Womens America's Cup opportunities set to expand in the coming 2026 and 2027 regattas
by America's Cup Media 18 Sep 18:29 PDT
Orient Express (FRA) and Emirates Team NZ - Group A - Puig Women's America's Cup, Final. - October 5, 2024 © Ricardo Pinto / America's Cup
In the long, 174-year history of the America’s Cup, women have certainly played a part but never shared the same spotlight as their male counterparts.
Indeed, the first woman in the competition can be traced back as far as 1886 when the colourful Susan Henn, the wife of Lieutenant William Henn, the owner of the Irish challenger 'Galatea', kept time for her husband, as well as keeping a menagerie of pets aboard the yacht. Susan Henn will be admitted to the America's Cup Hall of fame on October 16, 2025 at New York Yacht Club.
A look back on the Puig Women's America's Cup during the Louis Vuitton 37th America's Cup in Barcelona in 2024.
Further female sailing icons in the America’s Cup included the Honourable Enid Wyndham-Quinn in 1893, and Edith Hope Goddard Iselin who was the first woman to be in the afterguard of an America’s Cup winning yacht in both 1895 on Defender and 1899 on Columbia. Elizabeth ‘Sis’ Hovey continued the winning ways, sailing to victory onboard Rainbow in 1934, whilst Gertrude Vanderbilt, the wife of Harold S. Vanderbilt, was a key member of the 1930, 1934, and 1937 defences, timing the famous time-on-distance ‘Vanderbilt starts’ to perfection.
In the modern era, the legendary American sailor Dawn Riley has arguably done more for gender equality than any other. In 1992, she sailed aboard Bill Koch’s America3 programme in the Defender Series and by 1995 was team captain leading the narrowly defeated Mighty Mary IACC campaign, again backed by Koch, in what was a ground-breaking moment for women in the America’s Cup.
Dawn Riley was inducted into the America's Cup Hall of Fame in 2022, for making history as the first woman to manage an America's Cup campaign, and her accomplishments in the sport
Fast forward to 2024 and the inaugural Puig Women’s America’s Cup was announced following the publication of the Protocol for the Louis Vuitton 37th America’s Cup in Barcelona. It was a moment not only for women’s sport and equality but showed that the America’s Cup was serious about bridging the foiling skills gap and laying a path for the Louis Vuitton 38th America’s Cup in Naples for full inclusion.
Entries were open to the six America’s Cup teams, as well as for invited clubs from around the world and as squads and selection processes got underway, training on the AC40 simulators became a competitive virtual game played out in cyberspace between the teams as they trained for the competition.
By the time the regatta got underway, there was much speculation as to who was fast and in a variety of conditions. Two teams, Athena Pathway from Great Britain and Luna Rossa Prada Pirelli from Italy stood out as the favourites whilst the dark horses of the America’s Cup teams were Emirates Team New Zealand. Amongst the invited teams, there was huge local support for SailTeam BCN whilst the Swedish Challenge powered by Artemis Technologies and the young team from JAJO DutchSail were tipped to perform.
Once racing got underway with the two fleets of six teams split, it was all about making the top three and qualifying for the Semi-Finals ahead of a one-race, winner-takes-all race scheduled between the first and second races of the America’s Cup Match in the full glare of publicity. Shoreside the atmosphere was both colourful and loud with supporters coming from far and wide to the Port Olímpic in Barcelona to witness history in the making. On the first dock-out, Ngati Whatua Orakei, the Auckland-based Maori tribe gave a rousing send off as the sailors all focussed on winning the fabulous silver trophy crafted by local artist Patricia Urquiola.
From the outset, Athena Pathway skippered by Hannah Mills OBE with co-helm Tash Bryant and trimmers Saskia Clark and Hannah Diamond, were the team to beat as they stormed to a first race win. However, the Luna Rossa Prada Pirelli team led by Giulia Conti with Margherita Porro on co-helm and trimmers Maria Giubilei and Giulia Fava, had other ideas. The Italian team won three straight races, showing unbelievable qualities of recovery as well as the ability to hold super-deep angles off the wind at pace. Speeds topped out at 44+ knots on the bear-aways, and the action was some of the tightest seen in Barcelona in the late summer of 2024.
