andoo comanche yacht cost

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Take a tour of supermaxi Comanche, a yacht so beamy she’s called ‘the aircraft carrier’

• December 26, 2015

Crosbie Lorimer takes a looks at Comanche, the 100ft super-maxi yacht that created such a stir at the last Rolex Sydney Hobart Race

Comanche races in the Rolex Sydney Hobart. Photo: Carlo Borlenghi/Rolex

“The design office were told specifically by me that if this boat wasn’t the worst rated boat in history they have failed,” Dr Jim Clark said about his new raceboat. Not exactly the sort of remark you might expect, perhaps, but Clark, founder of software company Netscape, is well known for his singular approach to his many sailing ventures.

For Clark, owner of the 295ft three-masted schooner Athena and the replica J Class Hanuman , the goal for his brand new 100ft super-maxi Comanche is first and foremost to break records.

At her first major outing in the Rolex Sydney Hobart Race 2014, she caused something of a stir, although she was pipped for line honours in the 650-mile offshore classic by the well-sorted and immaculately sailed Wild Oats XI .

Not surprising that Clark should look to his regular skipper Ken Read and the French design team collaboration of Verdier Design/VPLP to create his new master-blaster. Despite a punishing one-year timeline for the build team, project managers Tim Hacket and Brandon Linton worked with boat captain Casey Smith – all three were involved in Read’s previous Volvo campaign – to see the new boat launched on time from the Hodgdon Yard in Maine in late 2014, given an impressive first run in heavy airs and then put on a ship to Sydney.

Under sail, first impressions of Comanche  inevitably draw comparisons with IMOCA 60s and the globe-circling multihulls in which the design team excels. With massive beam at the stern, long reverse sheer, the mast well aft of 50 per cent of the boat length, towering narrow mainsail and a long boom overhanging the stern, everything is built for speed when the wind is abaft the beam.

In anything above eight knots of true wind Comanche starts to move out of displacement mode and at 25° of heel she has the same wetted surface as the 100ft supermaxi  Wild Oats XI – the more remarkable when you consider that you could fit two of Wild Oats ’s sterns into Comanche ’s.

Helming Comanche requires a different mindset, according to Read: “You sail the boat a bit like a multihull in a way, it’s so wide you rock it up on its ‘leeward hull’.”

So beamy is Comanche that she was given the nickname the Aircraft Carrier

The photos below show exactly what this remarkable yacht looks like on deck and below.

Specifications

LOA 30.50m/100ft 0in

Beam 7.80m/25ft 6in

Draught 6.50m/21ft 4in

Mast height 46.00m/150ft 0in

Displacement 31,000kg/68,343lb

Mainsail 410m 2 /4,413ft 2

Downwind sail area 1,022m 2 /11,000ft 2

Upwind sail area 350m 2 /3,767ft 2

Largest spinnaker 1,100m 2 /11,840ft 2

IRC Rating 1.958

Designed by Verdier Design/VPLP       

Built by Hodgdon Yachts, Maine, USA and Owner’s build team

Mast/boom Southern Spars

Sails North Sails

Hydraulics Cariboni       

Foils Re Fraschini

Winch System Harken with Jon Williams

Rigging   ECsix

STERN Comanche ’s beamy stern swiftly earned her the tag The Aircraft Carrier. Her optimum heel angle is anything over 20°, while at 25° she has the same wetted surface as Wild Oats XI . The fitting of an escape hatch and the liferaft stowage in her stern are a direct result of lessons learned from the capsize of Rambler in the 2011 Rolex Fastnet

MAST As with the IMOCA 60s, the mast is positioned well back in the boat; sited directly above the canting keel, the mast is deck-stepped on a triangulated mast post integrated into the same frame as the keelbox. Static loads on the mast base are in the order of 75 tonnes, increasing to 150 tonnes under sail

DEFLECTORS The 150ft (46m) four- spreader rig features two running backstays and three deflectors, precluding the need for checkstays for mast bend control, and also reducing windage and weight aloft. Mast height was limited to be able to pass under Sydney Harbour Bridge

