Her predecessor established YYachts as an international avant-garde boatbuilding brand. The new Y7, designed by judel/vrolijk, takes the game a notch higher.

She proved her worth twice early on. And on both of these occasions, in a strong breeze and also in very light wind, her sailing performance exceeded all expectations.

In April, when under way from the Baltic Sea to the Mediterranean, where she would make her debut at the Palma Boat Show, the English Channel set the stage. This being a delivery trip, the new Y7 sailed conservatively canvassed for the solid force six from astern, under selftacking jib and reefed mainsail only. But it didn’t seem to tame her much.

For almost four hours non-stop she sat on a continuous plane, averaging more than 16kts of boat speed, topping out at 20.7kts through the water even without any help from the rather unruly sea state.

‘She sailed like dream, like on rails’, recalls Klaus Kurzweg. The skipper who has logged nearly 50,000 nautical miles on previous Y7 models met the new design “with a bit of scepticism”, as he admits. ‘I was really in love with the old boat’, he says, not sure the wider, bigger sister would match his expectations. ‘But she really does have significantly more power.’

Ten days earlier, during the very first sea trial in her home waters near the city of Greifswald, an ice-cold high-pressure system across the Pomeranian coast threw a pointedly different challenge at her. Together with YYachts founder Michael Schmidt, a highly experienced team of engineers from judel/vrolijk & co who were working with the yard for the first time, stepped aboard to get a feel for the Y7’s sailing performance.

As the 22m yacht slid away from the jetty under engine there was hardly any breath of wind. Further out at sea, the anemometer at the top of the 34.6-metre tall mast began to turn sluggishly, recording four to five knots, with puffs reaching seven to eight knots true. However, the light breeze did not reach the water’s surface.

Any conventional cruising boat would have become a drifting buoy in these conditions, even for the Y7 it appeared challenging. This 72ft luxury performance cruising yacht is full carbon sandwich construction and lighter than most of her competitors. The backstay-free rig, braced by extremely wide, aft-swept spreaders, allows for a square-top mainsail the size of a volleyball court. During the test, with the code zero unfurled, the boat projected a total of 500 square metres of jet-black Technora membrane. Yet it was also pulling the equivalent of a loft-style flat through the water, complete with four bedrooms, just as many bathrooms, a kitchen, living-dining room, boat office and separate crew quarters.

So, expectations were, shall we say, cautiously subdued. But no sooner had the sails been trimmed in than the log figures on the mast display started ticking merrily upwards. Before you knew it they roughly matched those of the wind sensor: 5.0 kts… 5.8 … 6.4… 7.0… 6.7. It felt like a quiet miracle in this wintery cool, almost motionless weather.

Matthias Bröker, who played a key role in designing the new Y7, was still marvelling at that moment weeks later: ‘The way she created her own wind on the oily-calm patch of water was truly surreal.’

Of course, the yacht was designed for this: challenging wind speed in the light stuff and outpacing most of her competitors. But experiencing first-hand the combination of tenderness and power on such a colossal scale is something else still.

Easily accessible performance has always been one of, if not the very essence of the brand. The boats are also distinguished by their own signature aesthetic. Clean hull lines and the flat superstructure with recessed, vertical coachroof windows define YYachts’ appearance. Michael Schmidt calls it “timeless elegance”, and rightly so. Even at 10 years old, the marque’s first designs still look fresh and distinctive today. Schmidt, a restless entrepreneur who has never been shy to challenge conventional wisdom, built the very first boat in 2015 for himself: Y8 Cool Breeze. It was to be his retirement project after 20 busy years as founder of Hanse Yachts, during which he had developed the yard into the world’s third-largest production builder and successfully floated it on the stock exchange.

Why did he not just buy from another yard, and happily cruise the Med, the Caribbean, the world? ‘The yachts available at the time just didn’t spark my interest’, he says. ‘Too heavy, too cluttered, too complicated’. He wanted a yacht he could handle on his own, one that is easy for a small crew to operate – ‘as easy as it goes for an 80-footer, a boat you can feel’.

It apparently wasn’t just Schmidt who liked the idea of sophisticated simplicity. A year after Cool Breeze was launched, he sensed demand – and an opportunity to postpone early retirement. He founded the company in 2016 as Michael Schmidt Yachtbau and then later rebranded it more internationally as YYachts. Today it is arguably one of the hottest brands in big-boat sailing.

Y7 technical specifications

Naval architect: judel/vrolijk & co
Interior design & styling: YYachts Design Team & David Thulstrup
CE classification: Category A
Yard: YYachts GmbH
Hull length on deck (LOD): 21.99 m
Length overall (LOA): 23.80 m
Length waterline (LWL): 20.55 m
Beam: 6.10 m
Draught standard/shallow keel: 3.50 m / 2.85 m
Displacement31.8tBallast / Ballast ratio: 10.7t / 34%
Ballast telescopic keel approximate: 10.4t
Mainsail: 180m²
Self-tacking jib (Std.): 126m²
Jib 105%: 147m²
Code 0: 320m²
Gennaker: 500m²
SA/D upwind with jib / genoa: 31 / 33
Displacement/LWL: 102
Engine (Yanmar 4LV SD15 saildrive): 150 hp, 110 kw
Fuel tank approximate: 850 litres
Fresh water approximate: 850 litres
Black Water approximate: 240 litres

The original Y7 was launched in 2018, a design by the American naval architect Bill Tripp. It became the shipyard’s bestseller: both a style icon and a highly successful business model. No other boat of this size and configuration has sold a total of two dozen units in just eight years. So it is no coincidence that the yard kicked off its 10-year anniversary with a new, refined version.

Judel/vrolijk designer Jan Kuhnert compares designing the successor to the task of “developing the next generation of a Porsche 911”. It’s a balancing act between sensitively preserving the heritage on the one hand and resolutely modernising the product experience on the other.

The design and engineering team, who also undertook the structural analysis, have mastered this thoroughly challenging task remarkably well. From every angle the new Y7 appears more taut, more defined, more elongated, more exciting while still maintaining the family DNA.

The reverse sheer line suggests agility. The forward section of the hull and deck look nicely tensioned, poised to spring forward. It also brings down the tack on the bowsprit for more sail area in the asymmetric spinnaker and the code zero. The transom is wider but significantly slimmer, giving the boat a distinctive lightness from the stern.

Not visible but certainly noticeable is the significantly higher stability. Matthias Bröker puts the increase at 30 per cent. This is due to nuances in hull design generating more form stability and a lower centre of gravity. These measures allow for more upright, efficient sailing in moderate wind conditions. The ratio of righting moment to heeling moment is improved by no less than 25 per cent.

The judel/vrolijk & co team optimised a total of 11 parameters relevant to sailing performance over dozens of iterations before finalising the Y7’s design in collaboration with the shipyard’s development team. ‘As naval architects we were tasked with creating much more space below deck without compromising sailing performance and ideally improving it,’ says Bröker.

The sail area to displacement ratio sits at 31 with the self-tacking jib, reaching 33 with the optional 105 per cent genoa. Displacement to length is 102. By common standards these indicators put the new Y7 firmly into the category of racing yachts. She can provide for pleasant daysailing in the notoriously light-wind Mediterranean as well as crossing oceans at pace.

On hull number one, only the rather stiff steering dampened the fun somewhat. The twin-rudder set-up had noticeable initial resistance even when operating without load. While it improved during delivery, the shipyard has now modified the push-rod steering system to deliver that light yet precise feedback which is part and parcel for a luxury performance cruiser.

Pedestals, electric winches, halyard clutches and line storage are situated aft of the guest cockpit, ensuring that the deck area remains clearly segmented. A companionway offset to port leaves the seating area around the large cockpit table as a relaxation zone, free of any traffic by other crew passing.

Access to the winches is excellent. They are mounted on pedestals further inboard than on most yachts, so to actively sail and trim the genoa sheet no one needs to brace all the way out and down on the side deck to leeward, allowing for more sheltered sheeting and easing. Features like this show the depth of experience and refinement in the design team as well as within the yard.

The Y7 has also gained enormously in terms of space below deck, far more than the 30-centimetre increase in beam would suggest. In fact, the increase is closer to 20 per cent in volume, due not only to the more powerful hull shape and wider forward sections but also to a more efficient layout.

This is particularly evident in the saloon, where in the yacht’s standard configuration the U-shaped galley adjoins the main bulkhead on starboard side. On the port side there is a lounge that can also be converted into an office or partitioned off to create a guest cabin. Those who do not choose the latter option retain the open character of the saloon, which then appears as spacious as on a typical 80ft yacht.

Equally impressive is the owner’s cabin, located forward in all layout variants. It features a slightly off-centre double berth, accessible from three sides, and has an en suite bathroom. A walk-in wardrobe is available on request. The optional VIP guest cabin aft on the starboard side is also a new and highly attractive feature. However, it does restrict the crew quarters aft a bit, as the crew lose their own mess.

Owners can choose from three basic layouts, which allow for a further five variations. All of this is available in four different styles – from dark and dignified (Baltic) to fresh and light (Glacier, as on hull number one). So the Y7 offers nearly three dozen different combinations without moving bulkheads or racking up extra cost and complexity for custom solutions – which the yard is, of course, still able to provide.

No matter what you choose, crew on the new Y7 can access the deck from their cabin via their own companionway, located in front of the mainsheet block. It is so seamlessly integrated into the aft end of the cockpit that it remains almost invisible.

The carefully insulated engine compartment is also accessible via this route. There is a second access from the forward end, via the central service tunnel, which houses the washing machine (on rails!) and much of the electrical system.

Whilst the first boat in the series is already sailing under her owner’s flag following the Palma boat show, the second is due to be launched in Greifswald shortly. Orders for three further yachts have already been placed. Ready to sail, they generally cost between €3.2 million and €3.6 million ex tax.

It looks as if the Y7 is continuing her successful course in swift style. So YYachts have given themselves a fitting gift for their 10th anniversary. And there is yet another one in the making. The new Y6, which at 65ft will become the brand’s smallest model yet, is set to be presented this fall.

More on YYachts

Slingsby’s numerous sailing achievements speak for themselves. After winning an Olympic gold medal in the Laser at London 2012, he played a key role in Oracle Team USA’s legendary comeback victory in the 34th America’s Cup in San Francisco, before masterminding three consecutive season championship wins in SailGP as skipper of the Australian team.

The common thread that runs through all those successful campaigns is the level of his influence over the way they were run.

His Olympic gold medal came with plenty of support from his coach Michael Blackburn, but out on the waters off Weymouth it was Slingsby alone in the boat who delivered the results.

The US America’s Cup team’s turnaround in fortune came almost immediately after a rejigging of the afterguard that saw Slingsby elevated to become one of the key decision-makers, on and off the water.

And the Australian team’s almost total domination of SailGP since its inception can almost completely be attributed to the quality and longevity of the sailing team that Slingsby hand-picked and then carefully honed into a close-to-invincible force.

