Defending champion Wild Oats XI made a perfect start to lead the fleet out of Sydney Harbour and dueled with its main challenger, fellow maxi Skandia, over the first eight hours of the Sydney to Hobart yacht race Friday. Wild Oats, trying to win Sydney-Hobart line honors for the fourth year in a row, at one stage trailed Skandia, first across the finish line in 2003, by just over two nautical miles. But Wild Oats made up the ground and the two traded the lead several times late Friday, often separated by only several hundred meters. The two maxis had opened up a lead of 10 nautical miles over Ichi Ban, which finished third last year. Dark clouds that had hung over the harbor in the morning burned away and weather conditions were expected to be favorable for most of the race – northerly winds that will push the fleet down the south coast of New South Wales state, across Bass Strait and to the island state of Tasmania and its capital Hobart. Wild Oats, a 98-foot maxi, was first to reach the Sydney Heads at the entrance of the harbor, passing through the rocky outcrops and into the Tasman Sea. As Wild Oats unfurled its spinnaker, pleasure boats and race craft zigged and zagged, often coming close to colliding in the washing machine of the open ocean. There were 11 international entries this year, including two each from New Zealand, the Netherlands and Britain and one from the United States. The race, which was first held in 1945, had been hit by severe storms in the past. This race marks the 10th anniversary of the 1998 event in which six sailors died and seven boats sank during a storm that hit the fleet early on the first night.