COCKPIT AND WINCHES Sail handling is by grinder-powered Harken winches with customised drive shafts, grinder pedestals and gearboxes to cater for the substantial torque. The winch pedestals are placed inboard to permit stacking of up to four sails in the cockpit

WHEEL POSITION The steering pedestals can be moved to a position at the forward end of the cockpit (ringed), just behind a detachable hard dodger over the companionways, affording the helmsmen and crew maximum protection if required for long passages

DEFLECTOR RAMS The three deflectors controlling mast bend are trimmed by three hydraulic rams that work interactively. Although cheat sheets have been developed for basic settings, the crew is still exploring setting refinements for these

CANTING KEEL The canting keel is controlled by a 350kg titanium ram built by Cariboni. The keel can be swung 35° either side of centre and moved through the full arc in about 25 seconds. A secondary slave cylinder can be used to swing the keel if the primary ram fails

WATER BALLAST Manifolds, pipes and valves controlling water ballast are located behind the navstation bulkhead. Water ballast comprises 6.5 tonnes per side in three tanks on each flank. All pipework is built in carbon fibre

COMPASS The cheapest fitting on the boat is a card compass that would look more at home on a Laser. Though the helmsmen and trimmers use the digital read-outs, the rules require a card compass to be fitted, so the team went looking for the simplest and lightest

NAVIGATION STATION is located immediately behind the companionway bulkhead, also being the point from which all the boat’s electrics are controlled. The carbon fibre chart table can be tacked and the bench seat is long enough to allow the navigator to sleep or rest here if required

TACKING HEADS There are two concessions to ‘luxury’ aboard Comanche , one being a carbon fibre tray for six coffee cups and the other a carbon heads that can be tacked! No privacy for the latter, of course

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Comanche – the 31.5m sailing superyacht built to win

Sailing superyacht Comanche is a boat that belongs at the front of the racing pack. Comanche _surprised everyone watching the Sydney Hobart race in December 2014 when the brand new 30.5 metre Hodgdon Yachts-built speed machine was pictured tearing along ahead of Sydney Hobart legend Wild Oats XI. It was an advantage that _Comanche was able to maintain all the way to the Bass Strait during the 2014 Rolex Sydney Hobart. But when 30-knot winds failed to materialise, the more slender Wild Oats XI slipped past Comanche and into the lead, a position she held all the way to Hobart for victory and her eighth line honours. Second place is never going to be good enough for Comanche ’s owner, software mogul Jim Clark, but it was a minor miracle his yacht was there at all. She was only launched in September 2014, so the famously brutal race represented a kind of masochistic shakedown for a yacht designed for just one thing – to win.

Comanche : built to win

Think Laser dinghy or 49er morphed with rocket ship and you’ll get some idea of the qualities of_ Comanche_. At the yard, the racer was partially hidden behind two larger yachts with immaculate pedigrees, _Meteor_ and Artemis , but Comanche ’s square bow and carbon sprit jutted out beyond them, drawing the eye away from the varnished teak of her neighbours to a lean sailing machine intended to go as fast as possible powered only by the wind.

Sailing legend Ken Read, who also happens to be the president of North Sails, managed the project from day one for Jim Clark. Built at Hodgdon Yachts in Maine, US, Comanche had a hand-picked design and engineering team of international experts. It also had a construction schedule that raised eyebrows from the first day Jim Clark talked to Boat International about the radical project during the America’s Cup Superyacht Regatta in San Francisco, September 2013.

Comanche launched one year later and after stepping the mast in Newport, Rhode Island, and just two weeks of sailing trials, including a 600-mile qualifying sail to Charleston, South Carolina, the boat was packed aboard a cargo ship and sent to Australia to compete in the Sydney Hobart, which starts each year on Boxing Day.

Jim Clark and his Australian wife, Kristy Hinze-Clark, met the boat in Sydney for its short re-commissioning, Hinze-Clark racing aboard Comanche in a harbour tune-up event on 9 December 2014, where the yacht placed second despite poor conditions. The tabloids had a field-day, captioning photos with, “The supermodel and the supermaxi” and “She’s got legs” in reference to Kristy Hinze-Clark’s modelling career. These days she is a businesswoman, director for the Australian Nature Conservancy and the mother of two girls.