Given that SailGP success, it comes as no surprise that when tasked with picking a team for the first Australian America’s Cup challenge in 26 years, Slingsby has called up all but one of his BONDS Flying Roos teammates. (Only wing trimmer Iain Jensen is missing from the list, having previously signed for Emirates Team New Zealand.)

SailGP flight controller and tactician Jason Waterhouse steps into a helming role on the port side of the Australian AC75 opposite Slingsby, after switching allegiances from the Swiss America’s Cup challenger Tudor Team Alinghi. Waterhouse won silver in the Nacra 17 (sailing with Lisa Darmanin) at the Rio 2016 Olympic Games.

Team Australia’s two trimmers/flight controllers are Luke Parkinson and Tom Needham.

As well as winning the 2014-15 edition of the Volvo Ocean Race aboard Abu Dhabi Ocean Racing, Parkinson was a cyclor with INEOS Britannia when they won the Louis Vuitton Cup during AC37, and is the flight controller with the Season 5-winning Emirates Great Britain SailGP Team.

In 2025, Tom Needham became the youngest-ever helmsman to win the JJ Giltinan 18ft Skiff World Championship. He sailed as part of the Team Australia entry in the 2024 Youth America’s Cup in Barcelona, and is a reserve sailor for the BONDS Flying Roos, as well as working within SailGP’s hydraulic and systems operations. Appropriately for a modern America’s Cup sailor, Needham attained a degree in mechanical and aerospace engineering, in which his specific focus was on the performance of supercavitating foils.

The BONDS Flying Roos’ Tash Bryant had previously been announced as a member of the Team Australia America’s Cup challenge. A past 49erFX under-19 world champion, Bryant was co-helm opposite Hannah Mills aboard the British Athena Pathway Women’s America’s Cup crew that made it to the final against Luna Rossa at AC37.

Also announced as sailing team members were BONDS Flying Roos grinders Sam Newton and Kinley Fowler – both of whom were part of Oracle Team USA’s America’s Cup victory. Although Fowler’s role has not been specified, Newton describes his responsibilities as: “working with the sailing team as part of the operations management, to keep the link between the sailing team, design team, and shore team, to work out the most efficient processes to maximise our time out on the water”.

The Australian team will not be competing at the upcoming second preliminary regatta in Italy in a couple of weeks’ time, but the sailing squad have been spending plenty of time in their simulator at the team’s new base in Sydney.

Meanwhile the Aussie AC75 – previously Te Rehutai, winner of the 2021 America’s Cup – continues to undergo modifications by its previous owners Emirates Team New Zealand under the supervision of technical director Glenn Ashby. The team aren’t planning to launch their boat until 2027, with the first sail expected to be at the 38th America’s Cup venue in Naples.

• How great it was to return to Valencia / memories of America’s Cup events of old / thronged with UK visitors there to see SailGP

• The local taxi drivers’ opinions on the size of the crowds

• The problems of covering sailing in light winds and the constraints of a broadcast window

• Magnus pitching (again) for a trial of windward starts

• The perfect positioning of the media centre in Valencia – right at the back of the start box

• Light winds didn’t mean poor racing / the benefits of split fleets / the sailors remain ultra competitive

• How impressive the F50’s big rigs are to be able toi race in seven knots of breeze

• Motorised booster jets yet to be tested

• Justin’s experience with Russell Coutts in the press conference

• British Olympic medallist John Gimson gets some wheel time for the Swedish team

• The Spanish sparkled on Saturday and crashed out on Sunday

• How the Italians surprised everyone – including themselves?

• A stellar performance in Sunday’s single fleet race from the Americans

• Backed up by a smash and grab win in the final

• The British were better but not good enough

• The Australians had to settle for second, but will have gone home happy

• Time to make a decision on the Middle East events

• Geneva is up next – will there be any wind?

Today’s performance cruising multihulls are faster, lighter, and more highly loaded than their predecessors. They carry larger sailplans, sail at tighter apparent wind angles and often spend extended periods operating at speeds once associated primarily with racing yachts. At the same time, owners expect these boats to remain manageable offshore with small crews, long reefing intervals and high levels of reliability.

For sail designers, this combination presents a unique challenge. Unlike monohulls, multihulls do not heel significantly to dissipate load. With the loads transferring more directly into the platform, the rig and the sails themselves, fabric strength, reefing geometry, sheeting angles and load distribution all become more critical factors for performance, durability and handling.

Quantum Sails has been at the forefront of addressing these challenges through its highly customised approach to sail design and its proprietary iQ Technology platform. A design and validation system originally developed for high-performance racing programmes, iQ is now used as part of a broader design process that enables Quantum Sails’ designers to simulate, refine and validate the behaviour of complex sailplans before they are built.

This capability is particularly relevant in the performance cruising multihull market, where each project demands an individual balance of speed, reliability, handling and owner expectation.

A different type of design challenge
Modern cruising multihulls routinely operate at apparent wind angles and boatspeeds that create substantially different aerodynamic environments from traditional cruising monohulls. Large square-top mainsails, overlapping reaching sails and highly refined deck layouts create systems where relatively small geometry changes can produce meaningful differences in sail shape and load distribution.

Reefing adds another layer of complexity. Offshore cruising multihulls often spend extended periods at sea, which means that the sailmakers are not simply designing for a single full-power condition. Instead, they must consider how sail shape, twist and structural loads evolve across multiple reefing states and wind ranges.

Using iQ, Quantum Sails’ designers can evaluate those reefing states and wind ranges virtually, helping identify not only how a sail will perform when reefed, but also the conditions where a reefing transition may become the more efficient, controlled or safe option.

‘Multihulls don’t provide sailors with the same “feel” that monohulls do, to help them to identify when to reef, which can often lead to breakages or failures,’ Quantum VP of design Doug Stewart explains. ‘By looking at shroud loads, sheet loads and loads on the sail fabric, iQ can give owners the exact numbers they need so they know when to reef. Otherwise it’s just guesswork.’

Historically, much of this process relied on accumulated design knowledge and seatrial refinement. Experienced sail designers developed instinctive understanding of how certain sailplans would behave on certain platforms. Quantum’s approach builds on that experience with digital validation tools capable of modelling not only sail shape, but also the interaction between sails, rigging, deck geometry and aerodynamic loads.

Modelling the entire system
Quantum’s iQ Technology platform approaches sail design as a fully integrated system rather than an isolated exercise.

For projects such as the new S/V Delos expedition catamaran, that process begins by constructing a virtual model of the yacht which includes detailed deck geometry and rigging layouts. The longrunning sailing channel operated by Brian and Karin Trautman is building a new 53’ aluminium expedition catamaran designed by David De Villiers and built by Stradbroke Yachts in Brisbane, Australia, for extended offshore cruising and circumnavigation.

The project presented an unusually broad design brief. The yacht needed to combine offshore durability and manageable handling with the performance characteristics expected of a modern performance cruising multihull. Sailplan and rigging decisions therefore became closely interconnected from the outset.

Doug Stewart worked with the Delos team during the early development phase, helping evaluate both sailplan and rigging configurations before the final geometry was locked in. Once the configuration was established, Quantum designer Joan Subirats and the design team created a complete digital model of the platform within the iQ environment.

Winches, chainplates, sheeting tracks and hardware locations were incorporated into the model so the software could reproduce precise sheeting angles and trim geometries. Once the sailplan was established, designers could simulate airflow across the sails over a wide range of wind angles and velocities while simultaneously analysing structural load paths throughout the sail.

Subirats describes the process as a balance between aerodynamic and structural requirements. ‘It’s a kind of dance between the structural side and the aerial one,’ he says. ‘We adjust until they are in harmony at each stage.’

The practical implications are significant. Rather than estimating how a sail may behave under various reefing conditions or sheeting configurations, designers can evaluate those scenarios virtually before construction begins. Changes to running rigging geometry, sheeting angles or sail structure can be modelled and tested digitally, allowing designers to observe how loads move through the sail and where shape distortions may occur.

‘iQ helped us to understand what size patches we actually need for the different reefing configurations,’ Stewart explains. ‘For an offshore programme like Delos, those insights are really going to impact the overall strength and long-term durability of the sails.’

Another area of focus for Delos was fabric selection for the mainsail and headsails. Early discussions had pointed toward Dimension-Polyant’s Hydra Net radial fabric, a woven hybrid material combining polyester with Dyneema and Spectra fibres. Using iQ, Quantum modelled various Hydra Net weights against alternative constructions while observing how each behaved structurally across projected operating loads and reefing states. According to the designers, the simulations reinforced the choice not only from a performance standpoint, but also from a longevity and reliability perspective.

The same process allows sailmakers to compare construction and fabric options with greater precision. Different constructions and material weights can be modelled against identical sailing conditions to evaluate how each behaves structurally and aerodynamically across a projected operating range.

While the software itself does not replace the sail designer’s expertise, it acts as a validation tool that allows experienced designers to confirm assumptions and refine decisions using measurable data. For the sailor, the outcome is a sailplan intended to feel more predictable and controlled in the conditions where the boat will actually be used. A better-supported shape can result in smoother steering, more consistent autopilot performance, easier trimming, more confidence when reefed, and a construction plan designed around longevity rather than generic load assumptions.

Proof across the multihull category
While Delos provides a detailed example of the process on a custom expedition platform, Quantum’s work in the performance cruising multihull segment extends across production, semi-custom and owner-led projects.

For builders such as Vaan Yachts, which has specified Quantum sails across its range for a number of years, the value lies not only in sail construction but in the ability to support the boatbuilder’s broader design and performance objectives. A builder must deliver not only performance, but also a consistent sailing experience across boats, owners and conditions.

‘On a modern cruising catamaran, the sailplan strongly influences the overall onboard experience: how a boat accelerates, balances, handles and ultimately how intuitive and enjoyable it is to sail,’ explains Igor Kluin, co-founder and CEO of Vaan Yachts . ‘That is why we value working closely with Quantum from an early stage in the design process.’

The same approach can be applied to well-established performance cruising platforms. On owner-led projects, the design objective is not simply to replace sails, but to tune the sail package around the owner’s real use case: fast passagemaking, manageable loads, and confidence across a wide range of conditions.

On a recent project for an Outremer 55, the owner wanted to fine-tune his setup. ‘We worked from the sailplan and analysis on what has been done on similar boats and used iQ to estimate loads and refine all the systems,’ says Quantum sail designer Adrien de Belloy. ‘The boat is fast while easy to handle in all kinds of wind and sea conditions. The owner is particularly impressed with how the sails retain their shape and allow the boat to accelerate.’

Together, these projects show the broader relevance of Quantum’s process. The value of iQ is not limited to one-off custom programmes, nor is it confined to grand-prix raceboats. In the multihull segment, production partnerships, owner-led upgrades and custom expedition projects all contribute different kinds of insight into how modern cruising catamarans are actually sailed. Those data learnings can then feed back into future designs, creating a continuous loop between design, validation, real-world use and refinement.

