October is an important time for sports fans. MLB and WNBA are close to announcing their champions. MLS is approaching playoffs. The NBA and NHL are already underway. And I bet by the time you’ve read this, you’ve mistakenly wandered into a bar that had the NFL on and wondered if it was going to be too loud to stay. The world of sport(s) never stops and so when I came across a Sail GP race at the gym the other day (honestly, I’ve only seen this sport when at the gym), I gave an approving nod at the screen.
“Oh yeah, I forgot about you little homie.”
If you’ve never heard of SailGP, it’s essentially a competitive sailing circuit. One of the youngest competitions in sailing ( it was founded in 2018 by Russell Coutts and Larry Ellison), it has quickly been considered one of the top tier competitions in sport. Whether it’s because it has big money sponsors like Emirates Airlines or Rolex, or the races look like a video game, Sail GP is looking to be the “Formula 1 on water.”
If you didn’t know any better, you’d think teenagers are controlling the boats with remote controls. They’re not, though. These F50 catamarans are piloted by about a half-dozen men and women who are representing (to differing degrees) a dozen countries worldwide. My local team, the US SailGP team, is one of the few teams without a corporate sponsor in its team name.
But she probably won’t be single for long.
So what’s the deal and appeal, you ask? Well, on one hand, I kind of see the comparisons to Formula 1—or at least this current pop-culture-infused version of Formula 1—in a few ways. There’s the luxury sponsors; there’s that “Street Fighter II” aspect of participants traveling all over the world to perform in a single season. There’s even an obnoxious reality show that probably has to invent rivalries and stories to make things interesting.
Drive to Survive? No, we’re Racing on THE EDGE!
But I would pump the brakes (no pun intended because I hate puns) on the Formula 1 comparisons. For one, a single race take about fifteen minutes to complete, and that alone deadens a bit of the appeal. Imagine flying all the way to Australia but getting the urge to use the restroom at race start? If you’re not careful, you can miss the whole thing. (There are multiple races a meet as a note of clarification) Hospitality, or that thing you do where you spend more money at the same sporting event to turn your nose up at people who didn’t, has had its own issues of providing an experience comparable to other sports. At a soccer game, for example, your view is confined to the field. With Sail GP, you can be in a grandstand that offers only about a sliver of action.
TLDR: Almost $900 for what looks like an afternoon cookout.
“Maybe Sail GP is for classic racing fans,” I can probably hear you say. Indeed, there are Formula 1 fans who lament how mainstream the sport has gotten. But it’s not like Sailing was short pure sport competitions. Between America’s Cup, Round Texel, or even something called the “Extreme Sailing Series,” nobody was asking why there weren’t enough places to see boats race other boats. Sail GP was designed to be that brand forward, celebrity-invested, huge television deal, 800 pound gorilla of a league. And with that comes the casual fans. They go hand-in-hand. “Big fans” watch the sport. Casual and new fans invest in the sport.
For what it’s worth, a lot is going for Sail GP, and it may be worth checking out. Rooting for a country is pretty simple, especially if it’s a country you care about. The short races can be an advantage to the younger generations and their shortening attention spans. Maybe even the cities that are hosting these things would see a spike in tourism.
I kind of struggle to think about how something like this grows? It’s not like I can call up the homies and make a boat hoopty (hooptyship?) and run with these guys. Nor can you have a Beyoncé concert at halftime because there is no halftime. You know what? I’m going to go back and watch the provided handy-dandy “SailGP101” vid they came up with.