Boat International speaks exclusively with Comanche ‘s owner, Jim Clark

In our exclusive interview with Jim Clark, shortly before the race begins, we ask simply: “Why?”

“It’s a hobby,” he says, “I like the supermaxis, they are like Volvo 60s on steroids.” Jim Clark appears to be done with the J Class and is not a huge fan of what he calls the “multihull phase” of the America’s Cup with its reduced crew numbers. “The old sailing community is in monohulls and it’s nice to keep the guys engaged – there are lots of good sailors in the supermaxis and the guys are a lot of fun.”

When Jim Clark decided on a supermaxi, his plan was to go for line honours rather than wins on corrected time, and speed/distance records that could be set for yachts with human powered winches. “I don’t want any of that record stuff with an asterisk that says push-button winches,” Jim Clark scoffs. With this target, Jim Clark and Ken Read embarked on a “design experiment” for a yacht that could sail 30 knots or more on a broad reach. The experiment pushed them to some extreme stats, which Jim Clark says were run through CFD tests and simulations time and again.

“The 25-foot (7.6 metre) beam saves weight,” Ken Read says. “By going wider, we can have less weight in the keel to keep the same righting moment, thus we will go faster.” This thinking is carried over into the keel itself, which is solid stainless steel and not welded. With a 6.7 metre draught, the keel can be two tonnes lighter than a comparable keel on a boat with half the draught. The governing factor was the depth of Rhode Island’s Newport harbour where the boat will be based when not chasing records. “With the keel canted to one side we can just get to our berth,” Read says.

The downside to beam is increased surface drag when sailing flat in light air. “Being considerably wider than other boats, we need to be heeling at 11 to 13 degrees to present the same beam,” says Jim Clark. “In light air, we are at a disadvantage. When the wind cooperates, there is no question the boat is explosive.”

Hodgdon, the oldest boatbuilding business in the US, might seem like an odd choice if you don’t know that part of the yard’s annual output is high-tech military vessels and another part is carbon fibre limo tenders. In fact, Hodgdon is quite skilled at innovative construction techniques and when Tim Hodgdon agreed to build an oven to cook Comanche ’s carbon fibre hull, the deal was struck. The yard’s location also made it a good gathering stop for its far-flung team.

Is_ Comanche_ too powerful to handle?

Some critics have said Comanche is too extreme and too powerful to handle, but Jim Clark just laughs at this and suggests we “ask Kenny”.

“Yeah, it’s still an unknown but I’m not overly concerned,” he adds. “The hull is well baked and it’s been ultrasounded and X-rayed. There is a fuse in some of the loads so that nothing super bad can happen. But you can’t have a fuse in the rigging… Some of those termination points on the rig are kind of scary,” Jim Clark says.

That rig, which rises 47 metres above the waterline, is more than 50 per cent of the length aft from the bow, a surprising configuration but based on model testing for best all-around performance with the foil and appendages.

Innovation through design

Also innovative on _Comanche _are the daggerboards outboard of the mast and slightly forward of it. By canting the keel and putting the lee side daggerboard fully down, the boat generates enough lift to keep the angle of leeway to a minimum or crab up to a mark.

Comanche ‘s wide cockpit, full of grinder pedestals, hydraulic sail controls and sophisticated LED panels, gives the impression of a workhouse with modern instruments of torture. In a way, that is what they are. Grinders will work these six pedestals to turn the Harken winches. The only push-button winch on board is used to raise the mainsail. Once that sail is up the halyard is locked off and the winch isn’t used.

The winch pedestals are set slightly inboard and Read explains that when sailing on other 30 metre yachts he found that waves coming inboard at 30 knots or so would sweep the helmsman or winch grinders off their feet. “I have fetched up in the corner of the cockpit with pieces of steering wheel in my hands,” he says. Thus, by having 10 feet more beam than other 30 metre boats, there is space to put people and gear in a safer location with the added benefit of space for sails to be temporarily stored outboard of the pedestals on the high side.

