RC44s gear up for their 16th World Championship
by 44Cup 19 Sep 02:59 PDT
23-27 September 2026
2023 44Cup World Championship Cowes © Nico Martinez / 44Cup
The 2026 World Championship for the RC44s will take place next week on the Solent, out of Cowes, where the high performance one design class is once again being hosted by the Royal Yacht Squadron and Team Aqua owner Chris Bake.
As usual in this highly competitive owner-driver fleet, second-guessing the outcome between the nine teams is difficult. Currently leading the 2026 44Cup championship is Markus Törnqvist's GeMera Racing. At April's 44Cup Puntaldia in Sardinia the Swedish team relieved John Bassadone's Peninsula Racing of the RC44's 'golden wheels' (the equivalent to the yellow jersey in the Tour de France). They followed this with a second place on their homewaters of Marstrand in June and now lead Pietro Loro Piana's team on Aleph Racing by two points, in turn one ahead of Nico Poons' Team Charisma.
"It's important," comments Törnqvist, who will again face his father and stable mate Torbjörn, steering Artemis Racing. "You can't discard the points, so you need to go in with confidence and make sure you do well. It can get very difficult straight away, so, we'll have to try and stay consistent and see what we can do."
Supporting the younger Törnqvist is tactician Francesco Bruni and a mixed crew of seasoned pros such as Kyle Langford, David Gilmour, Kinley Fowler and Nick Hutton as well as young up-and-coming Swedes such as Hugo Christenson and Ida Svensson. Bruni, who raced the last America's Cup as a helmsman for the Italian Luna Rossa Prada Pirelli team added: "As always in this class it will go to the wire on the last couple of days, I'm sure. I just hope that our team will keep doing well as we have been doing this whole season. We are super excited to be going to Cowes."
While GeMera Racing is a relatively new team to the 44Cup, Aleph Racing is not and despite campaigning for the last 15 years, a World Championship win has remained elusive for Hugues Lepic's team. With Pietro Loro Piana taking over the reins from Lepic this season, the team has been getting ever more consistent.
For the last few years Loro Piana has divided his professional life between London and Milan, but despite being a keen sailor has never previously sailed in the UK. "I'm truly curious and excited to see what Cowes is all about," he says. "All of my crew have all sailed there and tell me the legends about the currents and the sea state. So I'm looking forward to the event, not only because it's a World Championship, but also because of the location. As always, sailing in this class is something else: Up until the last race, you never know who's going to be on the podium and it truly shows that the level is the best of the best. And the boats are something else: They've stood the test of time for 20 years and they're still fast and a lot of fun. There's no other boat I'd prefer to sail than the RC44."
Next on the leaderboard currently are two 44Cup veterans; both multiple RC44 World Champions: Nico Poons' Team Charisma and his Monaco-based friend Vladimir Prosikhin and his Team Nika. Team Charisma has recently regained Kiwi tactician Hamish Pepper and comes to Cowes as the winner of the last event in Marstrand. They previously won the RC44 Worlds in 2022 and 2023.
"I don't have that much expectation, because then the results are always better than when you go in with high expectations!" quips Poons, adding on a serious note: "The competition is so tight that anything can happen. And you need a bit of luck. Otherwise one mistake and it can be dreadful..."
Pepper also looks forward to it: "I'm excited. On Charisma last time there we won. So I have some good memories of it but I know how tricky it is. There's a lot of good sailors - it's Nic Asher's sort of home waters and a lot of people have done the Admiral's Cup there recently so they know the conditions. It's going to be fun, with exciting racing hopefully."
Britain's Nic Asher is tactician on board Team Nika which already this year has won in Puntaldia. The team comfortably won the 2025 season, during which they claimed three events, including the World Championship in Scheveningen, the Netherlands. Prosikhin and Team Nika have also won more RC44 World Championships - five (2015, 2017-18, 2024-25) - than any other team, ahead of Chris Bake's Team Aqua on three (2012, 2019, 2021).
The only other British tactician competing next week is a new recruit to Artemis Racing: round the world and America's Cup legend Adrian Stead. Stead is also a very long term 44Cup participant with Igor Lah's Team Ceeref Vaider (currently on sabbatical from the circuit). This year marks a decade since Lah's Slovenia team won the World Championship, although in addition they and Stead are a three-time 44Cup annual championship winner (2016-17, 2019).
Racing will take place on the Solent next week over 24-27 September. It will be preceded on Wednesday 23 September by the King's Cup. Initiated by Team Aqua's Chris Bake, this is a charity event organised on the event's practice day between the class and the Royal Yacht Squadron to raise money for local Isle of Wight charities, notably the Ellen MacArthur Cancer Trust. It will see a number of VIPs take to the water aboard the RC44s.