Skandia leads Sydney-Hobart race
SYDNEY, Australia (CNN) -- Last year's winner and pre-race favorite Skandia holds an early lead in the annual Australian ocean racing classic, the Sydney to Hobart yacht race.
The 116 boats competing in the bluewater event face heavy weather as they run south.
The race began at 1.10 p.m. local time Sunday (0210 GMT), with a spectacular start on Sydney Harbor that was watched by more than 300,000 spectators jamming vantage points on the foreshores.
Hundreds of small spectator boats accompanied the fleet for the 20-minute run to Sydney Heads, where the yachts turned south for the arduous 628-mile (1163-kilometer) race to Hobart.
Though conditions for the start were virtually ideal, the weather is expected to deteriorate in the next 12 to 18 hours.
The fleet taking part in the 2004 event is the biggest contingent in a decade.
Last year's line honors winner, the 98-foot (30 meter) super-maxi Skandia, is hoping to repeat its 2003 success.
Its chief rival is Konica-Minolta, also a 30-meter super-maxi and the yacht that, racing as Zana, came second last year, just 14 minutes behind Skandia.
The other main contender for line honors is Nicorette, a brand new 27-meter (90-foot) yacht that has yet to be tried in rough conditions. Skipper Ludde Ingvall won in 2000 with an earlier version of Nicorette.
Skandia had been expected to be first through the Sydney Heads, but was just headed by Nicorette, with Konica Minolta in third place. The bigger boats quickly hoisted their spinnakers for the run south.
About four hours into the race, Skandia holds a narrow lead from Konica Minolta and Nicorette, with AAPT in fourth place. An early retirement is one of the other top contenders, Targe.
The fastest boats will take about two and a half days to complete the race. Some of the smaller boats will take four to five days.
The race record is 1 day, 19 hours 48.02 minutes, set by Danish-Australian entrant Nokia in 1999.
In a final briefing for entrants Sunday morning just before the start of the race, the weather bureau said conditions had eased a little, but crews could still expect a rough, uncomfortable time for much of the race.
The bureau said there were still two south-westerly fronts headed towards Bass Strait -- traditionally the roughest, toughest part of the event.
Weather is always a crucial factor in the event.
In the tragic race of 1998, when massive seas struck the fleet, six sailors lost their lives, 55 crew had to be rescued and only 44 of 115 boats completed the race.
Bruce Dover, skipper of the 14-meter (44-foot) EZ Street, told CNN just before the start of the race that it would be a challenging time for the competitors, particularly for the smaller boats at the back of the fleet.
"We are in for a bumpy ride," he said