Another interesting option is set right into the deck. Small black plugs cover screw holes that allow a dodger to cover both hatches. “On long distance races, we wanted the option to erect a dodger to keep the crew safe when on deck,” Read says. A slot in the cockpit sole just aft of the dodger allows the steering wheel to be moved forward, allowing the helmsman to stand behind the dodger for more protection.

Step below and you can see how much weight has been saved on Comanche . The single-skin carbon fibre hull and foam cored framing is fully exposed. It is mostly black with white non-skid patches. The forward end of the vessel is totally open, to store sails. Directly under the cockpit on either side are the crew berths, which keep the crew centre of gravity aft, close to the position they would be in when on deck; thus the trim of the yacht is not affected by off-watch crew moving around.

Directly under the cockpit sole is the navigator’s area with barely space to sit up. “The only requirement that navigator Stan Honey had was that we made the navigator’s seat 1.8 metres long so that he didn’t have to fight the crew for a berth,” Read says.

Talking to Read one gets a sense he is completely at ease with a project of this magnitude and the commitment it will take to sail Comanche to her potential. He has sailed around the world with several of his present crew and all had input into the new yacht’s design. That counts for a lot of experience, in addition to the French design team of Guillaume Verdier and VPLP (Marc Van Peteghem and Vincent Lauriot-Prévost). “Without the designers we would probably have built a far more conservative boat,” Read says, “but with their help we have taken a leap forward.”

On deck, Comanche is also radically different. All halyards go to the masthead, where they are locked off in the same style that was pioneered in the 12 Metre Class. But on Comanche , tension is applied on the sail luff by hydraulic rams mounted on the foredeck and by pulling on the sail at the tack. “It reduces weight aloft,” Read explains, “and allows complete sail adjustment from the [safety of the] cockpit.”

Another advanced feature not often seen on smaller craft is that the jib tracks run transversely instead of fore and aft. “The clews for each headsail are in the same place and we might use the same sail for going hard to windward and when easing off onto a reach. With this arrangement all we need do is ease the track car to leeward when coming onto a reach. This enables us to keep power on without altering the shape of the sail when changing course relative to the wind,” Read notes.

The deck-stepped carbon fibre mast has swept spreaders to eliminate the need for adjustable running backstays. In some ways this is a disadvantage in that the masthead cannot be moved fore and aft when sailing up and downwind, but it eliminates the need for checkstays and runners. The masthead position is controlled with backstays to each corner of the transom and lines that are led into the mast from the backstays to control the rig bend.

“I started this boat thinking I could race it,” says Jim Clark wistfully. A degenerative condition in his ankles that makes standing uncomfortable has recently cropped up in his wrists as well. “They made a seat for me where I can drive it,” he says, but he opted out of the Sydney Hobart to make room for America’s Cup-winning skipper Jimmy Spithill to assist Read on the helm.

“I feel confident we’ll start getting line honours and next summer we’ll do the transatlantic race and see how that goes,” promises Jim Clark. “I’m optimistic.”

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Rolex Sydney Hobart Yacht Race 2024

Andoo Comanche

Arguably the fastest monohull on the planet, Andoo Comanche returns to defend her Line Honours title in the 2023 Rolex Sydney Hobart Yacht Race.  Skipper John “Herman” Winning Jr and his exceptional team including tactician Seve Jarvin, Sam Newton, Iain Murray and Richard Allanson have captured every major Australian offshore line honours title since they chartered the yacht in 2022.  With a new inventory of sails by North Sails, Andoo Comanche will be hard to beat in 2023, with John Winning Jr looking to cap off his impressive run with the maxi yacht.

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Andoo Comanche

Let’s tour the vplp / verdier maxi 100-footer with skipper john winning before the 2023 sydney hobart race..

One of the most well-known monohulls, originally built to win the Rolex Sydney Hobart on line honours (it was her first race in 2014), and to break records, now known as Andoo Comanche, under her current team, she is still breaking records, and is the current line honours holder for all major Blue Water Pointscore Races on the East Coast of Australia.

"The boat is what it is because it is built the best way, with the best tools and the best equipment, and so a big shout out to Harken for all their stuff. I can guarantee you when we have always gone out we are not looking to save money. Price is always what you pay, but value is what you get.”

