Spain’s SailGP final chances ebb in Abu Dhabi’s light airs
Sign up now: Get ST's newsletters delivered to your inbox
Team Spain with their 50-foot foiling catamaran during the SailGP event on Lake Geneva on Sept 20, 2025.
PHOTO: AFP
Follow topic:
LONDON – Spain's chances of making this weekend’s three-way SailGP final slipped on Nov 29, as Diego Botin’s defending team lost ground to their nearest rivals Australia in the overall championship.
Light winds made for a tactically challenging contest for the 12-boat fleet, with speeds at a relative snail’s pace for the F50 catamarans, which in stronger breezes are capable of “flying” above the water at more than 100kmh.
Botin’s Los Gallos and Tom Slingsby’s Flying Roos both took penalties as they duelled for an edge in their mission to make the top three on the season leaderboard and clinch a place in the Nov 30 US$2 million (S$2.6 million), winner-takes-all finale.
Championship leaders Britain, along with New Zealand and Australia, are vying with Spain for a place in the grand final, while the other crews are looking to end the season with a win in the Abu Dhabi event.
In Nov 29’s four races on a compact course, where the sun shone but the wind waxed and waned, the crews jostled for position at the start, which largely proved decisive for the outcome as those that got away managed to hold a lead.
Small margins were critical, with the Spaniards penalised for being 15cm over the line on one start as they tried everything to tease extra speed out of their boat.
But after four races, with four more on Nov 30 to decide the championship finalists, Spain were lying last in the event rankings, behind Australia in 11th spot, Britain’s Emirates GBR in 10th and New Zealand’s Black Foils in eighth.
The British, skippered by Dylan Fletcher, and New Zealand, led by Peter Burling, both sailed conservatively as they worked to cement their positions at the top.
“Not our finest day of the season,” Fletcher said after the last race of the day, adding: “It’s all about the start.”
The team were focusing on what they needed to do to make the grand final and would then “take it from there”, he said, adding that he hoped there would be more wind to allow the F50s to foil.
“We’re looking forward to giving it our all,” said Burling, adding that it was interesting that all four crews in contention for the grand final had endured a tough day. REUTERS