Continuous evolution
For offshore cruising multihulls, the key objective is not always outright speed. Many owners are equally focused on stable sail shapes, predictable reefing behaviour, manageable loads and long service life over the course of their extended cruising programmes.

As performance cruising multihulls continue evolving, sail design is becoming more integrated with rig engineering, deck layout and offshore systems planning. Sails are no longer being designed independently from the rest of the core platform. Instead, the boat’s entire sailing system is increasingly evaluated as a connected structure.

For large multihulls, that can mean modelling apparent wind ranges, validating reefed sail shapes, analysing square-top mainsail load paths, comparing cloth weights and understanding how changes in sheeting geometry affect both trim and structure. The goal is not to remove the designer from the process but to give the designer a more complete picture of how the sailplan will behave before the boat goes offshore.

For owners preparing for passage-making, the result may be less about extracting another half-knot of speed and more about reducing uncertainty. And for a new generation of performance cruising multihulls, that shift from estimate to validation may prove just as important as outright pace.

More on Quantum Sails

For A+T, the 2026 New Year began with the news that B&G had ceased production of its flagship H5000 display, which was supplied with all its high-end systems since launch in 2013. With no direct replacement, the A+T team got round the table and the HFD5 five-inch display was born as a drop-in upgrade and replacement. Below, we look at the design challenges and how these were overcome.

It had to be compatible

The HFD5 is designed to fit the same footprint and mounting as an H5000 display. The N2K compatible connection is plug and play. It displays all core data available on the N2K network, including custom channels, in a variety of formats. It does not support pilot applications or advanced calibrations which are better suited to a web interface.

It had to be better

The display is transflective, so the stronger the sunlight, the better the definition. Each unit is tested to 75°C and those recently shown at Palma Boat Show were working fine at an internal temperature of 85°C in the strong sunlight there.

Anti-glare glass is used, as in all A+T products, which enhances visibility and doesn’t show reflections or finger marks like other displays on the market. Like all A+T displays, the HFD5 has no breather hole and is hermetically sealed, so it is fully immersible in water for extended periods. Central to this is using control buttons with no connection to the internal electronics, using instead tiny magnets sensed from inside the sealed casing.

A wide range of data display formats is available from simple grids of data to analogue displays, trend graphs and bar indications. Any combinations of these can be selected and set up as custom pages. The display also allows for data-based context switching of colours to indicate good/bad/warning or point of sailing selectable layouts.

As with all A+T products, users are encouraged to request sensible additions and modifications which generally can be implemented within a few days.

Software updates are done by linking to each display with WiFi, so the display does not need to be opened or removed to do this. This WiFi may be connected to the vessel’s WiFi network, thus opening the possibility of running this display without a data cable. This is not implemented in the initial release.

Another possible application of this WiFi, especially for a smaller boat, is using it to drive the increasing population of watch, phone and tablet displays and applications being produced by people and organisations such as Campbell Field, Ian Moore and NMEAremote, iRegatta, SAILGRIB.

It had to be done quickly

Once the B&G-end-of-life announcement was made for the H5000 displays, clients were on the phone within days asking if A+T would step up and provide new and better replacements. The design team met in the first week of January, specifications were agreed and work commenced. Pre-production units were produced some three months later for testing.

It certainly helped to meet this time scale that much of the design of A+T’s seven-inch display, the QBD7, could be carried over to the new display. The QBD7 was launched at METS in November 2025 to great acclaim and many of the units being sold are to yachts that had Sailmon displays. Sailmon went out of business in 2025 and A+T specialise in upgrading these systems.

A substantial run of orders is being received and are now being delivered on a first-come, first-served basis. Many of these are replacements, but a good number are also for new-build projects.

Part of the family

This is the versatile little brother of the existing A+T range of vibrant and tough colour displays, 12in BFD and 7in QBD. All of these are tough, versatile, ultrabright, anti-glare and robust non-touch screen units. They are built with interfaces to Ethernet and to N2K networks (N2K compatible). They are fitted to many hundreds of large yachts and new builds including the new 65m Aquarius from Royal Huisman and Project Zero, currently finishing build at Vitters.

Note: A+T has no connection or affiliation with Sailmon, Navico or B&G. H5000 is a trademark of Navico, which is acknowledged.

More on A+T Instruments

• What a great venue Sassnitz is – despite the wind holes on Sunday

• Why we are still loving the split fleet format

• Is Giles Scott’s renaissance in SailGP linked to his new job at the US America’s Cup team?

• The Australians had to fight to make the event final – but they dominated once they got there

• The increasing influence of the off-the-water coaches on the on-water plays

• The Australians and Spanish look like certainties to make the Season 6 Grand Final – if there is one – but who might join them?

• Artemis sailed well but missed out on the final – and what about that tight upwind call with the Canadians?

• Why Diego Botín and Florian Trittel probably enjoyed the Monday morning coffee and croissants at the French AC team base more than Quentin Delapierre and Leigh McMillan

• The mystery of the Italians’ continuing underperformance

• What are we going to do about Brazil?

• How much do we appreciate Erik Heil’s refreshingly honest interview answers?

• Has the shine come off the Americans’ season?

• Harry Melges makes his first SailGP appearance – but not on the wheel

• Despite a so-so performance in Sassnitz, the British moved up a place in the overall standings – but can they somehow revive their early season sparkle and mount a challenge for the Season 6 Grand Final (if there is one)

• Magnus shares rumours of both the British SailGP team and the league itself being on the market

• What was the short-lived SailGP email survey all about?

• How long will SailGP wait before making a call on whether the event in Dubai and the Grand Final in Abu Dhabi are going ahead

• Next up is a debut event for Valencia, Spain

Whatever type of sailing you do, it’s vital to be able to trust your kit. Sails, electronics, winches, hardware, you have to be sure that it’s going to do what you need it to do. The same applies to foul-weather gear, and that’s why more and more pro teams are choosing Mustang Survival.

Mustang Survival’s reputation is built on decades of service to military, coast guard and special forces in Canada and the US. It’s that frontline experience, those industrial relationships, that allow Mustang Survival to use militaryspecification 6.5 GORE-TEX in its EP 6.5 Ocean Collection. That’s how its kit is exceptional for its breathability, durability, flexibility and waterproofness. Performance like that builds trust.

Cole Brauer, a brand ambassador, was wearing Mustang Survival when she finished second in the 2023-24 Global Solo Challenge. ‘I absolutely love the new EP 6.5 Ocean Collection, it’s perfect for offshore racing,’ she says. ‘I wore the previous version during my round-the-world race and I’m stoked to continue in the newly redesigned gear. It’s by far the best quality out there.’

Erica Lush (above) and Joss Creswell (below) are both wearing Mustang Survival gear for their current campaigns on the Solitaire du Figaro circuit, where high-speed spray from the boats’ foils demand very watertight wrist and neck seals.

Both Django and JOLT crews were wearing Mustang Survival’s Atlas 190 DLX lifejackets and EP 6.5 Ocean Collection smocks, jackets and salopettes for their memorable 2025 Admiral’s Cup battle. Black Jack 100’s crew were wearing the same kit when they won line honours in the 2026 RORC Caribbean 600, 2025 Rolex Middle Sea Race and 2025 Rolex Fastnet Race. It’s quite the roster of talent, and Mustang Survival is helping to bring more through.

‘You need to be able to rely on your kit,’ says Joss Creswell, Mustang Survival ambassador, a 27-year-old Brit racing his first La Solitaire du Figaro on board digiLab. ‘When you have the peace of mind that, whatever the conditions, you are going to stay comfortably warm and dry, it allows you to perform at a much higher level,’ he says.

Also on the start line, for her second La Solitaire du Figaro, is Erica Lush. Another Mustang Survival ambassador, the 34-year-old Rhode Island native is only the third American to complete this apex solo offshore event. ‘It takes huge pressure off to know that the gear is going to be well suited to the conditions,’ she says. ‘I have an amazing smock that has seals on my neck and wrists. It goes down really low so it’s an extra layer on the bum where you tend to get wet because you’re always sitting in water.

‘I’ve worn Mustang Survival gear before I started working with them. I wore it with the Canadian Imoca team when we did two Transats and in the Southern Ocean with Maiden Factor in the Ocean Globe Race 2024 and it stood up to those conditions. For me it’s tried and tested and it’s one less thing to worry about.’

Lush and Creswell have both recently emerged from the gruelling two-handed BGPO (Banque Populaire Grande Ouest), another Figaro 3 event. Creswell raced with Cole Brauer. ‘It was very hectic,’ he recalls. ‘There was a 14-hour leg reaching in around 35 knots. As a foiling boat, it causes a lot of spray and the kit held up very well. Cole and I both use the EP 6.5 kit, which has very good latex seals that really protect you from the elements, from side spray. I definitely feel the EP is the key to keeping core heat, and that means staying dry. That’s what the Mustang Survival kit was able to provide.

‘In solo racing, you’re managing your rest levels throughout the race,’ Creswell continues. ‘You need to be in this constant zone of quiet comfort and that’s what Mustang Survival gives me. Because it’s breathable, comfortable, easy to get on and off, it allows me to stay within that steady state where I’m able to focus on a lot of stuff. I’m able not to spend too much emotional capital on whether I’m cold or warm, but stay in a sensible mental state throughout.’

Another advocate for the kit is Germany’s Mustang Survival distributor ‘Broxe’, Lorenz Pinck, skipper of the Marten 49 Moana for owner Hanno Ziehm. ‘The owner doesn’t want to sail with pros,’ Pinck clarifies. ‘He wants to sail with his friends. We have really skilled people on board but everyone is doing it for fun.’ While it may be a Corinthian outfit, they clearly take their racing seriously. Moana placed second in IRC1 in the RORC Transatlantic Race 2025 and won IRC1 in the West-to-East Transatlantic Race 2025.

The latter Pinck describes as ‘intense, an awesome transatlantic race with some really mixed weather, everything you’d want.’ After a foggy start the wind returned south of the Newfoundland Banks before Moana parked up at the Gulf Stream. Then it came back.

‘The wind wasn’t so strong, 20-30 knots, but we had huge waves so the boat started diving and we had a lot of water on deck. We were on the edge, load-wise. We pushed the boat to 32 knots, which is quite good for a cruiser-racer and also a bit scary!

‘We knew we needed the best-of-the-best weather gear. The temperatures were not too bad, five to six degrees during the night, but there were waves going over the boat. You’re always sitting in water so it’s important that you have really reliable gear. Mustang Survival doesn’t just make gear, they engineer trust. And for those of us who live on the water, that means everything.’

‘The gear is really nicely engineered and executed,’ Pinck continues. ‘There’s Velcro behind the knees of the salopettes so there is less pressure on the shoulders, that’s a great little detail. Normal salopettes hang on the shoulders. The offshore smock hoods are removable so if it’s not raining you can take it off and replace it when you need to. It’s the gear you want if you don’t want to get slowed down by complicated, heavy gear and wet clothes.’