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Published on December 27th, 2022 | by Editor

Comanche first to finish Sydney Hobart

Published on December 27th, 2022 by Editor -->

(December 28, 2022) – John ‘Herman’ Winning Jr has set his sights on back-to-back Line Honors wins in the Rolex Sydney Hobart Yacht Race with Andoo Comanche after the maxi claimed this year’s title.

Early this morning, Winning Jr skippered the champion 100-footer to its fourth elapsed time victory for the 628 nm course, but his first with the boat he has on a lease until April 2024.

“We’ve got the boat and will be coming back for sure,” said Winning. “We’re not trying to come second. We’re here to win every race that we do.

“This boat doesn’t deserve to come second; certainly not when it’s in its prime. Until the foiling boats outdate this boat she should always be going out there trying to win Line Honors.”

However, for now, Winning Jr and his crew will continue to celebrate their success in this year’s race, secured when they crossed the finish line at 12:56:48 am today.

Their winning time of 1 day 11 hours 56 minutes 48 seconds was just outside the race record time of 1 day, 9 hours, 15 minutes, 24 seconds, set by LDV Comanche in 2017.

But their victory was nonetheless an impressive one in the fast downwind conditions which were created by the north-north easterly winds that prevailed for their entire journey south.

Second to finish at 1:23:19 am was Christian Beck’s LawConnect in 1 day 12 hours 23 minutes 19 seconds.

Third at 1:40:34 am was Peter Harburg’s Black Jack, skippered by Mark Bradford. The Oatley Family’s Hamilton Island Wild Oats, skippered by Mark Richards, crossed at 2:38:13 am

Andoo Comanche and LawConnect, which flew protest flags due to incidents exiting Sydney Harbor, both finished with their protest flags no longer up.

For Winning Jr, who was aboard Perpetual Loyal for her victory in 2016, it was a special result. It was his first as skipper and his father, John ‘Woody’ Winning, was also aboard.

“The moments are still sinking in,” Winning Jr said. “It just didn’t feel real until the last minute. Once it started sinking in, I just started thinking about who went into making it all possible.”

Andoo Comanche’s win added another chapter to its history. It was its fourth Line Honors win after 2015, 2017 (record that still holds), and 2019. It is also the first boat to win under three different owners.

American Jim Clark and his Australian wife, Kristy Hinze Clark, were the original owners of the yacht designed by Verdier Yacht Design and VPLP. They launched Comanche in 2015 and took Line Honours in the Rolex Sydney Hobart that year.

The Clarks sold the boat to Jim Cooney and his wife Samantha Grant, who renamed the yacht LDV Comanche and took Line Honors and the race record of 1 day 9 hours 15 minutes 24 seconds in 2017, returning as Comanche in 2019, to take Line Honors again.

LawConnect’s owner, Christian Beck, was more than happy about finishing second behind Andoo Comanche, especially in conditions that did not suit his boat.

“We thought we were going to come fourth in these conditions, so second was beyond our expectations,” said Beck, for whom it was his fifth campaign on the boat.

“I’m very proud of it. The boat’s not that good, but the crew is awesome. For us to be half an hour behind Comanche and ahead of Wild Oats and Black Jack is incredibly good for us.”

Black Jack skipper Mark Bradford said this Rolex Sydney Hobart might be the last for Peter Harburg’s yacht, which won Line Honors last year.

“We’re going to head to Europe next year,” he said. “We’re going to go where the winds are light. We’re getting out of here!”

As for this year’s race, Bradford noted how it was a totally different race compared to last year. “Just an easy downwind race. No real dramas. Everyone should get here safely and yet have a great race.

“It was always going to be a close race, this race. Halfway through, Comanche had a pretty healthy lead and then towards the end, it came back into sort of 12 miles or so to us and six to LawConnect. I think that’s probably a fair result for everyone, really, to be honest.

“Comanche is a great boat with a great crew. They sail it well, obviously; but to be 12 miles behind after 628 nautical miles in what is their conditions? We’re pretty happy with that.”

