Diego Botin barely made it into the podium race and then skippered Spain to its first SailGP victory, beating Nicolai Sehested of Rockwool Denmark and three-time defending champion Tom Slingsby of Team Australia in the Oracle Los Angeles Sail Grand Prix on Sunday.
The breakthrough victory for the young Spanish crew came in light, puffy winds on the Port of Los Angeles’ Outer Harbor in the Southern California debut of tech billionaire Larry Ellison’s global league. Botin was the first to get his 50-foot catamaran up on its foils just after the start in the tricky conditions and opened a lead of almost 500 meters before holding off his more experienced opponents.
The crews struggled to keep their wing-sailed catamarans on their foils, making for a slow slog up and down the course. Sehested closed within a few hundred meters approaching the final gate and Botin buried his port hull in the water, but he recovered and stayed ahead through the gate and across the finish line. Sehested finished second and Slingsby, an Olympic gold medalist and former America’s Cup champion who was seeking his first regatta win of Season 4, was well back in third.
Spain joined SailGP starting with Season 2 and the 29-year-old Botin is its third skipper. The Spanish finished last in Season 3, when Slingsby won his third straight $1 million, winner-take-all championship race.
“We’ve been through a tough process and through tough times, and obviously this is huge for us, winning an event,” said Botin, who joined his crew in its first SailGP Champagne celebration aboard their catamaran. “We know we are behind from the top teams in many areas, and we have to prove a lot and keep our heads down, but we had massive, massive motivation to be able to pull it off today and we’re looking forward for the future.”
Slingsby went 1-2-4-2-1 in the fleet racing to reach the podium race while Sehested went 3-1-5-4-3. Botin won the fourth fleet race and then tumbled to ninth out of 10 boats in the final fleet race, but it was enough to edge Canada by one point for the third spot. The Spanish crew then minimized its maneuvers and sailed the shortest distance in the final race to win the regatta.
“There was a big shift at the start,” Botin said. “In these conditions, it’s super hard to get the timing correctly because it’s super puffy and the timing to the line changes a lot, and we managed to get the best spot at the start and from there it was way easier for us.”
Slingsby said the Aussies fell into a wind hole at the start and never recovered.
“I’m really angry right now just because I feel like we deserved that one,” Slingsby said. “We sailed really well in the fleet races. I’m just frustrated. I know I’ll calm down soon but right now it’s pretty raw.”
Slingsby, one of the world’s most dominant skippers, said he was “really excited for the Spanish, actually. They’re a great group of people. I remember our first win and there was a lot of elation. Congratulations to them. They’re sailing really well. They’re only getting better and better. It’s exciting to see another contender up there.”
Slingsby leads the season standings with 17 points while Botin and Sehested have 16 apiece. Canada’s Phil Robertson is next with 15 and New Zealand’s Peter Burling, the two-time reigning America’s Cup champion helmsman who won the SailGP season opener in Chicago, has 14.
The next regatta is in Saint-Tropez, France, on Sept. 9-10.
___
Follow Bernie Wilson at https://twitter.com/berniewilson