For Lush, as a female sailor, foul weather gear can present challenges unknown to her male competitors. ‘The EP 6.5 offshore cut is unisex and because of that there are quite a lot of adjustment features,’ she says. ‘I can cinch the waist and there’s a Velcro tab behind the knee, which means I can wear the small, which is still on the bigger side for me, but I can adjust it to my form. Whether I’m bulking up with layers or just trying to stay dry in warmer weather, it allows me to adapt the size to the conditions.

‘The kneepads are awesome,’ Lush continues. ‘They make you a bit fearless, especially in a Figaro 3, a boat where you’re always crawling around moving the stack, on the foredeck you always want to keep your weight as low as possible. It takes the hesitation out of getting something done. I find it really good to just know that I can kneel down, use my body hard and stay comfortable and uninjured through the process.’

‘It’s always been a struggle for me and for the other girls I’ve sailed with, they always had trouble with lifejackets resting in the wrong spot on your shoulders,’ she notes. ‘If you’re wearing your lifejacket 24/7 it’s important how it’s fitting. The Atlas 190s are really cool because they sit off the back of your neck. Because we’re always leaning down and pulling ropes, it’s an area that gets really tight so if you have a lifejacket sitting there it’s pretty uncomfortable. Their design is very well-adapted to the sport.’

Pinck also favours the Atlas lifejacket. ‘It’s lighter so you don’t feel it as much on the shoulders. One guy on the crew doesn’t like to wear lifejackets because the pressure on the neck makes him seasick. The Atlas has a really wide cut-out so that doesn’t happen. That was a game changer for him.’

Mustang Survival is also a great fit for grassroots sailors operating on a budget. ‘The company takes feedback from people who are using the kit really hard,’ Creswell notes. ‘Because Mustang supports Figaro sailors who don’t have an enormous budget, they’re a bit more community focused. We provide better feedback for the average sailor. They’re in a similar position to me. I have a budget that digiLab has given me and that’s great, but I don’t have four jackets’ worth of breakage in my budget. Because of the military background, all Mustang’s stuff is super-hard wearing. It’s designed to be tough and to last for a long time.

There’s another aspect of Mustang Survival’s approach to looking after sailors, as Pinck outlines based on his transatlantic experience. ‘I nicked my neck seal so I fixed it with Cuben Fibre tape and it was fine for the last five days. Afterwards I sent it into Mustang. We had two weeks before the Fastnet Race and they instantly took care of it and I got a new neck seal. They have a life-long warranty for the membrane and the hardware on it. Good after-sales service is as important as a good product. They take it seriously.’

More on Mustang Survival

There are so many positives about the weekend, it’s hard to know where to start.

But let’s begin with the venue itself. Unknown in regatta circles until discovered by SailGP in Season 5, Sassnitz has quickly proved popular with the fans and competitors alike for its strong and shifty prevailing winds and wide open race course. Last season the Danish Rockwool Racing crew set a new F50 top speed record during a first-mark bear away that saw them top 103.93 km/h (56.1 knots). This weekend it was the French DS Automobiles team that pushed that benchmark up to 107.63 km/h (58.1 knots) on a similar bear away. Conditions on Saturday saw winds up around 25 knots.

Getting hi-tech designs like TP52s to achieve their peak performance requires more than top crew work, perfect sail trim and outstanding steering and tactics. Having the right spars is also absolutely essential. A case study of a successful Class 0 entry at the ORC World Championship in Sorrento, Italy shows how MC1 Spars rose to the challenge of designing, fabricating and delivering a replacement mast on time and on budget, for a high-profile team entered in this very competitive event, and then providing full commissioning support.

This story starts at the 2025 Admiral’s Cup where Carl-Peter Forster’s TP52 Red Bandit, part of the Bayerischer Yacht Club team, showed tremendous promise. They came into the Admiral’s Cup after an overall win in the 2024 Middle Sea Race and scored some solid results in the opening stages of the AC.

The team was earning attention for these results because Red Bandit Racing is not just another all-pro programme loaded with decades of elite talent and the very latest technologies, like a typical Admiral’s Cup campaign. In fact, the Forster Offshore Racing Foundation that supports Red Bandit Racing is a decidedly pro-am effort that provides ambitious young sailors with the chance to get the training from a few seasoned pros and to compete at a professional level in a variety of inshore and offshore racing events. The foundation’s mission is to train and develop young sailors from one-design and dinghy classes (such as, 420, 470, 49er) the opportunity to transition into the world of big-boat racing.

‘So far we have invited more than 70 young people to sail with us in this programme,’ says Forster, ‘and interest continues to grow’.

Yet this positive start to last year’s Admiral’s Cup took an unfortunate turn. On the first of the inshore races in the Solent, Red Bandit’s mast crumpled and broke, fortunately without injury to any of the crew, but taking them out of the event and cancelling all other planned racing for months to come.

Enter MC1 Spars
In the search for a replacement mast, Forster contacted MC1 Spars’ manager Trent Justice to find out what options were available to get them back on the water.

‘We first looked carefully at the team’s goals,’ says Justice. ‘Their programme has a primary focus on serious offshore racing, with occasional inshore races as well, so we agreed that a mast of exceptional strength was a priority, especially after their experience in the Solent.

‘Cost was also a consideration, so we suggested high-modulus carbon rather than ultra-high modulus because the small difference in weight and centre of gravity did not outweigh the extra expense for the type of racing they were anticipating.’

Justice then contacted Steve Wilson, who he calls “the godfather of rig design”. Wilson’s development of the SailPack software system has led to extensive experience in designing many dozens of successful high-performance spars.

Wilson routinely works with the team at MC1 Spars to determine the dimensions and composites layup needed to optimise a spar to meet the customer’s needs. In this capacity he works alongside other experts, such as project manager Wade Morgan, who was available for this job after finishing his role with the new Mills 56 Denali built in Valencia, another highperformance boat with an offshore focus.

‘Working with this team at MC1 Spars was a great pleasure,’ says Forster, whose background in the 505 and Star classes, as well as in offshore racing, gave him a strong personal insight on the importance of having exactly the right mast to match the boat.

‘Our TP 52 is an older judel/vrolijk design from 2008, which is a little heavier with a shorter keel than the current generation boats, but has less wetted surface in the hull form,’ Forster says. ‘So we can do quite well in winds less than 10 knots.’ The sailplan is slightly different as well, with a smaller mainsail but larger headsails and spinnakers. Other important features that needed consideration in the spar design were:

• the ability to increase headstay loads from 6.5 tons to 8 tons

• no less than six halyard locks to handle staysails and flying sails as well as the headsails and spinnakers

• while a new mainsail would be built for the new mast, the team wanted a workable deflector system to fine-tune the mast shape as needed throughout the range of conditions typical of most offshore races. This avoids the need to make too many luff curve adjustments in the new mainsail

• all other sails – headsails, spinnakers, staysails and code sails – would be from the existing inventory and used without immediate plans for replacement

Time to deliver... but also innovate
Another important target was to deliver the new mast to the boat in St-Tropez by early May 2026 in time for the ORC Worlds in Italy. Hopefully sooner, to have some time to check its fit and do some tuning before the event. This included ensuring the new set of composite rigging from Future Fibres was also arriving on time and on dimension to fit properly.

‘What also really impressed me about working with MC1 Spars,’ Forster says, ‘was the on-site commissioning service and how Trent and his team worked really hard to solve a few issues that came up in the commissioning. Their work was diligent and efficient so that we had time to not only make the event, but to have a few days of sailing before racing.’

The on-time delivery from the team at MC1 Spars started with completing the mast fabrication at its base in Zhuhai, China, ahead of schedule, allowing Forster to help find a shorter shipping route from the export location in Shanghai. He found a one-stop solution that landed the mast in Belgium and it was then transported by truck to St Tropez a few days earlier than the plan. In all, it was delivered four and a half weeks earlier than the contracted arrival date.

‘One thing we do for our customers is to maintain a constant flow of weekly reports that give not only the progress of what’s happened to date, but also a projection of completion targets in the next week,’ Justice says. This approach builds confidence and trust, effectively bring the client into the team to collaboratively arrive at outcomes that don’t just fulfil contract goals but provide an opportunity to exceed them, as happened with Red Bandit’s new mast.

‘We are deliberately careful in establishing timelines that may seem ambitious but are actually realistic,’ Justice says. ‘That avoids us having to rush at the end to meet deadlines, which is when mistakes can easily be made and we then fall behind in correcting them.’

Another interesting aspect of the Red Bandit mast project is the detailed innovations in spar assembly that make a difference in a variety of important ways, such as reducing weight and windage, increasing strength and adding useful functionality. Justice gives an example in the fabrication and installation of the diagonal shroud tangs.

‘When we were designing these we realised we could improve not only on reducing the weight from 510g to 397g by using titanium, but also reduce the fabrication time by building the tangs in one part and not three. We spoke about this with Carl-Peter and he said: ‘This is great, but how much more will it cost?’ When I said there was no charge for it, this is what we do, he could not believe it.’

Similar improvements in design were made to the six halyard locks by having the bullet travel over the sheave and positioning the flipper behind it. This makes the release under load more reliable when applied off-axis, which is typical when dousing even a furled sail while under way. For any foredeck team in modern offshore racing, a consistently reliable halyard lock system can be a game-changer.

Besides the full-service commissioning work performed by Justice and the MC1 Spars team, Forster was also impressed with the guidance they gave for an initial set of tuning numbers to get them started towards the ORC World Championships in Sorrento, which were fast approaching.

‘In our pro-am team we are without a specialist in rig tuning,’ Forster says. ‘Trent’s guidance was a tremendous help in getting us started. We would have been lost without that.’

At the ORC Worlds the Red Bandit team performed well considering that they were starting afresh. In Class 0, the toughest class at the event with 15 entries including eight seasoned, mostly all-pro TP52s and three Wallyrockets, Red Bandit finished fifth among the TPs and eighth overall. Included in their remaining season of four events are the always competitive Copa del Rey and a return to the Rolex Middle Sea Race.

Watch for this team as they grow in competitiveness while still completing their mission to also grow the sport.

More on MC1 Spars

A glance at the SailGP Season 6 leaderboard could lead the casual observer to think that Tom Slingsby’s three-time season championship winners the Bonds Flying Roos are already well on their way to a fourth overall victory in 2026. After all, the Australian crew holds a massive 12-point lead at the top of the table going into the ninth regatta of the 2026 season taking place in Sassnitz, Germany this coming weekend. But, while there’s no denying that the Roos are rock-solid favourites to contest the 2026 Grand Final in Abu Dhabi this November, the question of who the on-form team is right now is somewhat more complex.

A deeper dive into the Season 6 results shows that Diego Botín’s second-placed Spanish Los Gallos crew have also been having a stellar season, but one that has been marred by major technical breakdowns beyond their control.

