The Sydney to Hobart bug still bites deep for Ed Psaltis, 20 years after he broke a family duck with surely the most bittersweet handicap win in race history.
The Farr 40 boat AFR Midnight Rambler he co-owned with Bob Thomas, took overall honours in 1998 in hellish conditions, in which six competitors' lives were lost and only 44 of the 115 starters finished.
The win ended a near half century long family quest that started back in the early 1950s when Ed's dad Bill first contested the race.
Now 90, Bill will fire the ten-minute warning cannon before the start of this year's race on Boxing Day, when Ed on his 36-foot Midnight Rambler, will contest his his 37th Hobart.
He will be one of four crew members from the victorious 1998 boat.
Between Bill, Ed, and his two brothers Charles and Arthur, the Psaltis clan nave racked up around 90 Hobart races across almost six decades.
Hence the mixture of emotions when AFR Midnight Rambler not only survived the torrid conditions in 1998, but emerged the overall winner.
"When we finished dad rung us on Constitution Dock, I can still recall he was in tears," Ed Psaltis told AAP.
"He said 'thank God you're both alive, my two sons,' because Arthur was there as well.
"Then he said 'you've finally won this bloody race, thank God for that..'
"What we did was totally against the odds, but certainly publicly it was horrible undeniably.
"Six people dying some of whom I knew very well , it was a horrible tragedy."
Psaltis said teamwork was the key to his crew surviving and succeeding in the 1998 race.
'"We looked after each other, if we'd been in that gale as seven individuals, we would have died, we went in as a team of seven," Psaltis said.
'We always said the welfare of the boat overrides personal welfare and because of that ethic I think we were able to get through some pretty horrendous times.
'We were in control at some stages, other stages we were out of control and the sea was about to take us out, but we managed to to get through, but it was line-ball."
Although he's relocating to Hobart in the new year, Psaltis doubts this will be the final time he contests the great race.
"The next year is the 75th (Sydney to Hobart), it would be lovely to do it," Psaltis said.
"It has been a huge thing for all our family all our lives and it will continue to for me.
"I tried to escape it a few years ago and I couldn't, it just dragged me back in again, so I'm probably going to keep doing it for a bit further."
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