said steer this course for a couple of hours and then this course and we will be heading for Melbourne, and he went to bed. It was a miserable wet cloudy night and I had my head down under the canvas dodger watching the compass – lifting my head up every now and then to look ahead. All I could ever see were long white breaking waves across in front of me, then they would dissolve and a new one would appear. After a while I was watching one and it was not dissolving, and just at that moment the moon broke through for a few seconds. Up ahead was a white beach, not very far ahead. I immediately put the yacht about and in an instance Jock was on deck wanting to know what I was doing. I pointed to the beach. “Oh, the tide must have swept us a bit further north than I expected. That must be Rebecca Bay, steer this course for another hour and then turn for Melbourne”, and promptly went back to bed.

Twice I have sailed in yachts from Hobart to Sydney, and once raced from Sydney to Mooloolaba, just north of Brisbane.

 Sailing has been in my blood since childhood, ever since I read the complete series of the “Swallows and Amazons” books by Arthur Ransome. I still pick one up now and then.

 What to do about these constant lies year after year?

ONE: Stop all reference to Bass Strait in any mention of the yacht race in the media.

OR

TWO: Put a buoy (or use an island) in Bass Strait and make the yachts sail out of the Tasman Sea, round the buoy, and then back into the Tasman Sea, and head for Hobart.

 Laurie Ford
29-12-2025

 
Research indicates the first Ocean races were as follows:

( Source Yachting World Encyclopaedia Author Peter Johnson and Ian Dear, Historian for the Royal Ocean Racing Club )

1904 Brooklyn New York to Marblehead Mass.( Brooklyn Yacht Club)

1905 Brooklyn New York to Hampton Roads Virginia (Brooklyn Yacht Club)

1905 Marblehead to Halifax (Eastern Yacht Club)

1906 Transpac Race Los Angles to Hawaii

1906 Cowes Isle of Wight to Dinard / St. Malo France

1906 New York to Bermuda

1907 Rudder Cup Port Phillip Heads to Low Head Tasmania (Royal Geelong and Tamar Yacht Clubs)

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