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From performance cruisers to superyachts, many of the high-end vessels built in Italy, and increasingly beyond its borders, rely on components designed, engineered and produced by a remarkable supplier based in Ancona: Advanced Mechanical Solutions, or AMS.

The trajectory of this thriving firm is impossible to separate from the story of its founder and CEO, Francesco Pelizza. His approach to marine structural engineering began long before Finite Element Method (FEM) calculations, carbon laminates and composite load paths entered the picture. At the beginning there was simply the family boat: a Show 29 designed by Alain Jézéquel, one of the glassfibre yachts that introduced a generation to offshore sailing during the 1970s and ‘80s.

For Pelizza, that early exposure became a genuine apprenticeship. By the 1990s he had built extensive offshore racing experience, including a PHS division victory in the Sydney Hobart Race and line honours with a course record at both the Middle Sea Race and the Giraglia, as well as second place in the Fastnet Race. All of that he achieved before graduating from university and launching his own engineering company.

‘I started in the Optimist like everyone else, although only briefly,’ he recalls. ‘The real sea school was the family boat, cruising and long passages.’

At the same time came his first offshore races out of Ancona, which during the 1980s and ’90s was one of the most active offshore sailing hubs in Italy. Pelizza joined local crews and sailed alongside some of the best-known names in Italian sailing including Andrea Giorgetti, who was the bowman aboard the Italian America’s Cup 12 Metre Azzurra.

‘I was mainsail trimmer for these round-the-can races,’ Pelizza says. ‘I also did countless deliveries between regattas, thousands of miles between the Adriatic and Tyrrhenian Seas.’

In those years the sea was more than a sporting passion. Pelizza also worked as a commercial diver for an Ancona-based offshore contractor servicing oil platforms in the Adriatic, while simultaneously studying engineering and continuing to race. There were periods, he says, when he spent more hours at sea than ashore. His first big offshore campaigns were in the early 1990s with the 500 x 2, the historic double-handed Adriatic race. Despite its enclosed geography, the Adriatic is far from benign. Violent summer squalls descending from the Balkans and steep, short seas generated by southerly weather systems make it an unforgiving training ground.

Pelizza belongs to a generation of Italian offshore sailors raised in an era when campaigns were run on modest budgets. Technical preparation was largely self-taught and success depended heavily on practical ingenuity. It was common to arrive at the start line of a race after days of offshore delivery sailing with a reduced crew, little sleep and continuous boat preparation under way. The same mindset would later prove to be invaluable in his engineering career.

One of the first significant results came in 1994 with victory in the Rimini-Corfù– Rimini aboard Pegaso, an Open-class yacht considered exceptionally quick for its time. But it was double-handed racing that truly defined that period. Pelizza competed in multiple editions of the 500 x 2 and Roma x 2 races, experiencing challenges that were central to both his technical and personal development.

One campaign in the 500 x 2 ended dramatically when, during a night return leg toward Italy, the 10m yacht he was racing double-handed – while lying second overall – was struck by a commercial ship. Nobody was injured but the race ended with a badly damaged bow and the boat dismasted. The following year he returned with Massimo Giacomozzi and won.

A long string of successes followed. Giacomozzi and Pelizza formed one of the most successful offshore partnerships of late 1990s Italian sailing and the two sailors also shared a Mini Transat project. Giacomozzi bought a Mini 6.50 that the pair prepared together for the 1997 race, while Pelizza competed in the 1999 edition, all while continuing their intensive offshore programmes in both the Adriatic and Tyrrhenian circuits.

One of the emblematic boats of that era was Vulcangas, a tiny but exceptionally quick Ami 30 designed by Alberto Fiorenzi. Spartan, light and aggressively optimised, the boat repeatedly defeated much larger rivals. With Vulcangas, Pelizza and Giacomozzi won the Roma per Due, the 500 x 2 and the Rimini–Corfù–Rimini, frequently beating yachts 10ft or even 20ft longer on real and corrected time.

Those involved in the Italian offshore scene at the time still remember that boat as a David-versus-Goliath project. Fifty and 60-footers regularly found themselves behind a stripped-out 30-footer prepared with obsessive care and sailed exceptionally well.

At the same time Pelizza joined the crew of Riviera di Rimini, the famous Andrea Vallicelli-designed 60ft design which was among the Mediterranean’s most competitive offshore platforms of the period. He raced in multiple editions of the Middle Sea Race aboard that yacht, including the particularly brutal 1998 race in which Riviera di Rimini established a record of 72 hours, 50 minutes and 42 seconds – a mark that stood for 12 years. In 1998, he also came second in the Fastnet Race aboard the same yacht. On board, Pelizza alternated between bow work, helmsman and watch captain duties. His résumé also includes the 1997 Sydney-Hobart aboard the Italian entry Orchidea, racing on the Farr 50 Seac Banche which the team had chartered in Australia. They won the PHS division.

Then came the 1999 Mini Transat and in many ways that was the moment when Pelizza chose his long-term direction.

He graduated in mechanical engineering from the Marche Polytechnic University in 1999 with a thesis dedicated to the structural analysis of a sailing yacht at sea. His experimental platform was none other than Vulcangas. Sensors, data acquisition systems and instrumentation were installed aboard to study real deformation and load cases during offshore sailing.

‘It was already an attempt to connect practical experience with structural analysis,’ he explains. ‘I wasn’t interested only in theoretical numbers. I wanted to understand what actually happens to a yacht at sea.’

The 1999 Mini Transat was meant to represent the natural culmination of that journey. His Mini, designed by the late Andrea Romanelli, had been heavily modified with a canting keel and revised systems to remain competitive in a class that was evolving at remarkable speed.

The campaign ended prematurely when the keel detached, causing the yacht to capsize. Pelizza escaped unharmed but the incident also marked the end of his top-level offshore racing career.

‘In reality I had already decided that after the Mini Transat I would dedicate myself entirely to engineering,’ he says. ‘Whether I finished first or last, that was going to be the moment I changed direction.’

The next step took him first to Rome, working in the office of marine structural engineer Giulio Ricci, before moving into the aerospace sector between Trieste and Rome with Aerostudi. Those years proved decisive. Advanced FEM analysis, carbon composite structures and aerospacederived calculation methodologies became his daily working environment. It was there that what later became the AMS method truly took shape: applying aerospace engineering principles to yacht design while retaining the perspective of someone who has deep and long experience of high-level offshore sailing.

In 2005 Pelizza returned to Ancona and founded AMS. One of the company’s first major commissions was the structural design work for the RC44 conceived by Russell Coutts and designed by Andrej Justin. That project became the company’s real turning point.

‘The RC44 was the project that made me realise I could build something of my own,’ says Pelizza. ‘Everything started from there.’

Today AMS operates as a multidisciplinary organisation comprising an in-house engineering office with more than 15 engineers and 30 people in the company, a composites division, a dedicated metalworking facility and a broad network of specialist external partners. In 2021 the company also launched AMS-Composites, a division dedicated to the direct production of in-house developed carbon components.

The company has worked and continues to work with many international shipyards and design offices across projects ranging from performance cruisers to full custom superyachts. Clients include Wally, Solaris Yachts, Cantiere del Pardo, Maxi Dolphin, YYachts and CRN. AMS is currently working on a 100ft superyacht project, the details of which cannot be disclosed.

Yet despite the company’s growth and the increasing sophistication of modern yacht engineering, Pelizza still sees a direct continuity between his offshore sailing background and the way AMS approaches structural design today.

‘When we size a component, we don’t think only about the numbers imposed by classification rules,’ he explains. ‘We think about the yacht slamming into waves, about real dynamic loads and what can happen during offshore sailing. Having lived through those situations helps enormously.’

According to Pelizza, the biggest change from the past lies not so much in structural principles themselves but in the design constraints that are imposed by the styling of contemporary yachts.

‘Today, structures have to coexist with far more extreme interior layouts,’ he says. ‘Yachts have greater internal volumes, fewer bulkheads and much more open interiors. Our job is to maintain stiffness and minimise weight within increasingly complex constraints.’

The AMS approach remains strongly focused on FEM optimisation and weight reduction, with a philosophy heavily influenced by the racing world even when applied to high-performance cruising yachts. It is no coincidence that many systems developed by AMS for large motor yachts are equally applicable to sailing superyachts: tender handling systems, retractable passerelles, automatic awnings, stern-door opening systems, anchor arms and numerous custom carbon-and-metal kinematic assemblies.

‘In the end the principle is always the same,’ says Pelizza. ‘It is to build structures that are light, reliable and as integrated as possible.’

In truth, the connection with yacht racing never entirely disappeared. In 2017 Pelizza won the ORC Corinthian World Championship aboard a Grand Soleil 43 whose structures had been engineered, a few years before, by AMS itself – a fitting full circle in which the designer returned to winning aboard a yacht shaped partly by his own engineering work.

In recent years he has returned to dinghy sailing, choosing the Contender.

‘When I was younger I sailed very few dinghies and always felt something was missing,’ he says with a smile. ‘The Contender is an extraordinary boat. It’s a 1967 design but it still feels completely modern in terms of acceleration, balance, sensitivity. Ben Lexcen really was a genius.’

And if he had to choose a yacht for a return to offshore racing today?

The answer comes immediately.

‘A modern Class40. I think it’s one of the most interesting offshore platforms in existence today. I would love to do a major ocean race aboard one of those boats – particularly the Musa 40, which is a completely Italian project.’

More information on AMS

I have long been an admirer of Paul’s achievements across the Olympics, America’s Cup and the Volvo Ocean Race, but what has particularly impressed me is his longevity at the very top end of some of yacht racing’s most competitive classes. In 2025 he won his second Star World Championship victory – a remarkable 37 years after his first in 1988. Then, earlier this year, he won the Etchells world title, too.

In what turned out to be a more than 90 minute conversation, Paul talks us through his illustrious sailing career: from his introduction to the sport at age eight, to his early successes, and his inevitable transition to professional sailing.

As well as his AC and around-the-world exploits, he also reflects on his Olympic experiences, including being an alternate in 1984 and competing in the Star class in 2004.

We talk about the physical and mental demands of sailing, his current fitness regimen, the importance of teamwork and strategy in his career, and mull over the evolution and challenges of sailing, and find out why he laments the shift from traditional sailing to more spectacle-driven competitions like SailGP, which prioritize speed and spectacle over strategy and teamwork.

Paul also highlights the camaraderie he enjoys so much in the Star class and mourns the loss of keelboat sailing in the Olympics. We also discuss his role at America One Racing, an initiative focused on youth development and Olympic preparation, with a $5 million annual budget.

All this and much more…

Read more

If, like me, you had slightly lost track of France’s flagship offshore class, here’s a handy update to get you all caught up…

The IMOCA world has been a hive of activity in 2026 with a multitude of top-flight campaigns currently on the go in and around the epicentre of the development class – the bustling port city of Lorient on the northwest coast of France. The next edition of the Vendée Globe – IMOCA’s pinnacle solo nonstop around the world race – does not start until the winter of 2028, but the key campaigners are very well-advanced with their preparations.

