Sailing-Bigger and Faster, SailGP Back where all of it Began In Sydney
By Nick Mulvenney
SYDNEY, Feb 7 (Reuters) - SailGP go back to where all of it began in Sydney this weekend and six years on from the inaugural race, co-founder Russell Coutts sees a brilliant future for larsaluarna.se the innovative global sailing league.
An Olympic champion and skipper of 3 Americas Cup-winning boats, Coutts partnered with Larry Ellison, forum.batman.gainedge.org the billionaire creator of the Oracle software company, to release the series with 6 groups all owned by the league.
While the which kicked off in Sydney in February 2019 included just five rounds, this weekend's race will be the 3rd round of 13 the now 12-strong fleet will contest on the 2025-26 schedule.
"It's simply amazing, actually, the uptake and variety of occasions now," SailGP chief executive Coutts informed Reuters at the Sydney Opera House on Friday.
"We're certainly sitting at 13, and aiming to increase that over the next seasons to somewhere around 20. If you compare that to Formula One that has 24, that's sort of where we desire to get to. So yeah, the future appearances excellent."
The concept of Formula One on water is implicit in the league's name and the contrast is not far from the mark when the world's finest sailors press the F50 hindering catamarans to their limits at what are awesome speeds for waterborne vessels.
"We didn't set out to simply attract the passionate sailing fan, we try to make this sport easy to understand and explainable for all sports fans," Coutts added.
"Most of our fans are not devoted sailors, and that's one of the reasons we've grown so rapidly. We are appealing to people that similar to viewing a race, they do not have to understand anything about sailboats."
A bumper crowd of 25,000 ticketed fans ended up to enjoy Tom Slingsby's Australia group win the second round of the series in Auckland last month.
"I think you'll see several of our events this year now like that, perhaps even topping that," said Coutts, a 62-year-old New Zealander.
"The most important thing is the fans viewing on broadcast ... but the fan experience on site is also essential. We want fans to come and have a fun time and see some terrific racing."
Technological innovation is essential to SailGP and hundreds of countless data points are passed on from the boats to the Oracle Cloud for making use of race organisers, groups and to assist broadcasters improve the viewer experience.
360 DEGREE VIEW
Coutts is delighted about some more innovations coming online as Artificial Intelligence is significantly utilized to work through the mountain of information.
"The big advancement for us going forward is the 360 degree view from on board the boat, with listening to the group comms," he said.
"The viewer will be taken on board and trip together with the Australian team in a race, and be able to browse anywhere they desire. That's the future."
There have, of course, been obstacles over the six years with the 2nd season interfered with by the COVID pandemic and race days still sometimes at the mercy of wind conditions.
A shortage of F50s suggested the French team was unable to contend at this year's season-opening race in Dubai and archmageriseswiki.com damage to the boat once they got it ruled them out of the Auckland leg.
The full fleet of 12 boats will for that reason race for the very first time this weekend and one of the most pleasing elements for users.atw.hu Coutts is that all however one of the teams are, or soon will be, independently owned or run.
"These groups are now costing $50 million, I would never ever have predicted that this early on," said Coutts, who prepares to bring another number of groups on board next year.
"We understood that that was the entire method the design was set up, that team owners would have the ability to trade their teams and hopefully generate income out of it, but I didn't think we 'd attain it this early. That's been a great surprise." (Reporting by Nick Mulvenney, modifying by Michael Perry)