2024 Rolex Sydney Hobart Yacht Race: Sydney Hobart first timers say 'bring it on'
by Greta Quealy / RSHYR Media 22 Dec 16:57 PST
26 December 2024
Ciao Bella during the Noakes Sydney Gold Coast Yacht Race © CYCA | Ashley Dart
Olivia Gates, 30, will compete in her first Sydney Hobart on December 26 - and it is interesting to consider that when the nurse from Newcastle moved to Sydney four years ago, sailing was not on her radar.
Gates was encouraged by her stepdad, former Cruising Yacht Club of Australia (CYCA) Commodore Noel Cornish AM, to go sailing after she had come out the other side of a relationship breakup.
"I was like, 'Who in their right mind would find sailing interesting?'," Gates said. "I was on a boat with [CYCA member] Bradshaw Kellett, and he said, 'You know Liv, one day you're going to love sailing' and I said, 'Nah.' By the end of that race, I loved it."
The beginning
Gates' cheer squad of Cornish, her mother Meg Cornish and good friend Emmanuella Noble, had her back. They were on the dock when she arrived just after midnight following her first offshore race in 2023.
"Everyone in the crew of every boat I sail on, they're always saying, 'Liv, this isn't a Hobart send off.' They're just so passionate," Gates said.
This year Gates will be on the bow of the Hanse 505 Ciao Bella. Cornish, who has competed in 13 Sydney Hobarts, couldn't contain his excitement when he learned Gates would compete in the 628 nautical mile race.
"When Liv told me that she was going to sail in the 2024 Rolex Sydney Hobart, I paced, I couldn't sit down for six months," Cornish said.
The start of a friendship
Gates and Emmanuella Noble became fast friends when they met at a CYCA members' night in 2021.
"It was love at first sight," Gates joked.
Noble, 45, won't be in Hobart to welcome Gates this year, unless the yacht that she's on the Beneteau First 40 Chancellor, beats Ciao Bella to the finish.
This year is also a first for Noble. "I'm not able to contain my excitement," she said. "I'm normally at the dock, cheering everyone on. But I tell you what, when I'm coming in, I might feel a bit emotional. I'm certainly going to have my father in mind."
Noble's father, Captain Beresford Noble, who served in the Australian Merchant Navy, died when she was young. Noble started to sail three years ago, with him never far from her thoughts.
"You grieve the opportunity to get to know them as an adult," Noble said. "Since I've been sailing, I've discovered that I've inherited many of his qualities. When I'm on the water, it reminds me of him."
Noble, a clinical psychologist, will be a trimmer aboard Ted Tooher's Chancellor
Supporting women in sailing
Both sailors are thrilled to be racing on yachts whose owners champion women in sailing.
When Gates first met the co-owner of Ciao Bella, Karl Onslow, he was on the lookout for someone to join them for the Blue Water Pointscore. Gates assumed he was after a male.
"Karl turned around and said, 'Half of my crew are female.' And that's how it started," Gates said.
Of the 12 crew members aboard Ciao Bella's Sydney Hobart crew, four are female. And of the 12 on Chancellor, two are female.
Gates and Noble plan to cheer each other on from the rail.
"Females in sailing need to support one another," Noble said. "You really get that [between Olivia and me], that feeling of empowering one another.
"I'm going to give the race a red hot go and I say, 'bring it on'."