The 2026 season has already seen two IMOCA Globe Series singlehanded races: May’s 1000 Race, which saw a seven-boat fleet race a diamond-shaped course from Concarneau and back and was won by British skipper Sam Goodchild (ninth in the Vendée Globe 2024-25) on MACIF Santé Prévoyance, and June’s action-packed Vendée Arctique - Les Sables d’Olonne, when Italian Ambrogio Beccaria on Allagrande Mapei pulled off a remarkable come-from-behind victory in light winds on the Bay of Biscay on the final night.

Next up on the 2026 schedule is the inaugural edition of The Ocean Race Atlantic, a fully-crewed (two men/two women plus an OBR) transatlantic sprint from New York to Lorient, starting on September 1. Six teams are confirmed: France’s Paul Meilhat and Portugal’s Mariana Lobato’s United by the Ocean (previously Biotherm), Oliver Heer’s Swiss entry Embrace the Challenge, Team Francesca Clapcich Powered by 11th Hour Racing (USA), Conrad Colman (21st in the 2024-25 Vendée Globe) and his New Zealand crew aboard MSIG Europe, along with Germany’s Boris Herrmann (twelfth in the 2024-25 Vendée Globe) on Team Malizia and Japan’s Kojiro Shiraishi (24th in the 2024-25 Vendée Globe) on DMG MORI GLOBAL ONE.

The first regatta of the 2026 52 Super Series had it all. Three new teams, all led by very different, very committed owners. From a fleet of 14 eight different boats won races, Alkedo Vitamina being the only boat to win two. And, nothing new here, the first regatta title went to the wire on the last day, the seemingly super-dependable Sled taking the win.

And in Puerto Portals the script wrote itself. The brand new Swedish boat, Trinity, steered by owner Joakim Sundberg – a rookie compared to others on the circuit – chalked up a win in the second race before a halyard issue forced them to sit out Race 3. After a solid opening, finishing third with No Way Back, new Dutch owner-driver Pieter Heerema also left Mallorca with a big smile.

Built by King Marine, the immaculate Trinity is a head-turner. She was also exceptionally fast for a new TP52 fresh out of the box. Ed Baird is doing a great job as tactician, with Ross Halcrow, having moved from Platoon Aviation, onboard as lynchpin trimmer.

Main picture: Left turn please, JC. Provezza helm John Cutler tacks away from new Brazilian Super Series team Caballo Loco to leeward at the series opener in Puerto Portals. To say Provezza is dripping with talent is an understatement. Cutler steering, Mariano Parada tactician, Nacho Postigo navigating, Santi Lange strategist and for 2026 with Paul ‘Flipper’ Westlake coming back to trim main. After missing the 2023 title by a single point, it’s fair to say that for 2026 skipper Ergin Imre is throwing the kitchen sink at this.

Halcrow: ‘We are pretty happy with the boat, it felt good! I was surprised, to be honest, at how good it felt. It is the same as Alegre and Platoon but with a different appendage package. Joakim shows great focus and concentration. We have a lot of room for improvement but it was an incredibly good start to the season.

‘The Trinity keel is of a more rectangular planform than what we have had in the past. The chord thickness is also greater than what we sailed with in the early days on Platoon, which right away gave us good grip upwind. But we have the standard Botín rudder which Platoon and Alegre both used last year.

‘We certainly felt we could hold a lane well off the startline – we even held Sled off the line with Adam Beashel driving which is encouraging. Upwind we were good generally. And as tactician Ed did his usual good job of keeping things nice and simple.’

Trinity starts with pretty much the ‘standard’ North Sails package and runs full Harken hardware including all of the hydraulics – which now also take in the jib functions. Mickey Costa, who master minded the layout, drew particular attention to the work ethic the Swedes have shown in the build-up to their TP52 programme. ‘This is TP52 number 12 for me and teams like Provezza and Azzurra are my family. But I have hardly ever seen a team work as hard as these guys! The performance of the boat is good and the team is already progressing well.

‘Ed Baird is the professor. His articulation onboard is exceptional. In terms of cool stuff, as on Provezza we have a Pro Trim system moving the traveller, but mounted at the companionway; most teams still have them by the traveller, on the cockpit floor or down in the hull. So when tacking in light air, for example, this system is driven by the front pedestal keeping weight forward.

‘All the jib systems are now hydraulic and I hope that one day the TP52 class allows electro valves in these layouts. What we do now is we pump the oil by hand and then open the valves with strings… but that could easily all be electronic.

‘Nevertheless, we have considerably simplified the system. We have created a simple suite of valves which control jib up and down, jib in and out, and jib tack all on the same system. Conceptually it is the same as on Platoon and Provezza, but this time Harken made everything for us.

‘Also we are trying a pivoting mainsheet track, a T-track that pivots fore and aft as on some of the maxis, instead of a fixed X-track bolted rigidly in place. Loads align better and it makes it easier for the main trimmer to ease down the traveller. We also have new line-spoolers from Morfrac in Brittany. Instead of shockcord, these suck in the line with a single pull like a lawnmower start. One pull and it’s done. We are very happy with those!’

Among those admiring the new Trinity is Gladiator trimmer Simon Fry. ‘Trinity is definitely a step on. What is impressive is that before with a new boat you would be two, three, four weeks minimum to get up close to speed. Even with really good people onboard. These guys lack TP52 experience and yet overall they were up to speed super quickly.’

Looking across the fleet, Fry also believes that the new keel fins are working well. ‘I think some of the new bigger fins have now given these boats different modes. On Gladiator we might now be slightly exposed as we are probably the smallest keel fin.

‘If we can sail targets on our own patch of water that is fine, but we definitely have to avoid setting up in skinny lanes with the likes of Alkedo, Platoon or Sled. They have a different grippier mode which we are not comfortable with. Downwind I did not see much difference but upwind these boats with more grip have a mode we can’t match.’

Fry also points to Sled’s consistently good sailing as the reason Takashi Okura’s team have won the last two regattas. ‘Three or so years ago they slightly rejigged and went straighter rig, less luff curve, more headstay in the breeze. Super good in heavier air, as we have seen.

‘However, I think most of us have now followed that, but then in lighter airs in Portals they just sailed super well! They never missed a shift and were relatively conservative in not putting themselves in a position of risk. And completing the last day with a broken main halyard lock was impressive.’

Thailand bound

Adhering to the 52 Super Series philosophy of trying to race outside Europe every two years or so, plans are advanced for the circuit to be hosted in Thailand in 2027, heading to Asia for the first time ever. The Whitcraft family, who campaign Vayu, are instrumental in advancing an exciting initiative that has already secured the required commitment from Super Series owners.

The first regatta will run in February as Thailand 52 Super Series Sailing Week. Then the Rolex TP52 World Championship Thailand 2027 will run in March. Both regattas will be hosted at Ocean Marina under the flag of the Royal Varuna Yacht Club. From the balmy winds of Thailand then it’s back to Europe in May starting in Sorrento, then staying in Italy for the fourth regatta in Scarlino in July with the finale in Puerto Portals in September.

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Back then I had been unexpectedly called up to stand-in as the onboard reporter aboard the Abu Dhabi Ocean Racing VO65 for what turned out to be a record setting lap of the British Isles.

My call-up didn’t come completely out of the blue. I was working for ADOR as the Volvo Ocean Race team’s communications officer in the 2014-15 edition of the fully-crewed race around the world. It was my second time working on the VOR – in the 2011-12 cycle I had been a member of the comms team at race HQ – and the race organisers had nominated the RBIR as a warm up for the then newly built fleet of one-design VO65s.

My role with the Abu Dhabi Tourist Authority-backed syndicate was very much shore-based, but I had been embedded with the team for the past several months as the boat was commissioned and I had enjoyed a number of days out on the race boat during the commissioning period. A few weeks prior to the RBIR, our original onboard reporter had resigned because of chronic debilitating seasickness. This was the early days of the OBR role and there weren’t as many obvious candidates to choose from as there are nowadays. So it had been a bit of a scramble to find a replacement, but we were happy we had found the perfect person in American videographer Matt Knighton.

Matt had trialled with the crew at our training base in Cascais, Portugal and everything had gone well. He clearly had the camera skills, he knew his way around a raceboat, and the crew – led by skipper Ian Walker – all seemed to like him. So there were ticks in all the boxes on the checklist, except for one. Matt had a totally-unmissable family event that clashed with the Round Britain and Ireland Race.

With the VOR Rules mandating that the team race with a functioning OBR – race management wanted to test out the onboard systems for sending back stills and video footage from at sea – we had to find someone to step in. I took the predicament to Ian Walker for his suggestions. “Well, you’ll just have to do it,” he said unemotionally, before turning away to another conversation.

I remember, in that instant, feeling first flummoxed, then elated, then petrified as I pictured myself carrying out the OBR role in an 1,800-nautical mile offshore race. Could I do this, I wondered? I wasn’t totally sure, but I was certain I wasn’t going to turn this amazing opportunity down. I don’t recall now how long I had to get myself ready for the race. I have a feeling it was a couple of weeks but it could have been much less. I spent that time familiarising myself, as best I could, with the handheld cameras (never my strong point), and the onboard systems for managing the boat’s remote cameras, as well as the Inmarsat high-bandwidth FleetBroadband satellite terminals used to beam the footage back to the VOR HQ in Alicante.

In the final few days before the race I sat in on the crew weather briefings delivered by our team meteorologist, the legendary Dutch navigator Marcel van Triest. Marcel is a towering figure of a man with the classic ‘Dutch-direct’ style of communication. He pulled no punches when he laid out the concerning weather scenario that was developing for the start of the race that coming Saturday. The tail-end of a once-hurricane called Bertha was making its way across the Atlantic and was set to bring heavy rain and violent storm force winds across the entire United Kingdom over the weekend. “It’s going to be heinous,” Marcel told us, as we huddled around his computer screen on the kitchen table of the team’s Portsmouth crew house. The first afternoon and night looked to be particularly bad, with the fleet having to crash its way upwind across the Irish Sea into 50-knot winds and huge seas.

Despite the storm warning, the RBIR fleet nevertheless assembled in the Solent on time on Saturday morning. However, as the fleet milled about under leaden skies, RORC made a late decision to put the start back to the next day, and to reverse the course so that we would set off to the east with the wind behind us and then reach up the North Sea on the way to Scotland. The pro sailors that made up the Abu Dhabi crew took the delay in their stride, of course. It was no biggie for them, but for me it meant another sleepless night, worrying about what was to come.

