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Speaker 1: I'm told The Race of the Century is available now

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Speaker 1: to stream on Netflix.

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Speaker 2: John Longley was one of the crew.

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Speaker 1: Members on Australia Too, which won the America's Cup in

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Speaker 1: nineteen eighty three, the first time America lost the race,

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Speaker 1: and he's joining us now, John, John.

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Speaker 3: Hi, guys, how are you very well?

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Speaker 1: Now?

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Speaker 2: We both watched it yesterday. Did you watch it yesterday

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Speaker 2: as well?

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Speaker 3: Yeah?

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Speaker 2: I had to think a preview tape or something.

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Speaker 3: No. Jen and I sat down and we watched it

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Speaker 3: last night. And of course Jenny had done to America's

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Speaker 3: Cups with me, so she knew in Newport as well

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Speaker 3: as I do. And we really did to get a

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Speaker 3: buzz out of seeing that amazing town, I mean Newport

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Speaker 3: and an America's Cup summer back in the eighties. You

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Speaker 3: were very blessed if you could experience that.

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Speaker 1: It will always be the definitive underdog story, won't it.

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Speaker 3: Yeah? It is, and I mean it is. I guess

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Speaker 3: one of the things that came out of the program

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Speaker 3: last night, and I'd almost sort of forgotten in a way,

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Speaker 3: was how it was watched by the whole of Australia.

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Speaker 3: Everyone was riveted by it. And what's extraordinary is that.

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Speaker 3: You know, I said, if you take AFL Grand Final,

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Speaker 3: you know many people in large joun of people are

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Speaker 3: interested in lots of people watching the Olympics. But what

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Speaker 3: those people know about the AFL. Yes, but the people

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Speaker 3: who were watching that program, the whole of Australia maybe

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Speaker 3: less than one percent ever sailed. It was a smaller number,

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Speaker 3: and I had any idea what was going on as

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Speaker 3: far as the tactics and the technology and so forth.

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Speaker 3: Wasn't just the untold story. It was really the fact

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Speaker 3: that it was Australia, little tiny country in recession, in

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Speaker 3: big recession against the might of America, and America was

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Speaker 3: even mightier in those days and it is today. It

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Speaker 3: was a wonderful story.

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Speaker 4: It is an incredible story.

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Speaker 3: John.

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Speaker 4: You know one thing, and you said you'd forgotten a

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Speaker 4: couple of things. There was a bit Now I forgot

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Speaker 4: farther behind we got during Ray seven they were quicker.

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Speaker 3: They were quicker than that. I mean, let me tell you.

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Speaker 3: People know we were dead lucky to win that last race. Yeah, yeah,

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Speaker 3: dead lucky. And the reason why I say that is

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Speaker 3: because in light breeze conditions in Newport, you look after

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Speaker 3: the right you know, you always look after the right,

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Speaker 3: and Dennis, of course got in front of us. He

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Speaker 3: was quicker than us because he'd pulled this absolute stunt

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Speaker 3: where he'd light and he was quicker and he just

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Speaker 3: looked after the right. But guess what, one time in

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Speaker 3: ten the pressures on the left and he kept forcing

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Speaker 3: us back into that pressure. You It was extraordinary, not till.

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Speaker 2: The doc is on Saturday night. At a turnaround, like John.

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Speaker 3: I tell you, were half way up the second beat.

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Speaker 3: Halfway up the second beat. I turned to Brian Richardson,

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Speaker 3: who was the starboard grinder, and he was a rower,

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Speaker 3: so he wasn't really a huge sailor, and I said,

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Speaker 3: Jesus rich we're two minutes behind here. And then then

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Speaker 3: we got into the left stuff and we got kided.

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Speaker 3: I mate, if this keeps going like this, will only

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Speaker 3: be a minute behind the top. Dark ending happen. And

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Speaker 3: that's what happened. I mean, it was, it.

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Speaker 2: Was, it was. The documentary includes Bob Hawk's last interview

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Speaker 2: and he amazed, was.

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Speaker 1: Amazing, and he talks about how of all the things

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Speaker 1: he said and done the you know, the the bosses.

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Speaker 1: A bum comment he made on the day will always

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Speaker 1: be his most famous.

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Speaker 2: I've always liked the whole of what he said.

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Speaker 4: Have you what any boss.

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Speaker 2: Who sex anyone?

