Matt Allen’s TP 52 Ichi Ban, with Gordon Maguire as Sailing Master, was first of all the TP 52s into the finish of the Rolex Sydney Hobart Race 2021 at 4:45:29 pm local time December 29th. But as she had only managed to open out an on-the-water lead of 17 minutes on Sam Haynes’s TP 52 Celestial, the slightly lower-rated Celestial currently holds the Best Corrected Time of all the finished boats, albeit by just three minutes from Ichi Ban which is now unassailably the winner of Class 0.
The current state of play is in full detail here, meanwhile, Gordon Maguire has given his own philosophical take on an extremely close outcome in this post-race interview
However, at 10.0pm in Hobart, it was revealed that two protests had been lodged against Celestial for non-compliance with communications requirements, one by the Race Committee and the other by Ichi Ban, which might affect the final results. Meanwhile, out at sea, there’s still all too play for in the overall stakes, as new weather patterns and good progress by the smaller boats show that the current projected overall leader and potential winner of the Tattersall Cup is one of the smallest boats in the race, the S&S 34 White Bay Azzuro (Sean Kearns) whose sailing master is Jim Nixon. He is doing his 27th Rolex Sydney Hobart Race, but it turns out that he maintains strong links with his Kildare and Blessington ancestry, and is the proud possessor of an Irish passport.