World’s top sailors preparing for blast off of SailGP on Sydney Harbour
Winning is one thing, but all six skippers at the SailGP which is hitting Sydney Harbour next week also have another target in mind: cracking the 50 knot barrier.
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Australian Olympic gold medallist Nathan Outteridge expects the 50 knot barrier to be broken in SailGP racing next week, revealing teams have already come within a knot or two of the mark in testing and training.
Outteridge and his rivals were on Thursday involved in a dress rehearsal for the inaugural SailGP event being raced in foiling, wing-sailed F50 catamarans on Sydney Harbour next week
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Outteridge, the skipper of the Japanese boat in the new world series, says the race is on between all six skippers to crack the 50 knots barrier on Sydney Harbour.
Sailors at the 2017 Americas Cup fell just short of the mark in their foiling 50-foot racing machines with multiple world former 49er skiff champion Outteridge, the skipper of the Swedish Artemis team at the famed regatta, eventually recording the fastest speed of 47.2 knots.
Australian SailGP skipper Tom Slingsby has made public his intent to crack 50 knots but fellow London Olympic gold medallist Outteridge said every skipper in the fleet has the same goal.
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“Forty nine knots is the closest so far. Everyone is gunning for this,” said Outteridge, who is also doing an Australian Olympic campaign with sister Haylee in the Nacra 17 mixed class.
“I would be surprised if we don’t hit 50.
“I did 48 in sea trails.”
Three of the six boats racing the SailGP have been built from scratch while the others have been built from components from the machines raced at the last Americas Cup with additional development delivering faster and more technologically advanced crafts.
The boats are now one-designed and raced by crews of five with Volvo round the world winner and French Olympic campaigner Marie Riou the only female sailor in the fleet.
For the first season a 100 per cent nationality rule applies to the Australian, French, US and British teams on the circuit.
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China and Japan are required to have 40 percent of the crew from their home nation, a figure which will increase by 20 percent each year until they are fully national.
Outteridge, who is also CEO of the Japanese SailGP team, is responsible for identifying and bringing up Japanese sailing talent to eventually meet full nationality requirements.
HOW SAIL GP WORKS
SailGP events will be run in iconic locations around the world with six teams contesting the first circuit.
Racing will be inshore with the circuit kicking off in Sydney next week over two days.
Teams are national with each catamaran boasting a crew of five sailors.
The series will culminates with a $1 million winner-takes-all match race in Franxe in September..
Teams competing are Australia, China, France, Great Britain, Japan and the US.
The crafts they will sail are identical wing-sailed foiling F50 catamarans.
THE AUSTRALIAN CREW
The Australian crew is headed by London Olympic gold medallist, multiple world Laser champion and America’s Cup winner Tom Slingsby from Gosford on the NSW central coast.
His crewmates are wing trimmer Kyle Langford, grinders Ky Hurst and Sam Newton and flight controller Jason Waterhouse.
2019 SAILGP
Sydney, Australia (February 15-16)
San Francisco, USA (May 4-5)
New York, USA (June 21-22)
Cowes, UK (August 10-11)
Marseille, France (September 20-22)
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