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Speaker 4: But not turning up the days above.

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Speaker 3: The next day to my gun.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, he did tell us we had to you know.

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Speaker 4: Yeah, you didn't hear that bit.

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Speaker 1: You never hear that bit. You don't want to ruin

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Speaker 1: a good story, but it was. It was such a

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Speaker 1: classic moment. There were a few classic moments. The other

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Speaker 1: one that I always think about is Bondie.

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Speaker 2: You know, giving the sign to bring it out of

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Speaker 2: the water to show the king.

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Speaker 4: He was the conductor.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, and you know what when that happened, I had

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Speaker 3: spent large one of my last year hiding the kell. Yeah. Yeah,

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Speaker 3: when body said lift, I said this and I went

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Speaker 3: shooting up to the top of the cat. One of

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Speaker 3: the sure guys was about the press the button. I said,

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Speaker 3: give me the button, Yes, the button to lift her up.

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Speaker 4: Yeah, that was your job.

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Speaker 3: I rember job.

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Speaker 4: In nineteen eighty three, Dennis Connor was paid for Australians.

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Speaker 4: There's a bit of a bad guy. We disliked the

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Speaker 4: a loudmouth American. He was actually very gracious in defeat

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Speaker 4: and he was a great, great sail, wonderful, brilliant.

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Speaker 3: Taylor, absolutely genius. I mean the third, the fourth race,

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Speaker 3: you know, we we to two one and we were

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Speaker 3: and you know, the breakages were, you know, just really

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Speaker 3: bad luck. I mean, the boat had been so resilient

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Speaker 3: for all of those races leading up to it that

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Speaker 3: that fourth race Dennis raced it as if it was

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Speaker 3: not a match race. One on one. He ignored us.

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Speaker 3: He sailed like it was a fleet race, and it was.

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Speaker 3: It was one of the most brilliant pieces of sailing

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Speaker 3: I've ever seen, and I saw it from up close,

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Speaker 3: trailing the barstard the whole time. He was. He was

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Speaker 3: amazing Dennis. And he's a very strange character in ways.

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Speaker 3: That's why some people like to sort of paint him

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Speaker 3: as this sort of because he was. He was just

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Speaker 3: as you can see yesterday, totally intense, I mean, very.

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Speaker 1: We love a parade and you you were very surprised

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Speaker 1: when you made the journey from Fremantle to Perth to

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Speaker 1: you know, so that everyone could say that.

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Speaker 3: I was still in Newport ye when Warren Jones, and

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Speaker 3: it was very sad that Warren wasn't you know, you

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Speaker 3: can't tell the whole story. You can only you can

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Speaker 3: only tell a flight of the pie. But Warren was

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Speaker 3: such a critical part of he was our manager. But

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Speaker 3: Warren Warren was sort of looking at a telex machine.

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Speaker 3: You remember them. Yeah, said they're going to Blady have

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Speaker 3: a parade from Freeman. I said, don't be mad, twenty

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Speaker 3: two k or whatever. They're going to be three people

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Speaker 3: and a dog watching us, you know. And it was

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Speaker 3: lying the whole way. The point was, and they didn't

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Speaker 3: actually say this on the Broatgrame last night. When we

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Speaker 3: got to the esplanade, Remember there'd been huge number of

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Speaker 3: people the whole way in Fremantle, all the way down

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Speaker 3: the Stirling Highway. There was police numbers. There was two

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Speaker 3: hundred and fifty thousand people on the esplanade. Wow. The

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Speaker 3: population of Western Australia was just over a million, so

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Speaker 3: one in four people were there.

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Speaker 4: Yeah, we're on the esplane. I've done all the way

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Speaker 4: of the river.

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Speaker 2: Isn't that amazing?

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Speaker 4: You've mentioned Dennis kind of being a different kind of cat.

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Speaker 4: What about barefoot Ben LExEN? Would it have happened without Ben?

