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Black Jack's Back

Black Jack's Back
Black Jack finishing - 3 minutes and 31 seconds behind Wild Oats XI

Black Jack's Back

Across more than 40 hours, Black Jack and 2017 Land Rover Sydney Gold Coast Yacht Race line honours winner Wild Oats XI were locked in a neck and neck battle up the coast with many surprised with just how fast Peter Harburg’s boat is.

In the end the two hundred footers were separated by just 3 mins and 31 seconds with the Black Jack crew sure to take confidence given their tight preparation times, “Just to put it in perspective, the rig was in the boat for the first time in 2 years and the mainsail was in the lock for the first time, 2 hours before the start. That’s how close it was,” said Mark Bradford, Black Jack’s skipper.

“We’re happy. For us there was a lot of stuff to check and we got through that and had a yacht race as a by-product of that and it was pretty good fun. We’ve been sailing around over the last 3 years in a Volvo 70 by ourselves, convincing ourselves we were racing and when you go racing again for a couple of days it was pretty nice.”

By the sounds of it the Black Jack team were as surprised as anyone at how competitive they were, but being edged out by such a small time difference, was there anything left in the tank that could have seen them take the line honours win?

Bradford commented, “We had a couple of opportunities for sure. I think their (Wild Oats XI) experience can’t be underestimated. They knew how to manage their boat through weaknesses whereas we struggled at weak points. Despite that the boat setup was perfect and we were competitive and that’s all you can ask for really.”

Most excitingly for Bradford and his team, the expectation is that their boat will only get quicker as the build more knowledge and understanding about what Black Jack is capable of.

Bradford added, “The nice thing for us is that we’ve laid a good foundation from here and move forward. It would appear initially we have an advantage in sub-nine knots while Oats have the edge reaching so its horses for courses in competition. We’ll be tweaking some more on the boat and then the back half of the year will be about sailing the boat better.”

Bradford’s comments echo those of his opposite number Wild Oats XI, Mark Richards, the Land Rover Sydney Gold Coast Yacht Race has set the scene for an exciting few months of competition between the big boats with the Rolex Sydney Hobart Yacht Race the crown jewel which everyone is building towards.