Sydney Hobart: Playing the Waiting Game down at the Dock

11:47 AM Sun 27 Dec 2009 GMT

'Race Fleet, Hobart awaits you - Rolex Sydney Hobart Yacht Race 2009' Crosbie Lorimer Click Here to view large photo

Sydney Hobart. It's about this time in a Rolex Sydney Hobart Yacht Race that the media contingent in Hobart are usually trying to work how best to pace themselves over the coming three or four days.

With the race frontrunners typically hammering down the Tasmanian coast and threatening to arrive in the early hours, do the media crew spend the majority of the race on deck or catch a few off watch stints here and there when the occasional gap in arrivals comes up.

The line honours winner will usually arrive at a time that requires a wake up call at some anti-social hour and you've barely covered their arrival and the associated line honours celebrations than the big end of the IRC fleet is heading up the Derwent River; then the next dilemma is that between filing a story or catching an interview from the next set of arrivals while the crew are still unshaven and in spontaneous response mode.

So there's some unfamiliar extra time for story-crafting amongst the media contingent at Constitution Dock this year with the prospect of an additional twelve hours or more before the first boats reach the Iron Pot at the entrance to the Derwent River, perhaps sometime on Monday evening

If you have a camera to hand the Hobart foreshore provides ample imagery to occupy your lens in the meantime, the immaculately kept fishing fleet providing much of the source material.

So here is a selection of Crosbie Lorimer's Day 2 dockside images in black and white from a warm and sunny Hobart.