Many people have tried, including several of those involved in the latest initiative, to deliver a professional and engaging sailboat race circuit. But teams don’t come better qualified than this one and Act 1 in Bermuda was none too shabby. A good time to build on it then… James Boyd grills Russell Coutts about SailGP
Eleven and a half years ago, a few months before the 32nd America’s Cup in Valencia, the press were invited to Lisbon to hear from Russell Coutts and Paul Cayard about a new sailing circuit called the World Sailing League, backed to the tune of 30 million euros by a Portuguese sports promoter. The circuit would be a global series of grand prix, in 70ft one-design VPLP-designed catamarans with a US$5 million prize purse. Given that at the time we were supposed to be getting excited about the latest Version 5 lead mines soon to be unveiled in Valencia, this new circuit for ultra-fast boats, supported by two of the biggest names in sailing, was a breath of fresh air.
Sadly the World Sailing League never materialized and it is perhaps for this reason that one of the worst-kept secrets in modern-day sailing is only being formally revealed now, just four months out from its first event.
Thanks to the entity formerly known as ISAF changing its name to World Sailing, ‘World’ was no longer an option and Coutts’s new circuit is to be called SailGP. The boats will be fully one-design, heavily enhanced versions of the AC50 flying catamarans and have been christened F50.
Read on.