The following day the VO65 fleet scorched out of the Solent in close formation, flying No.3 asymmetrical headsails, and regularly breaking 20 knots. From my position at the very back of the boat, I braced myself against the aft stanchion, clung to the sail stack and tried not to get washed off. The VOR fleet made up the leading bunch as we passed the Forts off Portsmouth, but we were soon overtaken by Sidney Gavignet’s MOD70 trimaran Musandam-Oman Sail, which tore past us in a ball of spray and quickly disappeared into the distance.

The first afternoon and first night was spent short-gybing along the south coast of England in close company with the other Volvo boats, as the navigators squeezed the fleet through the gap between the shore and the huge English Channel shipping separation zone.

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When you hear the word “Swan”, what springs to mind? Is it the gold standard of performance cruising, or an enviable stable of instantly recognisable yachts drawn by legendary designers? Is it the iconic topside arrow running from stem to stern emphasising the sweeping sheerline? Is it bespoke events with competitive racing in wonderful locations followed by well-run social events for owners and crew? Perhaps you think of Sayula II, the Swan 65 that Mexican businessman Ramón Carlin and his crew sailed to an unlikely victory in the inaugural Whitbread Round the World Race 1973-74, a boat that Carlin’s family still owns?

Whatever “it” is, there’s no doubt it will be there because few marques cut through like this one. ‘Nautor Swan is a name deeply rooted in the public imagination, even beyond the sailing community – it is one of the very few yachting brands recognised outside our world,’ says Massimo Perotti, chairman and CEO of Sanlorenzo. ‘Swan is the yacht every sailor dreams of owning because it delivers tangible achievements: winning round-the-world races, enabling owners to sail anywhere or compete at the highest level, always without compromising on elegance or performance. We are proud to be custodians of this beautiful brand’.

Nautor Swan occupies a unique niche in sailing, one crafted by a relentless focus on quality, performance, comfort and heritage, paired with vaulting ambition and sparkling creativity when it comes to promoting and developing its brand. And as the marque celebrates its 60th anniversary, those traits show no signs of diminishing. Indeed since joining the Sanlorenzo family in 2024, its plans are jaw-dropping.

The newly imagined Swanscape range, inaugurated by a 24-metre model developed with Rolf Vrolijk, takes them into the luxury blue water deck saloon space, while Swan Alloy sees the brand launch into the superyacht market with a 44m aluminium sloop designed by Malcolm McKeon and Studio Liaigre, scheduled for delivery in 2028. These are in addition to the existing performance cruiser Swan line, founded with the company in 1966 (soon to welcome a new Frers-drawn Swan 73), the Maxi Swan line, which began with the Sparkman & Stephens-designed Swan 65 in 1972 and will get a new entry-level model in 2026 with the new Swan 80, and ClubSwan, which features six one-design, all-out racing yachts including the Juan K-designed 28, 36, 43 and 50, and the Frers-designed 42 and 45.

For obvious reasons, ClubSwan Racing has been open only to the various one-design fleets – until now. In the interests of inclusivity and adding value for all Swan owners, two further divisions are being introduced: ClubSwan Legacy, for yachts designed and built up to the 1990s, and ClubSwan Spirit, for owners of post-1990 Swan yachts.

Nautor Swan was also the first boatbuilder to create an ecosystem of mono-branded events and racing to attract owners to the brand. These started with bucket-style regattas in Sardinia’s Porto Cervo, Guernsey in the UK’s Channel Islands and US ports like Newport, RI and Nantucket. Each featured entertaining racing by day, as competitive as the owner and crew choose to be, and slick, showpiece events ashore. These were well supported by owners looking to meet and compete with like-minded people and soon morphed into the Rolex Swan Cup, held every other year at Yacht Club Costa Smeralda in Porto Cervo. Again, it’s worth noting that Nautor Swan looks for premium partners and delivers experiences that make those partnerships thrive and endure: Rolex has been the Swan Cup’s title sponsor since 1984.

This year’s Rolex Swan Cup, taking place from 14-19 September in Porto Cervo, promises to be very special indeed, with a record entry list expected and a more family-oriented atmosphere ashore. It is an emotional bookending of Swan’s evolution that Tarantella, the S&Sdesigned Swan 36 #001, the first boat Nautor ever delivered in 1966, will be there, as will BeCool, the yard’s first Swan 128, which splashed in 2025. BeCool was designed to perform in 8-12kts, conditions typical in her home waters of Porto Cervo and will race alongside her sister, the dual energy Swan 128 Raijin, and the new Swan 80. To do so, the weight target demanded that the yard employed all of the knowledge it had gained in the build of the 125ft racing ClubSwan Skorpios, from carbon composite construction and resin infusion right through to foam-cored joinery and painting. As the yard itself has grown in size and output, so have the skills it has mastered.

Nautor Swan’s relationship with Sparkman & Stephens produced 824 yachts between 1967 and 1989, establishing the brand as a leading builder of performance cruising yachts. The partnership gave birth to designs including the Swan 48 in 1971, the yacht that introduced Swan’s iconic wedgeshaped coachroof, as well as the Swan 65, the world’s first production maxi. In 1981 Argentine designer Germán Frers’ star was rising fast and he was invited to draw the Swan 51. Over four decades, 24 designs and more than 2,000 yachts later, Frers continues to produce high-performance, easily-driven hulls, including the Swan 128, flagship of the Maxi Swan line, and the new Swan 80, due to debut at Cannes Yachting Festival later this year.

The Nautor Swan story began in 1966 in Pietarsaari, Finland, about 345 km south of the Arctic Circle. Shipwrights along the coast of the Gulf of Bothnia had been famed for their wooden boatbuilding skills since the 16th century, but in the mid-1960s, having built a boat for himself in his father-in-law’s garage, Pekka Koskenkylä spotted the potential of another material. ‘At the time, several yards were building fibreglass boats but they relied on in-house designs and performance was modest,’ said Koskenkylä. ‘Olin Stephens understood the potential of fibreglass to create lighter, faster yachts. That’s how we started.’ The desire for Swans to deliver quality, performance and comfort were ingrained in the brand from the very origins of the company: ‘I had to build the best boat in the world,’ he adds, ‘and I wanted to combine a racing boat with a cruising boat.’

That insistence on quality and craft was enabled by the generations of boatbuilding talent, the centuries of skill in the surrounding Ostrobothnian region. It is a resource that has shaped the brand’s evolution and continues to do so. Being able to draw on know-how passed down through generations is an extraordinary asset, as it allows for experimentation and innovation built on a very solid foundation.

The continuity of tradition is most obviously seen in the multiple generations of boatbuilders working at Swan, fathers and sons, mothers and daughters.

‘I am a second-generation boatbuilder,’ says Stefan Lillqvist. ‘My father, Runar, joined Nautor in 1970, working with Pekka Koskenkylä, he was the first generation in our family. Today my son is here as well.

‘The development I have seen over 25 years at Nautor is remarkable. Earlier the teak surfaces were only varnished, but today the customers are able to choose the type of wood and the finish on the surface. What stands out is the quality, even in the smallest details. Even what you don’t see is perfectly made. That is how you recognise a truly high-quality boat.’

‘I am the third generation in my family to work here,’ says Ralf Brännbacka. ‘I started in June 1970, and today my sons, Tommy and Robert, work here as well. If you look at the standard Swans of the late 1960s, they were very simple boats. Since then, both style and equipment have evolved. Thanks to our chief designer, Germán Frers, we have been able to create and preserve the Swan DNA. Because a Swan is a Swan – you shouldn’t have to ask. That is the essence of our brand.’

That essence, distilled over 60 years, has endured while the brand itself has grown, changing hands and growing in ambition. In 1998, fashion supremo and Swan owner Leonardo Ferragamo became majority shareholder having bought the company from Finnish industrial group Kymmene. ‘My admiration and passion for Swan was so deep that I dedicated every effort to the brand’s success, preserving its core values while evolving it into a modern, forward-looking organisation.’

The next step came when Italian shipyard Sanlorenzo bought Nautor Swan. ‘We chose Swan because it represents an excellence we could not have developed internally,’ adds Massimo Perotti, who will also be the proud owner of the very first Swan Alloy yacht. ‘Swan and Sanlorenzo share common values: both brands speak to an elite clientele of experienced owners who are passionate about the sea and appreciate refined, high-quality products.

‘With a new generation of yachts, the introduction of advanced propulsion technologies and an expanding global community of owners and sailors,’ Perotti continues. ‘Swan’s 60th anniversary becomes a statement of intent. It’s proof that the Nautor Swan brand’s most defining moments lie ahead, where tradition meets progress and the future of sailing is written under full sail.’

Sixty years after the story began, the narrative has grown in leaps and bounds. A bold future awaits as Nautor Swan brings its expertise to bear on entirely new markets with a confidence earned over decades of success.

‘I am proud to be part of this story,’ Perotti concludes, ‘not only as a manager of the company, but also as a future Swan owner. It is a pleasure and a responsibility because Swan is a reference point for the entire market. We are celebrating a birthday, but our focus is firmly on the future. With the support of Sanlorenzo we are charting new horizons, evolving while never losing sight of our legacy.’

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Americans Lucas Calabrese, Harry Melges IV, Michael Menninger, Riley Gibbs, and Louisa Nordstrom were all members of the New York Yacht Club’s American Magic campaign, with the only newcomer being US Olympian and United States SailGP Team flight controller, Hans Henken.

Other squad members will be announced in due course, no doubt, but this core group looks to be a sensibly safe choice by sailing director Giles Scott and team CEO Ken Read – especially given the ultra-short runway the US team has in this latest Cup cycle.

In the 37th America’s Cup in Barcelona, Spain in 2024, Calabrese was famously thrust into the media spotlight when he was called up from his role as reserve/training helmsman to stand in for the injured Paul Goodison, who broke five ribs in a fall aboard the American AC75 on the way in from racing during the round-robin series.

Calabrese was born in Buenos Aires, Argentina – but is now a naturalised American citizen. Racing with crew Juan de la Fuente, he won a bronze medal in the 470 class at the London 2012 Olympic Games. As well as previously winning Optimist, J/70 and Melges 20, world titles, in 2025 Calabrese served as strategist in the TP52 World Championship-winning crew aboard Quantum Racing, where he worked closely with helmsman Harry Melges IV.

Calabrese was no stranger to sailing the AC75 when he got called off the subs bench in Barcelona to drive opposite Tom Slingsby. I had previously watched from the recon rib as he racked up plenty of hours on the wheel of Patriot while Slingsby was regularly away on SailGP duty, but he still lacked that critical heat-of-the-battle race experience – and that proved costly on several occasions in the semi-final series against the slick Italian Luna Rossa Prada Pirelli crew.

Nevertheless, Calabrese’s performance under such extreme pressure earned him huge respect from the other AC helmsmen after AC37. His experience and knowledge of the American AC75 make him an obvious choice for this new US campaign.

Likewise, Melges’ place on the ARC Team USA roster will have shocked nobody. The Melges family lineage is inextricably linked to American competitive sailing. His late grandfather, Buddy Melges, won Olympic gold (Soling) and bronze (Flying Dutchman) medals and was a key protagonist in Bill Koch’s successful 1992 defence of the America’s Cup aboard America³.

