Balboa Yacht Club begins acceptance of Requests for Invitation for 58th Governor's Cup
by Susan Kenney 29 Jan 05:07 EST
29 July - 3 August 2025
“Changing of the Guard”, 2024 winner Cole Tapper left, and runner-up Jeffrey Petersen, right, at Governor's Cup press conference. After two previous wins, Petersen is “aged out” leaving the 2025 field to Tapper who will try to get his second win in 2025 © Tom Walker
The 58th Governor's Cup will be held between July 29 and August 3. The world's under 23 match race skippers are invited to file a Request for Invitation at www.govcupracing.com.
Balboa Yacht Club has posted all the information necessary for requesting an invitation ("RFI") for the 58th Governor's Cup International Youth Match Racing Championship, July 29-August 3, 2025 on the event website, www.govcupracing.com under "Race Documents". The deadline for receiving RFIs is April 11, 2025, but the Selection Committee may invite skippers who are particularly qualified at any time so interested skippers are encouraged to file an RFI as soon as possible.
"We look forward to another hard-fought battle in 2025, although it will be hard to beat last year's final match when Cole Tapper (AUS) came back from a 0-2 score to beat two-time GovCup winner Jeffrey Petersen (USA) 3-2 and win the Cup", said Christine Gribben, Governor's Cup Chair. Although Petersen has "aged out" of the under 23 event, Tapper has a final year of eligibility and is expected to attend.
The Governor's Cup is the oldest youth (under 23 years old) match racing championship in the world and includes among its "alumni", many of the finest sailors in the world led by two-time America's Cup winner James Spithill (AUS), multiple Congressional Cup sailors and champions as well as former World Match Racing Tour champs Spithill, Taylor Canfield (USA), Phil Robertson (NZL) and Nick Egnot-Johnson (NZL).
Many of the top sailors from the 2024 event are expected to return for this year including 2024's third and fourth place finishers, Justin Callahan (USA) and Josh Hyde (NZL). The event will be a "Grade 3" event but after the selection of teams, the Club may reapply for retroactive re-grading given the likely quality of the invitees list. The Governor's Cup is the only youth match racing event to achieve Grade 1 status (in 2018), a Grade usually reserved for professional events.
The Cup is sailed in identical "Governor's Cup 22" sloops provided to the competitors by the Newport Balboa Sailing & Seamanship Association. They were designed by famed yacht designer and BYC Staff Commodore Alan Andrews and feature fractional rigs, flat top mains and masthead spinnakers. They have proved perfectly suited to racing in wind speeds of as little as 4-5 knots, but also perform well and are exciting to sail in the 18-20 knot conditions seen in several previous regattas. Since they were first used in the Cup in 2016, skippers and crews have generally agreed they are among the best--if not the best—boats used in youth match racing.