(L-R) Benoit Falletti – Managing Director, Rolex Australia; John Winning Jr – skipper, Andoo Comanche; John Winning Sr – Andoo Comanche; Arthur Lane – Commodore, Cruising Yacht Club of Australia. Photo: ROLEX/Carlo Borlenghi

Attrition: Two boats retired on day one – the two-handed Avalanche (James Murchison/James Francis) due to a broken bowsprit and Louis and Marc Ryckman’s Yeah Baby with rudder damage from a sunfish strike.

On day two, the fleet was reduced to 106 boats with the retirement of the TP52 Koa, co-owned by Peter Wrigley and Andy Kearnan, after losing its rudder and calling for assistance.

Race details – Tracker – Facebook

The 628 nm Rolex Sydney Hobart Yacht Race is the 77th edition in 2022 and had a fleet of 109 boats for the start on December 26. One hundred fifty seven teams set off in 2019, but since then the 2020 race was cancelled due to the pandemic with 88 entries in 2021.

From the start in Sydney Harbour, the fleet sails out into the Tasman Sea, down the south-east coast of mainland Australia, across Bass Strait (which divides the mainland from the island State of Tasmania), then down the east coast of Tasmania. At Tasman Island the fleet turns right into Storm Bay for the final sail up the Derwent River to the historic port city of Hobart.

Source: RSHYR

Tags: Sydney Hobart

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VIDEO: Sydney Hobart Race 2023 →

Alive claims overall Sydney Hobart title →

Victory to LawConnect in Sydney Hobart →

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The John Winning Jr-skippered maxi yacht, Andoo Comanche, produced a masterclass of high-speed sailing to win Line Honours in the SOLAS Big Boat Challenge on Sydney Harbour today. Meanwhile, the Jim Cooney-skippered and owned Volvo 70 Willow was declared the overall winner.

Under glorious sun and in southerly 15 knot winds that suited perfectly, Andoo Comanche was first to finish the two-lap harbor course.

See LIVE: 2022 SOLAS Big Boat Challenge

After reaching a maximum speed of 27 knots, she crossed the finish line off Rushcutters Bay in 53 minutes 58 seconds. In Andoo Comanche’s wake and in order were the three other maxis – Christian Beck’s LawConnect in 55 minutes 18 seconds, Peter Harburg’s Black Jack (skippered by Mark Bradford) in 56 minutes 35 seconds and the Oatley family-owned Hamilton Island Wild Oats, skippered by Mark Richards, in 59 minutes 27 seconds.

“We had a good day. We started where we wanted to start,” said Winning Jr.

“We just want wind. We were lucky that we had a nice reach off the start to be able to be first at the bottom mark. We are thankful to the weather Gods for giving us that wind.”

First to finish behind the maxis was Willow, fifth in 1 hour 4 minutes 8 seconds, followed by the Grant Wharington-skippered Botin 80 Stefan Racing, 10 seconds further behind, then Anthony and David Johnston’s Reichel/Pugh 72 URM Group, skippered by Marcus Ashley-Jones, in 1 hour 7 minutes 39 seconds. The Duncan Hine-skippered Reichel/Pugh 66 Alive, owned by Phillip Turner, was just another 2 seconds behind, followed by Whisper (David Griffith), No Limit (David Gotze) and Moneypenny (Sean Langman) in that order.

“It was a really exciting race… We had a solid start. We were quite happy with our position,” said Cooney afterwards, adding that while “everything went to plan” in the race overall, the crew “recovered well” after one hiccup – a furling issue relatively early in the race.

The SOLAS Big Boat Challenge is one of the final lead-up events to the Rolex Sydney Hobart Yacht Race. While the Rolex Sydney Hobart is a vastly different race, the SOLAS Big Boat Challenge was still witnessed by a strong spectator fleet that provided a superb taste of what to expect for the Boxing Day start.

After some exciting jostling for position, the fleet of 11 boats set off from Point Piper, with bows virtually aligned towards the first mark at Cannae Point.

LawConnect was the fastest off the start, but soon Andoo Comanche picked up pace to sweep by and take a commanding lead. Andoo Comanche reached the first mark after about 11 minutes.