Italy and Great Britain topped the leaderboard whilst the fight for third and qualification to the Semi-Finals went to the wire between Emirates Team New Zealand and Alinghi Red Bull Racing with the Kiwi women’s team just squeaking ahead in the final standings. On the other side of the draw, the wind Gods didn’t play ball, and it was long days on the water that eventually saw the Spanish, Swedish, and Dutch teams secure their places in the fleet race Final to decide the top two.
The deciding six-boat fleet race series had it all with so much jeopardy all through the fleet. SailTeam BCN won two races but then dropped out of the standings. The most consistent were Luna Rossa Prada Pirelli and Athena Pathway, with the Italians even pulling off a remarkable race where they were over the line, returned, and were in first place by the first mark! Sensational sailing, all who witnessed it were mesmerised by the closeness of the action and the foiling skill levels on display. Athena Pathway and Luna Rossa Prada Pirelli made the Final with two of the most outstanding generational talents in Mills and Conti going head-to-head for the title.
The Final itself was a masterclass of both foiling technique and match-racing of the highest order. It was billed as a titanic tussle between the two outstanding competitors and signposted the very future of the America’s Cup. And from the very outset, it was Giulia Conti from the starboard helm, who eked crucial metres off the line, tacked at the left boundary after an arm wrestle of a drag race and willed and cajoled her Italian crew into keeping calm under intense pressure, never relinquishing the lead over the next six legs.
Italy held its collective breath as Conti bore-away at the final windward mark with a 19 second lead as Mills and Bryant throwing everything they had on the final run to the finish. The eventual margin of victory was just 8 seconds, and as Luna Rossa Prada Pirelli crossed the line, the Tifosi in Barcelona went wild whilst onboard it was unbridled elation.
The Luna Rossa support team came aboard the AC40 and proudly displayed the Italian flag with Marco Gradoni, winning skipper of the UniCredit Youth America’s Cup performing the customary dunking of the winning women’s team before the spraying of the Juvé & Camps cava. It was an historic moment for Italian sailing and one of the stand-out spectacles of an outstanding Louis Vuitton 37th America’s Cup.
For the winning skipper, it was elation as Giulia Conti contextualised just what winning the inaugural Puig Women’s America’s Cup meant, saying: “I think it's a huge stepping stone in the history of sailing, especially for women. When I was a little girl I was always looking up at Luna Rossa, but I was always seeing the guys and I never saw a woman, but I think we showed the whole world what we are capable of and how well we can sail.”
Accepting their award on the evening of Sunday October 13, 2024, on the main stage of the Race Village from the Puig Brand Ambassador, entrepreneur and model, Karlie Kloss, the Italian team raised the magnificent trophy in triumph and became beacons for the sport and icons to thousands of girls around the world who now have a clear pathway and target to make it to the apex of sailing—the America’s Cup.
The Mayor of Barcelona, Jaume Collboni, spoke at the awards saying: “The Puig Women's America's Cup is more than a regatta. It is the symbol of the conquest of equality, of the empowerment of women also in the world of sport, and of a fairer future. What has happened here this week will encourage many young women around the world to also compete and follow their passion and show that for women athletes there are no limits. There are no limits!”
History made, and whilst the next Women’s America’s Cup that will be held in Naples in 2027 is set in stone and will showcase emerging female sailing talent once again. The Protocol for the Louis Vuitton 38th America’s Cup has also confirmed that women will be onboard the AC75’s as a condition of entry.
Naples is set to be the ground-breaking moment when female athletes make their indelible mark on the America’s Cup and write their name in history.
Further opportunity presents itself in the planned Preliminary Regattas, where the AC teams can potentially run two AC40 yachts and have the option of one crewed by both Women and Youth sailors.
The pathway for female athletes has never been stronger than in the Louis Vuitton 38th America’s Cup.