RIO DE JANEIRO (AP) — Tom Slingsby and his Flying Roos peaked on Sunday to win the SailGP event at Rio de Janeiro and regain top spot in the series standings.
Flying Roos entered the South America debut event with a win in Auckland, New Zealand and a second-place finish to the British crew in Perth but Slingsby said his crew didn’t find its rhythm in Brazil until sweeping the four races on Day 2 on Guanabara Bay.
“Today we finally showed what we’re capable of when everything comes together,” the Olympic gold medalist said. “It’s a really satisfying feeling — not just as a driver, but also seeing it from a broader perspective.”
The Flying Roos had enough cushion to secure the victory despite a five-point penalty following a collision with the Swiss team at the start of the sixth race.
“It was a challenging day, especially with the conditions and that incident at the start — the sun made it really hard to judge distances, and I misjudged it, which led to contact,” Slingsby said. “It’s the first time we’ve hit another boat in SailGP, so not ideal, but we were lucky it didn’t impact the final result.”
In the Grand Prix Final, Flying Roos held off Artemis SailGP, the Swedish entry which earned its first podium finish, and Los Gallos of Spain.
After four events, Slingsby, whose Australia team includes actors Hugh Jackman and Ryan Reynolds as co-owners, has a seven-point lead over defending champion Emirates GBR and an eight-point lead over third-place U.S. team.
The series features identical high-tech, high-speed 50-foot foiling catamarans. The next event will be staged next month in Bermuda before the series continues with stops in New York, Halifax (Canada), Britain, France and Dubai and Abu Dhabi in the United Arab Emirates.
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