Australia SailGP Team capsizes and suffers serious damage ahead of Grand Final
by Olivia Hogan/Australia SailGP 25 Mar 03:33 GMT
26-27 March 2022
Australia SailGP Team helmed by Tom Slingsby capsize during a practice session ahead of the San Francisco SailGP, Season 2 in San Francisco, USA. 24th March. © Felix Diemer for SailGP
The Australian SailGP Team capsized on San Francisco Bay during a training session for this weekend’s SailGP season final, the upcoming Mubadala United Sail Grand Prix, March 26-27.
The capsize occurred towards the end of the team’s routine training from a failed tack bear away. all athletes were safe and accounted for following the incident.
Tom Slingsby said: “It was getting late in the day and the breeze was building. We were out for our final training run and we went for a tack bear away which is a hard manoeuvre and unfortunately we capsized.”
“We have broken a few of the fairings on the platform and some of the electrical components, but the biggest damage is to the wing. The top flap of the wing basically disintegrated on impact so that needs to be rebuilt from scratch. Typically that would be a one week process, but our tech team is looking to do this in the next 48 hours.”
The SailGP tech team will now work to repair the damage, with the aim of having the team back on the water as soon as possible, in preparation for the Season Final this weekend where they will be racing on San Francisco Bay.
Tom Slingsby said: “We are going to be trying as hard as we can to get back on the water to train ahead of the racing, so we can test out the boat and make sure everything is working properly. It's disappointing and it’s not the preparation we wanted. Unfortunately there are going to be a lot of people having late nights trying to get us ready, but we have an amazing shore and tech team around us.”
Following the Australian team’s dominant performance at the Australia Sail Grand Prix, the team has already clinched a spot in Sunday’s winner-take-all, Grand Final race where they will compete against the United States team and an as-to-be-named third team for the season championship title.
Racing will air live on Fox Sports and on Kayo. Kayo are offering fans free access to both the live and replay racing, via its Kayo Freebies offer.