On the upwind leg to Shark Island, Andoo Comanche extended her lead to 43 seconds over LawConnect, followed by Black Jack. Hamilton Island Wild Oats fell off the pace to turn at Shark Island a little more than two minutes down.

Over the last lap of the race, Andoo Comanche consolidated her lead for a trouble-free run to the finish after passing the Cannae Point and Shark Island marks once more.

LawConnect was the Maxi Division’s overall winner on 8 points, followed by Hamilton Island Wild Oats on 10 points, Black Jack on 10.5 points and Andoo Comanche on 12.5 points.

In the Mini Maxi Division, URM Group was crowned champion on 6 points, ahead of Willow, Alive, Whisper, Moneypenny and No Limit.

“The boat is well prepared. We’ve been working on it for a couple of years now,” said URM Group owner Anthony Johnston afterwards.

“We sailed pretty conservatively. We thought we would take a cautious approach. We had a few points up our sleeves. We’re happy with where the boat is. The crew is going really well. We are quite confident [ahead of the 2022 Rolex Sydney Hobart].”

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Dramatic start to Sydney to Hobart yacht race with close calls and wild weather

• Fleet sets off on Boxing Day in 78th edition of bluewater classic
• Andoo Comanche takes lead with eye on back-to-back line honours

Line honours favourite Andoo Comanche has taken the lead in the Sydney to Hobart after a dramatic start to the revered yacht race.

Comanche, the 2022 line honours winner, was travelling 28 miles off the coast of Port Kembla, south of Wollongong, when she overtook LawConnect roughly three-and-a-half hours into the race.

LawConnect, last year’s runner-up and a fellow 100-foot supermaxi, had taken an early lead out of the Sydney Heads, and later remained in hot pursuit of leader Comanche as they travelled at roughly 19 knots in northeasterly winds.

The two frontrunners have opened up a gap on third-placed supermaxi SHK Scallywag, which was about four miles behind Comanche when she passed LawConnect.

In-form 72-footer URM Group, along with Moneypenny and 2018 overall winner Alive – all contenders for handicap honours – appeared best-placed of the smaller boats.

Four hours into the race, the fleet remained at 103 boats – the same number that crossed the start line in Sydney Harbour.

Scallywag had earlier completed a 720-degree penalty turn in a bid to avoid a possible time sanction.

Accusing Scallywag of tacking too close, Comanche’s crew could be heard on broadcast coverage yelling to their rivals before formally flying a red protest flag.

The boats appeared to come within metres of each other.

The fact the incident had taken place in Sydney Harbour meant Scallywag had only a limited distance in which to complete the penalty turns, or risk receiving a time sanction on arrival in Hobart.

In 2017, Wild Oats XI opted not to respond to a protest from Comanche early in the race and a subsequent one-hour time penalty cost her a line honours victory.

Race officials confirmed Scallywag completed the turn off the coast of Bondi Beach.

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After a heavy storm cleared just before the 1pm starting gun, LawConnect led the way across the line then made the best of a change in the wind to pass the heads first.

But when a furling line snapped after LawConnect passed the first marker out of the Sydney Heads, she turned towards the spectator fleet in an attempt to correct the issue. The furling line issue has since been fixed.

The fleet is expected to encounter stormy conditions south of Jervis Bay on the NSW south coast.

Sudden and erratic wind changes, hail, rain and reduced visibility are all on the cards across the first two days of racing.

Easterly winds as strong as 35 knots are forecast for the far south coast of NSW on the night of Boxing Day and could impact the bigger boats in the fleet.

Winds are forecast to remain strong across the Bass Strait and southeast Tasmania on the morning of December 28, with storms a chance to continue affecting smaller boats.

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Skippered by John Winning Jr, the supermaxi yacht is out to defend her line honours title and break her own race record.

But a thunderstorm is forming, bringing with it erratic wind, hail and rain to test the fleet which includes three fellow 100-footers.

But Winning likes his chances.

"For us, it's really our swan song. We want to go out on a high," he said on Tuesday.

"We've got nothing to prove but everything to lose. We put ourselves in this position of being favourites.