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Speaker 3: Oh? Benny is one of my great great old mates

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Speaker 3: and I was missing so much as we've got godfather

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Speaker 3: of my son, Nicholas. He just he is just an extraordinary,

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Speaker 3: extraordinary and it was made the point was made in

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Speaker 3: the video. And he had three years of formal education,

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Speaker 3: and what that does is he gave him a completely

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Speaker 3: open free He wasn't constrained by anything. But he was

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Speaker 3: incredibly smart. I mean he needed to look calculus and

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Speaker 3: some of the you know, the design work. He did

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Speaker 3: so and taught himself. Here's a guy I went to

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Speaker 3: school for three years teaching himself calculus and his and

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Speaker 3: as also came out on the program. He was so

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Speaker 3: like linked into nature. I mean he would watch dolphins,

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Speaker 3: he would watch birds. He just had this he put

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Speaker 3: his head on, he blink and he goes far and

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Speaker 3: he just he was somewhere else. He was a wonderful,

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Speaker 3: wonderful man and go yeah, God, he was just back John.

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Speaker 1: It was a fierce rivalry obviously between the two boats.

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Speaker 1: But I've always liked to think that as yachties, at

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Speaker 1: the end of the day of racing, that a very

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Speaker 1: good time would have been had back at the clubhouse.

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Speaker 3: No no, no, no clubhouse. We're living we're all living

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Speaker 3: in mansion. That Newport's got all these old man they're

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Speaker 3: all now used for housing, you know, the kids to

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Speaker 3: go to the to the nursing college there. Anyway, so

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Speaker 3: we were after it was all over, we sort of

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Speaker 3: somehow we was led by police and god knows what

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Speaker 3: to the to the press conference, and we all did

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Speaker 3: the press conference that it was huge, you know, and

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Speaker 3: so forth, and then we sort of were forced our

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Speaker 3: way out from the finally you leave the crowd, and

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Speaker 3: then we sort of wandered back through the streets of

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Speaker 3: Newport and we looked at each other and said, what

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Speaker 3: are we now? Disappointment because you know, like we had

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Speaker 3: five days off in five months. Yeah, so we were

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Speaker 3: just totally obsessed by work. And so Bondie said, I'm

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Speaker 3: going to have a party at my house. So I

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Speaker 3: went up to Bondie's house and it was the quietest

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Speaker 3: most we were all your time each other and saying,

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Speaker 3: I went because I was I was living with my

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Speaker 3: wife Jenny in the house outside the Crew House because

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Speaker 3: I had my son there, Nick, and and I went

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Speaker 3: back to the crew House to get some clothes. The

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Speaker 3: next morning, I walked through the place was full of

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Speaker 3: people asleep, lads. A few of the lads went down

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Speaker 3: to town and rip of Department of US were just knacking. Well.

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Speaker 4: It was phenomenal to watch last night.

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Speaker 1: We've got to thank you once again for providing one

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Speaker 1: of the most amazing moments in this country's history that

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Speaker 1: I will ever see in my lifetime. And it's the

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Speaker 1: untold The Race of the Century is available to stream

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Speaker 1: on flicks now. Everyone's going to love reliving it.

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Speaker 3: Just thank you. Look, I'm just so proud that it

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Speaker 3: was made up. I mean there was thirty nine years ago,

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Speaker 3: but we were all professionally, we're all amateur saless teachers

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Speaker 3: and carpenters and what have you. And to have that

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Speaker 3: acknowledgment after so long. Yeah, but these two guys, you know,

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Speaker 3: Chapman and m clay way, who they weren't even born,

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Speaker 3: the producers, the Ammy Award producers. Yeah, and they said,

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Speaker 3: this is a story we've got to tell.

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Speaker 2: Absolutely.

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Speaker 4: I had a tear in the eye by the end

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Speaker 4: of it last night, and I won't be alone. It

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Speaker 4: was very cool, very emotional.

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Speaker 1: John Longley, it's always so lovely to chat with you

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Speaker 1: about the America's Cup.

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Speaker 4: By Longley's incredible. We could have spoken for about thirty

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Speaker 4: minutes easily.

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Speaker 1: These are really good. These are told on Netflix some

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Speaker 1: you know, a lot of documentaries and that I mean,

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Speaker 1: I'm biased, but that's the best one I've seen here.

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Speaker 4: And isn't it funny At the very end of the race,

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Speaker 4: after all of that, in the excitement, Bondie was going

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Speaker 4: on off, but John Bertrand, who was so dedicated to

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Speaker 4: the cause, it was just sort of like slumped.

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Speaker 2: Well, now you knows. John said, they.

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Speaker 4: Were like Kathy Freeman when she finally won the four

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Speaker 4: hundred years in Sydney. They just just slumped on the track.

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Speaker 4: So yeah, that's what the dedication brought them so much

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Speaker 4: fat