Quattro – as I’m told Harry IV once nicknamed himself – was named 2021 Rolex US Sailor of the Year and led the American Magic Youth Team to the final of the Youth America’s Cup in Barcelona during AC37. His season with Calabrese aboard the Quantum Racing TP52 must surely bode well for the communication loop aboard the ARC Team USA AC75, where the pair look like the logical choice in the helming roles. Melges is also a member of the United States SailGP Team, but has yet to make a competitive appearance.

Also likely to slot seamlessly into this new setup is the highly rated Michael Menninger, who raced in the trimmer/flight controller role aboard the American Magic AC75 in AC37. I first became aware of him at the 34th America’s Cup in San Francisco, where I interviewed him as a Red Bull Youth America’s Cup helmsman. Menninger has match racing and team racing world championships to his name, along with a victory as tactician at the 2017 Etchells worlds. After the last America’s Cup, he was recruited by the United States SailGP Team as wing trimmer, and is widely recognised as playing a key role in their significant improvement in performance since that time.

Less high-profile perhaps, but still, in my opinion, a wise selection, is another ex-American Magic sailor, Riley Gibbs. To me, Gibbs was an under-appreciated talent in the previous US America’s Cup campaign. Despite racking up a huge number of training hours aboard the American Magic AC40s and AC75, he missed out on selection for the senior crew at AC37. Racing with crew Anna Weiss, Gibbs finished ninth in the Nacra 17 class at the 2020 Tokyo Olympics, and last year finished sixth at the 2025 International Moth World Championships. He has always struck me as an impressive talent, and I am happy to see him get another crack at the America’s Cup.

I have to confess to not having known much about Louisa Nordstrom, prior to this announcement. As a college sailor, she was a four-time All-American and went on – with crew Trevor Bornarth – to campaign in the 470 class for the Paris 2024 Olympic Games. She was a trimmer aboard the American Magic Women’s Team at the inaugural Women’s America’s Cup in Barcelona during AC37. This June she joined the US SailGP Team after three competitive appearances with the team during the 2025 season as part of its development programme.

Despite being a newcomer to the America’s Cup, Hans Henken should have no problem slotting into the ARC Team USA setup. Crewing for Ian Barrows, he won bronze in the 49er at the Paris 2024 Olympics, and races as flight controller alongside Menninger with the United States SailGP Team. Complementing his high-performance sailing skills and making him virtually the perfect America’s Cup candidate are his bachelor’s and master’s degrees in aerospace engineering from Stanford University.

Interestingly, no crew roles were allocated in today’s announcement by the American challenger. However, logical choices for helming must surely be Calabrese and Melges, with Menninger and Henken the likely frontrunners for the sail and foil trimming jobs, and Nordstrom in the strategist/systems monitoring slot. All that said, Gibbs would also be a very strong contender as driver or trimmer.

Perhaps we will learn more when we see who is chosen for the four-person AC40 crew at the upcoming second preliminary regatta, which is scheduled to take place in Naples from September 25–27.

‘Racing yacht design is advancing rapidly but the growing gap between mainstream production boats and more extreme specialist designs is putting pressure on handicap systems, event formats and participation,’ says Frédéric Bouvier of J/Composites. From low freeboard and shallow, beamy cockpits to sailplans with square-topped mainsails and giant asymmetric kites, each capable of creating a partial eclipse, through to specialist double-handed racing yachts that are designed to promote shorthanded crews, these are exciting times for the racing scene. The recent success of some scow hull configurations have been among the latest developments to challenge what we consider as normal, yet despite their unconventional looks their growing popularity in some areas suggests that the sport is on the verge of yet another new trend.

But at what price?
Bouvier, a lifelong racing sailor who has clocked up many sea miles both inshore and offshore, says he is the first to acknowledge and celebrate the rapid and exciting growth in design.

As J/Composites’ commercial director his day job takes him to the heart of the sport where their own models frequently go head-to-head with some of the most extreme designs on the racing circuit. And while he freely admits that his prime commercial focus is on J/Boats, the combination of this and his long and sustained involvement as a hands-on participant in the sport provides both perspective and a useful datum to understand and comment on where things are heading.

‘It is definitely an exciting world right now with one of the widest ranges of options for owners and crew that we’ve seen, but this rapid, and at times extreme development, also comes at a cost,’ he says. ‘The technical improvements within racing design have been fascinating but they have also been responsible for a polarisation of sailing. Supporters of more radical designs would argue that innovation has always driven the sport forward and that rating systems must evolve accordingly. However, the result is that it has become difficult if not impossible at times to provide equitable racing across a range of similarly sized boats that were designed to excel in different ways. The problem now is that often we’re asking our rating systems to compare bananas with carrots.

‘Take the current and growing trend in scow designs as an example. There is no question that they are capable of raising the performance bar, they’ve already proved it. The way in which the limitations of these designs, particularly upwind, have been overcome is fascinating. But this is also a configuration that is very hard to build competitively as a production boat for mainstream racing as the performance benefits depend on creating large, voluminous structures down to a weight.

‘This in turn leads to an expensive path with boats built from advanced lightweight materials which in turn pushes the price up, ‘he continues. ‘And in simple terms, extreme designs, exciting as they are, have never been a good way of attracting people in big numbers.’

It is easy to see his point, but surely the argument is that rating systems are there to even out those differences?

Bouvier believes that handicap systems are now being pushed harder than ever to provide equitable racing between boats with very different performance profiles across a wide range of conditions and disciplines. And while the argument isn’t a new one, he and many others are concerned at what effect this will have on the sport and where the solutions lie.

According to the J/Composites team there are ways of tackling the issues. They see advantages and opportunities in their long term and wide-ranging experience where they have been immersed in the thick of strong domestic racing in France and in the varied fleets on the international scene. The ability to make their own assessments in how different configurations could be catered for to provide close equitable racing, by studying their own fleet of almost 200 J/99s, is a good starting point.

‘One of our goals here is to see whether it would be possible to bring a standard J/99 with, say, an alloy mast, back into contention with the more advanced specifications by adapting a handicap. If we can, then our longer-term goal is to apply this to other areas of our range.

‘To achieve this, we will be focussing on the J/99 to start with as it is a very versatile design which has proved to be successful in both fully crewed and shorthanded events across both inshore and offshore racing.

‘The design has also been pushed hard by some stiff competition too, so we know the data is good and that the results prove consistently that the J/99 is a highly adaptable and competitive design. Perhaps we shouldn’t be surprised, after all it has smooth polar curves rather than those of more extreme designs that have performance spikes. Naturally, this is one of the clearest indicators to a good all-round performer.’

Making close comparisons across a varied fleet and establishing what works and why started at the Spi Ouest regatta in La Trinité this spring.

‘We had 10 closely matched J/99s in the middle of the IRC2 fleet which gave us a good datum,’ he continues. ‘All the boats in this class were of a similar overall concept and were separated by just a few points on rating which meant that the racing was about getting a good start, taking the right shifts, making good manoeuvres at the leeward mark and so on. Success was not defined by your handicap figure.

‘But what was particularly interesting was comparing our performance in the water and on handicap to boats of a similar size but with very different design concepts such as the new scows and others that were in IRC1. Because we had rolling starts on the same course we were able to look at the numbers and make good comparisons. And what was clear was that while they were quicker on the water we would have beaten them on corrected time by a big margin. And the reason is that these boats were having to race on a windward leeward course with a full crew which is at odds with what these offshore boats are designed for.

‘One of our main concerns is that in trying to account for this disparity with the more extreme, grand prix designs, that handicap systems forget about the bigger number of competitors in the mainstream classes. And when I say this, I mean we are afraid for the sport as a whole, not for our business because if that does happen it actually opens a door for companies like ours that have a strong following to do our own thing – but that’s not what we want.

‘The Admiral’s Cup is a good example. There is no doubt that it was a huge success, great to watch and I’m sure great to be a part of. But the risk is that it is driving IRC into a very professional, expensive area and away from the mainstream. The same can be highlighted under ORC with latest new design campaigns. The investment into development, especially AI assisted, has set another standard to challenge the loopholes of the handicap system’

J/Boats has another way of collecting data, making comparisons across an impressively wide range of models and making their point thanks to their own well-attended regattas such as the J/Cup Europe.

But Bouvier and J/Composites believe that the future of keelboat racing is not simply about the numbers. Events need to be fun too. And while you might think this is a case of stating the obvious and unrelated to the technical arguments, Bouvier and the team argue that they are linked. They argue that time, money and commitment that has been invested to refine grand prix designs and the way that they are sailed has increased pressure to succeed which in turn has raised expectations at the cost of general enjoyment.

‘The simple fact is that if a crew’s goal is solely to win, then only one crew will be happy,’ he says. ‘Aside from the social events which are important of course, the changes that have taken place in the way that events are structured plays into whether people enjoy their racing. Spi Ouest is a good example again as it is typical of other events. The total number of competitors has reduced but the number of classes has increased which dilutes the racing while making it more complex to run for the organisers. It doesn’t make sense on any front. We believe that the answer is to bring more competitors together in fewer classes, but this means addressing the format of the racing itself along with tackling handicap issues for boats that are of different concepts.

For Bouvier, the problem is not only technical. Once boats become harder to compare fairly, events become more fragmented, more expensive and, ultimately, less enjoyable for the majority of competitors.

‘No one here is pretending it is easy, but we do believe that it is necessary for the health of the sport.’

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First, she's a major badass – and second, her résumé is a breath of fresh air when it comes to America’s Cup sailor signings.

It will come as no surprise to readers that the 29-year-old’s background combines elite-level competition experience in the British Olympic Sailing Team (where she was understudy to gold-medal-winning kite surfer Ellie Aldridge at Paris 2024) with a bachelor’s degree in mechanical engineering (pretty much a prerequisite for any aspiring America’s Cup sailor in this current era of semi-automated, AI-driven, foiling boats).

What people probably were not expecting is the pure adventurer element of her résumé, which includes working as a basecamp guide on Everest, climbing mountains in Alaska and traversing Mongolian mountain ranges.

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The French syndicate has been a little quiet recently since flooding their AC75 during a capsize in Lorient a few weeks ago, so it seemed like an opportune time to revisit my interview with Jason, which I had begun by asking him about his impressive French language skills...

JC: I was impressed to hear you speaking to the local media here in fluent French. What’s the story behind that?

JS: Well, my partner, Manon Audinet, is French. She was the skipper of the French Women’s America’s Cup team in the last edition. We’ve been together for 11 years now. I’ve now got a French passport as well as my New Zealand one. Our son, Louis, was born in France. So we’ve definitely got a strong link with France, and it’s great to be able to continue that for another America’s Cup cycle.

JC: Can you tell us about what you expect your role to be in the French team for the 38th America’s Cup?

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