Spain Stuns Australia and New Zealand To Steal SailGP Championship Title

It was a great day for Spain this weekend. As Carlos Alcaraz won Wimbledon, they also won the UEFA Euro Cup football championship and, last but not least, after the French literally crashed and burned on the final turn in Sunday’s first race, Spain went on to win SailGP’s Grand Final in San Francisco!

Spain foiled top teams Australia and New Zealand to steal the Season 4 championship title as driver Diego Botin and his team barely scraped into the Grand Final following a very disappointing day on Saturday.

The story on Saturday was France moving into third place by rocking their starts and taking a first and two thirds. Spain, formerly in third place overall, completely punted with two last-place starts, and finished the day with a 7-7-5. More excitement came with a tight finish between Canada and Denmark, with Canada on the inside and Denmark above. Skipper Phil Robertson held Denmark high of the mark, then bore away to make the finish, but instead sailed right into the soft, inflatable finish mark.

Sunday saw the tide turn between France and Spain. France once again was off with a good start in the first race but lost control on a leeward rounding, putting Spain and France neck and neck in fourth and fifth place. France ended up at the weather mark on port and tried a much-too-close tack at the mark, hitting Denmark and breaking their own starboard rudder. With France unable to repair their rudder for the second race of the day, Spain was left to cruise into the three-way final with New Zealand and Australia.

In the pre-start, the favored Kiwis and Aussies seemed to be racing each other, allowing Spain to capture the start. Spain’s lead was marginal, but that was all they needed. Disaster struck Australia on the penultimate leg of the race when a messy maneuver caused the triple-SailGP champions to fall off the foils, while the Kiwis were never really in it. Spain looked rattled on Saturday, and France fell apart on Sunday, but Spain kept their cool for the winner-take-all $2 million prize Grand Final by defeating the three-time Aussie world champions and the 2024 season leaders New Zealand.

Botin has paid tribute to the support of SailGP boss Russell Coutts, and revealed that the team suffered boat damage in the last moments of the podium final.

“He [Coutts] believed in a very young team with no experience in this type of racing and we’ve gone through very hard moments,” said Botin. “He was the only one telling us ‘guys, you will get there;’ without him we could not have done what we have done today.

“I was quite nervous because in the last jibe we got something in the rudder and the feeling was very bad,” Botin said. “Australia was close to us and I thought we might be in a bad situation, but when we looked back we saw they were far away and we knew we would win.”

Overall it was a fun event on the Cityfront. Saturday and Sunday started gray and cool without much wind predicted. By showtime the air was warm, the breeze strong without being a July gale, and the flood-current waters were flat. It was very pleasant spectating. While the event wasn’t a sellout, the shoreside stands were full, though the overall event scale seemed similar to or slightly smaller and quieter than last year. This could be summer dates compared to spring dates last year. The action on the water is marked by two peak moments: the intense first mark rounding after the start and last rounding to the finish, both happening right in front of the grandstands. Most of the rest of the racing you watch on the big screens. For all the setup on land and enormous staffing to cater to local crowds and move this show around the world, one would hope for larger local attendance.

With the close of Season 4, Season 5 kicks off quickly, beginning and ending in the United Arab Emirates. The first event will be held November 23-24, and the Grand Final will move from San Francisco to UAE and be held on the weekend of November 29-30, 2025. San Francisco will stay in the mix as one of four events in the Americas with three in the US and one in Brazil. The 2025 US events are Los Angeles, March 15-16; San Francisco, March 22-23; and then Brazil for May 3-4 before finishing up the tour of the Americas with New York on June 7-8. Between the opener in November and the Americas, the event travels to New Zealand and Australia, and following the Americas it heads to Europe before the Grand Final in November 2025.

The Spanish upset of New Zealand and Australia made for a spectacular, fairy-tale finish for the young team and the league. You can read more on the Grand Final and the tumultuous 4th Season in the upcoming August edition of Latitude 38!