"We've won all the races that we've had (navigator) Justin Shaffer on board and we really back his decision-making.

"The rest will be up to the wind."

With the wind behind her sails in 2022, Comanche stormed home in one day, 11 hours, 56 minutes and 48 seconds - the second fastest time for any line honours victor in Hobart history.

Winning and his crew are bent on beating the fastest-ever time of one day, nine hours, 15 minutes and 24 seconds - set by Comanche in 2017.

"I would say it's a little more than a glimmer of hope," he said.

"My navigator - I looked at him and he's looking at the wind, and he said, 'if we sail really well or whichever of the 100-footers in front sails really well, the breeze will deliver about a 10 to 20 per cent chance of things going and falling into place'.

"But we'd have to get down to Tasmania and up the Derwent in the easterly before that dies. If that's gone by the time we get there, it won't be possible."

Sailing master Iain Murray is predicting Comanche and her crew will clear the Boxing Day storm and enjoy at least some daylight on their 628-nautical-mile trip to Constitution Dock.

"We don't like thunderstorms," he said.

"You don't want to get caught with too many sails up and you certainly want to be able to react.

"Luckily, we're probably going to clear Sydney and most of the storms in daylight so you will have sort of some chance of seeing what's coming."

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Andoo Comanche set for Sydney to Hobart line honours defence but skipper aware of recent challenges

Sport Andoo Comanche set for Sydney to Hobart line honours defence but skipper aware of recent challenges

Andoo Comanche's crew are vowing to stay on their toes as they defend their Sydney to Hobart line honours title, lest they repeat a serious crash that sent two sailors to hospital.

Comanche has blitzed through preparations for this year's Hobart, where she will be one of four 100-foot (30.5-metre) supermaxis jostling to reach Constitution Dock the quickest.

Comanche holds the line-honours record and is arguably the fastest monohull in the world, crossing the line first at all four events of this year's Sydney Blue Water Pointscore Series thus far.

But Comanche's strength, her unmatched power, can be her greatest weakness, a point reiterated to skipper John Winning Jr and his crew earlier this year.

Sailing offshore near the site of another recent line honours victory, the Brisbane to Hamilton Island, the boat ran aground under motor.

Comanche only briefly scraped the bottom of her hull in the shallow water, but it was enough to send a jolt across the huge vessel.

The impact sent crew member Phil Jameson careering into the companionway, landing head-first and cracking his skull open.

"He was unconscious," Winning said.

"He doesn't have any recollections of the hours in between but we were having conversations with him and he doesn't remember any of that."

Fellow crew member Julien Cressant suffered a leg injury so painful he was struggling to walk.

"A couple of really good men got seriously injured, and they're probably two of the toughest blokes on the boat," Winning said.

"It shows you the tiniest thing on this thing, with the loads and the size and the weight of it, it can really hurt you if you get something wrong, and it did."

Both men have since recovered and are committed to joining Winning aboard Comanche from December 26.

"It's a good warning sign for us to always be on our toes," Winning said.

"The same thing can happen if you do anything wrong. It will come back and bite, you this boat. It's not forgiving."

Winning and his crew will spend the next month preparing for and contesting the Cabbage Tree Island race and Big Boat Challenge, as well as ironing out any remaining issues with their boat.

Winning is remaining alert to any mechanical issues after the engine and hydraulics failed during the Bird Island Race earlier this month.

"It was over an hour, maybe two or three hours, before they got it fixed," Winning said.

"We still won the race on line honours but we were lucky there were no other 100 footers or we might've had a bit on our hands to win that.

"The fact that in the last race we had a major problem is a little concerning.

"There's still a long way to go [until the Sydney to Hobart race] but we want to know what our back-up plans are for those situations."

It would be a brave punter who bet against Comanche once those issues were ironed out.

Winning is confident that in the right conditions, his team can break the line honours record — 1 day, 9 hours and 15 minutes — Comanche set in 2017.

"We want it windy, aiming at the finish line and as flat as possible on the water and as downwind as possible," Winning said.

"If we got the same conditions as 2017, we would like to think that as a crew, with the fact we've got new sail packaging and everything, we're every shot in beating that record."

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