LDV Comanche might consider dropping a protest against supermaxi rival Wild Oats XI if they beat them to the Sydney to Hobart finish line in what looks increasingly likely to be a race record time.
After 20 hours of racing, LDV Comanche led Wild Oats XI by around 11 nautical miles, with the first six boats all on record pace.
The projected times for the first three would result in them shattering the record by several hours, if they were to match the time of arrival predicted by the race's yacht tracker at 9am AEDT on Wednesday.
The big caveat is some of them will arrive in the Derwent River at the time the wind traditionally shuts down and won't have the strong north-easterlies that pushed them along through the early hours of Wednesday morning and were tipped to continue for most of the day.
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Boats need to finish before 2.31am AEDT on Thursday to get inside the record of one day 13 hours 31 minutes and 20 seconds set in 2016 by Perpetual LOYAL, racing this year as InfoTrack.
The defending line honours champion dropped from third to fifth overnight after losing time due to a damaged sail, but was still one of the boats on record pace.
The starting fleet of 102 suffered its first retirement with the German TP52 Rockall pulling out with a broken rudder.
LDV Comanche had a lead of around 20 nautical miles on Wednesday evening eaten into by Wild Oats XI, who she came perilously close to colliding with around 15 minutes after the race start on Boxing Day.
LDV Comanche raised a protest flag shortly after the incident and around four hours later notified the race's radio relay vessel of their intention to lodge a formal protest.
They will have six hours after finishing to lodge the paperwork with the international jury in Hobart.
"That's not the first time boats have been match racing and come close together, it won't be the last time," Cruising Yacht Club of Australia commodore John Markos told AAP.
"You've got expert crews and helmsmen that can manage those big boats very well.
"Yes, they were close but it remains for a jury to determine if there's an issue if there's a protest lodged, but I suspect there won't be if Comanche wins.
"The jury has to go through a process to convene a panel and hear the evidence and then make a ruling.
"It will likely be a time penalty if there's a ruling against them, but we'll have to see if there's a request for a jury yet."
He was excited about the possibility of a second race record in as many years.
"The interest for me was that last year the race record dropped by almost five hours," he said.
"This year another crack at the race record that I thought was going to live for a long time, looks real.
"The only thing that's really going to stop that is whether the Derwent shuts down or not, that's quite a possibility still."
InfoTrack was trying to fight back after being overtaken by the fourth supermaxi, Black Jack, and also the leading overseas boat - the 80-foot Hong Kong-based Beau Geste.
"We spent a fair bit of time trying to get a damaged sail down and that hurt us," Oxley told AAP.
"That's out of the race so now we're using a secondary sail."
