A year after Wild Oats XI was stripped of Sydney to Hobart line honours, skipper Mark Richards would have been worried history was about to repeat.
For the second year running the supermaxi passed the finish line first only to be hit by a post-race protest.
In 2017, the yacht lost line honours to Comanche after copping a time penalty for an illegal manoeuvre at the beginning of the race.
This year, Wild Oats XI faced an probe into whether the yacht's Automatic Identification System (AIS) was operational while racing after the skipper of runner-up Black Jack, Peter Harburg, raised concerns it wasn't, placing his yacht at a disadvantage.
Fortunately for the Wild Oats XI crew, the outcome was different.
After an hour-and-a-half deliberation on Saturday, the international jury ruled the protest invalid as it had not been lodged by a competitor.
"This year, very happy for the outcome. It's a very different situation to last year," Richards said, calling it a common sense decision.
Wild Oats XI had finished just 28 minutes ahead of Black Jack on Friday in a contest rated one of the best in the race's history.
Shortly afterwards, Harburg told media he couldn't pick Wild Oats XI up on the AIS, but didn't lodge an official protest.
The AIS, which transmits the location of a boat, was this year made a mandatory requirement to help improve race safety.
Richards maintains his AIS was on for the race's duration.
Despite initial concern about not being able to see Wild Oats XI on his AIS, Harburg said he was content with the jury's decision.
Attention will on Sunday morning turn to Tasmanian yacht Alive, who will be named the race's overall winner.
Five boats have retired from the original fleet of 85.
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