Unbroken

After a night’s sleep, helmsman Tom Slingsby understood the position his team was in, yet he appeared level-headed, like the true competitor he is, stating, “We do reset. It’s nice having the confidence; you get that feeling you just have to put together a decent race and you’ll win, whereas at the moment, it feels like we need to do a better race than normal to win which is not the position we want to be in. But today’s a new day and we’ve made some changes to the boat which we know are going to improve our speed and manoeuvring, so we’re going to be a lot better today.”

San Francisco really turned it on for both sailors and spectators alike offering a breezy 12-17 knot wind range for the athletes to contend with. Hitting the ground running, Race 4 saw four team’s, including Australia, biting the start early providing United States SailGP Team, helmed by Rome Kirby, a nice lead going into the first mark. The fleet of F50’s could not have been closer together, crisscrossing one another on multiple race legs. Australia sat just behind Great Britain until Japan sneakily came inside around the final mark. Australia absolutely pushed it out heading into the finish hoping to edge out Japan until a heart-stopping crash metres away from the finish line dropped the boat off the foils, drifting into the finish taking third.

“We had a really nasty crash going into the finish on Race 1. We went for a codenamed ‘eagle,’, which means drop both boards and fly like the sacred eagle to try and finish before the Japanese. But unfortunately, the boards sucked down more than we anticipated and we pretty much almost went into a pitchpole at about 40 knots to about 7. The boys on the front handles got a little banged up, but to their credit, they pulled through and toughened up for the next few races of the day. Happy that nothing broke and we were able to get a good rebound from that, “ says a relieved flight controller Jason Waterhouse.

Both grinders Ky Hurst and Sam Newton suffered minor injuries going into the finish after the crash. Ky Hurst’s face and ribs met the unforgiving F50, but even after seeing a bit of blood, the four-time Ironman champion pushed through pain.

Race 5 was a battle of the Commonwealth as tie points for Australia and Great Britain meant the Australians needed to beat the British if they wanted in on the final match race round.

“In the second race of the day, our whole concentration was on the British so we sort of sacrificed our start to get them. In the end, both boats sort of sailed through the fleet, but keeping in mind our main goal was just to beat the British, and I’d say we sort of achieved that,” laughed Slingsby.

Both teams chose opposite sides of the course for a nailbiting race, but it was the Australians that gained ahead once the British took a penalty against the U.S. team coming around the last bottom mark.

After the crucial Race 5 win, Slingsby was ecstatic but notes, “It’s going to be a tough final [against Japan]. It’s a real boat handling situation. Just gotta make sure we sail well,” when looking ahead.

Australia SailGP Team is now two points ahead in overall standings, and one step closer to the coveted SailGP’s $1 million dollar purse prize.

sailgp.com