The red and green stripes of the South Sydney Rabbitohs and the De’Longhi logo were being displayed proudly on the waters of Sydney Harbour on Sunday 22 March, when De’Longhi’s 18ft skiff entrant won the annual Queen of the Harbour race.
The Queen of the harbour is a time honoured race which has been conducted by the Australian 18 Footers league since the 1930s when the regular 3-man crew is joined by a female crew member.
Teaming up with the Simon Neam (skipper), Richard Howard and Chris Cleary was Madeline Mitchell, daughter of Tom Mitchell, De’Longhi general manager – sales and marketing, who was awarded the honour of being Queen of the Harbour.
The De’Longhi/Rabbitohs team won a close race with a time of 1 hour 16 minutes and 22 seconds, beating its closest rival, Southern Cross Constructions by 1 minute and 8 seconds.
The race is a highly contested event with some of the entrants previously racing in the Sydney to Hobart and/or the Whitebread Ocean race, so the competition was definitely fierce.
But De’Longhi did not have it their way for the whole race with the early lead being contested between Yandoo and Project Racing, with Gotta Love it 7, Southern Cross, Kinder Caring Home Nursing and De’Longhi close behind.
De’Longhi soon made a dramatic charge and captured the lead during the second lap of the race.
Although the battle for 2nd, 3rd and 4th was highly contested, De’Longhi raced through the final lap untroubled to claim the victory.
The day ended with a great result for the team at De’Longhi and the their NRL sponsorship partners the South Sydney Rabbitohs, due to the fact that it gained an immense amount of publicity for the brands and increased the reputation of its racing team.