Emirates GBR ends Oracle San Francisco Sail Grand Prix in 7th place
by Emirates GBR SailGP Team 24 Mar 14:14 AEDT
22-23 March 2025
The Emirates Great Britain Sail Grand Prix Team has finished in seventh place at the Oracle San Francisco Sail Grand Prix, leaving them in second place on the 2025 Season leaderboard.
The event was full of drama as Australia suffered a wing collapse at the start of the seventh race. The wing of Tom Slingsby's F50 collapsed as the team approached the start line, thankfully all crew members were unharmed and an investigation into the cause of the incident is under way.
Emirates GBR Driver Dylan Fletcher said the San Francisco event was "a weekend to forget" for the British team after a few frustrating races, but that the team was "focusing on the bigger picture" and pleased to be just one point off the top spot of the overall season leaderboard.
"We always knew this season would be a bit of a rollercoaster," Fletcher said.
"If someone had said to us at the start of the season that we would be second overall and just one point off the top after five events we would have snapped their hand off. Ultimately this was a disappointing event for us, we couldn't quite catch a break. We made too many mistakes and we changed our starting technique which obviously didn't work out. It's now about putting our energy into the next event in Rio in May and we're excited to get racing there."
Emirates GBR Strategist Hannah Mills said: "It really felt like a battle all weekend. SailGP isn't easy, we are racing against the best people in the world so you've got to be at the top of your game. We know we can perform so it's about figuring out why we weren't firing this weekend and mitigating that. It's a long season, we've still got lots of events left so to be near the top after a top weekend is great for the overall season."
Reacting to Australia's wing collapse, Mills said: "It's pretty tough when you start a race and there's an incident where someone's wing goes down. We are all friends here so we were all worrying and it was a huge relief when we got the news that everyone was OK. We are all hoping they will be back on the course racing alongside us in Rio."
Emirates GBR entered race day two in San Francisco in sixth place after a difficult day on the water on Saturday. Unfortunately, that theme continued into Sunday for the Brits, who began the second day with an 11th place finish in race five after crossing the start line at the back of the pack. The British team had a better start in the sixth race of the event, with them managing to get to the first mark in third place, before they lost the rudder and suffered a severe splashdown. This left the team back in 11th place, but they dug in deep to climb up the fleet and cross the finish line in 7th place.
Race seven began with a dramatic turn of events as Australia suffered a wing collapse as the team approached the start line. A statement issued immediately by SailGP confirmed that all athletes were accounted for and unharmed, while the cause of the incident is not yet known. The wing collapse meant Australia, which was sitting in third place after an impressive performance all weekend, was unable to race in the three-boat Final, handing their qualifying place to France instead, who joined Spain and Canada. It was Spain who once again took the win on the iconic racecourse under the Golden Gate Bridge. Diego Botin's team repeated its Season 4 Championship winning performance in San Francisco waters.
The San Francisco event was the second stop on SailGP's U.S. slate of events, with the global racing championship heading to Rio de Janeiro for its first South American event next month (May 3-4), followed by the Mubadala New York Sail Grand Prix on June 7-8.