The sailors of the US SailGP Team have been living their best Rockstar life in Dubai for about three weeks, acclimating for the first regatta of SailGP’s fifth season. They’ve played in a gigantic waterpark, bounced a concert, and bombed through the desert in dune buggies under a full moon. All of it so ridiculously amazing, says its strategist Mike Buckley, and that’s even before the lights and cameras of the media day, the VIPing and the practice sessions on their newly wrapped Lady Liberty in “Liberty Green.”
It’s all good, but it’s time to go racing.
The league has slapped down a bumped-up $12 million prize purse on the heels of announcing Rolex as title sponsor and a 10-year deal. The Rolex SailGP Championship is now a long season that circles back to the Middle East (Abu Dhabi) next November, with 14 international venues and 12 teams going for it. The US Team rookied its way through last season, under-skilled in the F50 and babes to the slaughter of the leagues veteran teams. But a summer training block in Bermuda in August, and productive days in Dubai with their new flight controller Hans Hanken, is a boost to their confidence.
“Our confidence—in executing maneuvers—is probably the biggest thing,” said helmsman Taylor Canfield. “We gained a lot of confidence in our ability to push the boat. In some of the venues and in some of the conditions last season where we were very inexperienced there was definitely some intimidation. The boat was sailing us a little bit, and now it feels like we’re sailing the boat and taking control. We have the confidence to do any maneuver that any of the top teams are doing now.”
That’s not just because of Henken’s mountain of experience as flight controller alongside Jimmy Spithill, the league’s undisputed GOAT. It’s the whole team, Buckley reminds: “Everybody’s so damn good on these teams. The experience certainly helps. But you need the chemistry, you need the communication, you need the confidence in each other to really move up the leaderboard. Some of these other teams have taken key people out or moved people around, and it’s going to be interesting to see how it stacks up.”
Weis is Jacked, As Is the Team
Buckley also believes he has an ace in the cockpit with jib trimmer and grinder Anna Weis. She’s been posted up at the Red Bull Athletic Performance Center, doing the heavy lifting so her grinding can get the F50 the lift it needs for “popping.”
She went into training at 14 pullups, Weis says. She’s now pulling 17. Canfield only dreams of that.
“I’m on for every single race, and that’s exactly why I train super hard, so that I can push as hard as I can in every single race,” Weiss says. And yes, when not hitting the handles hard, she’s also trimming the jib. “I think that especially in lighter conditions it’s going to be an advantage because the women are going to have to grind and four- and five-up sailing conditions (likely for Dubai), so it just gives our team a benefit that I have the experience and have been training for it.”
Light-winds on the practice day delivered mixed to marginally good results (5-7-8) for the US team, but those don’t count, Canfield says, as there was some “erratic behavior from some of the teams” and “umpires clearing calls whenever they want.”
Still, Canfield said, “We stuck to our plan and had two decent starts and one really good start. We executed when we needed to and made a few mistakes. There’s no doubt with our sailing ability, how much it’s grown over the last month, that, if we sail our best, we can go out and have a good start and win the race.”
An Underdog Prone To Bite
If that were to be the case, the team on Lady Liberty would certainly shock the broadcast commentary team of SailGP, which put the US team at rock bottom of its pre-seasons rankings. “Haters gonna, hate,” Buckley says. “I think we’re a little misunderstood and frankly, everybody loves an underdog, right? And there’s a reason it’s called the American dream, so we’re gonna figure it out. It might not be tomorrow or the next day, but it’s really hard to beat people that are not willing to ever give up.”
As far Canfield is concerned, “It’s a long season, and with this many more boats, you’re going to see people having that big swings, they’re going to win races, and they’re going to have deep ones. So I think a good goal for the team right now is to play the averages, to come away with some threes and fours, and occasionally maybe a seven. We’ll start making finals pretty quickly if we aim for that.”
And it’s all live on Saturday and Sunday (November 23-24), 1 to 5 p.m. GST, on SailGP.com, YouTube and host broadcast networks.
