Deutsche Bank Germany - Race Day 2 - Oracle Perth Sail Grand Prix - January 18, 2026 - photo © Samo Vidic/SailGP
Emirates Great Britain, the Season 5 Grand Final winner, carried their momentum into Race Day 2 of Season 6’s first event. They closed a seven-point overnight deficit and made the cut for the series final with an emphatic win.
Maybe that was predictable, given the afterguard includes three Olympic gold medalists. The Brits gelled well, forcing the points leader—newcomer Artemis Racing—out of the Final. They achieved this by scoring back-to-back wins in the first two races of the seven-race qualifying series.
The power of the British performance was demonstrated in Race 7, when they were penalised for a pre-start boundary infringement and had to start at the back of the fleet by Mark 1. Artemis Sweden, helmed by America’s Cup winner Nathan Outteridge, had pre-start issues from which they never recovered, finishing last in the race, or rather being just pipped across the line by Mubadala Brazil. The Brits, meanwhile, worked their way through the fleet to finish fourth, after opting for the right-hand side of the course, and lit the afterburner once they found some clear air on Leg 5.
In the final, the Brits were handed the event on a platter after the Australians incurred a pre-start penalty for sailing outside a course boundary and had to be last across the start line. France got to windward of the Brits on the start line, but the afterguard of Dylan Fletcher, Hannah Mills, and Stuart Bithell soon got the established control, edging Quentin Delapierre and friends to windward and into the grip of the relentless Tom Slingsby.
That simple controlling move gave the Brits clear air and plenty of options on Leg 2, allowing them to build a lead, while the other two fought each other for second place, leaving the Brits to get richer.
There was a split finish, with the judges giving the nod to the Bonds Flying Roos for second place. Both the host team and the French were credited with the same delta of 23 seconds behind the winners, Emirates Great Britain.
Quotes from the Boats:
Dylan Fletcher, Skipper/Helmsman, Emirates Great Britain
“It’s been an incredible start for the team here in Perth. We left a lot out there, with plenty still to work on, but I’m really proud of how the team has been chipping away each day. We had a disappointing start yesterday and didn’t get the results we wanted, but we came out firing today, and I’m just stoked.”
“To be honest, I feel on absolute cloud nine. It was an incredible day for it — buzzing to sail these boats in conditions like that. The team did such a good job, and the flight controller was amazing. I’d love to do more racing like that in these F50s — they’re just the best conditions for it. Absolutely amazing.”
“I got quite excited at the start — there was a small opportunity, or what might have been an opportunity, to lock the other boats out — but from there we just focused on our own race. We had the inside line at mark one, so after yesterday it was about staying clean, especially at the bottom gate. We gave away a few metres to sail our own race, and the results came through.”
Hannah Mills, Strategist, Emirates Great Britain
“It’s mega — it’s surreal. Like all the teams, we have so much to learn. Most teams have had a bit of a shake-up coming into this, and obviously we’ve had Stu come on board as wing trimmer, which is a big dynamic shift. We’re just really proud of how the team has come together this week, kept a learning mindset, and then put it into practice when we went racing.”
“Honestly, it was the best day ever — just insane. It doesn’t get much better than that, especially here in Perth. It’s our flight controller’s hometown, and for us to go out there with the Doctor coming in strong, amazing breeze and a bit of chop, it made it tricky to sail the boats but delivered phenomenal racing.”
Tom Slingsby, Skipper/Helmsman, Bonds Flying Roos
“It hurts losing to the British — that’s two event wins in a row on Australian soil. We’ve got the ashes at least, but the sailors will pick up our slack at the next home event. It does hurt, but at the end of the day, I said to my wife on Thursday night when Goobs was injured that if we could get away with a top six, we’d be happy. Here we are with second, and we’re over the moon with that.”
“The hardest part is that Glenn hasn’t sailed in those conditions before. He hasn’t sailed with the 18M wing, T-foils, or any of that, so it’s really about supporting him and helping him through it. Goobs was in the coaching box, sitting there calling different things and bringing us into the start — he did a great job helping out. Glenn’s got tunnel vision, just trying to do his job well, but slowly and surely the blinkers are coming off and he’s seeing more around the racetrack. He did such an amazing job stepping in on a couple of days’ notice and getting a result like that for our team and his country. He’s stoked to be racing for Australia, so it’s an awesome result for us and for him.”
“It was amazing. I don’t know — I think Fremantle should be the final. It caused a bit of chaos and a lot of damage as we head into event two, but I think this would be the best final venue. Imagine doing that three-boat final for a couple of million bucks — I think that’s how we should do it in the future.”
Quentin Delapierre, Skipper/Helmsman, DS Automobiles SailGP Team France
“I’m not pleased, but I am happy. My feeling is that we just handed it to the Brits, and on the starts we know what we missed, so we’ll focus on the next one. It’s an unbelievable start to the season, and we just have to take it as it is.”
“Exactly — it’s so good to start the season with a podium. With the new group of athletes and the new coach, it’s really good for confidence. We’re still working on our processes, but it’s a good start.”
Nathan Outteridge, Skipper/Helmsman, Artemis Sweden
“Fourth is an awesome result. It’s always hard to go from leading to missing the podium on day two. I’m really proud of the team — what a result. If you’d told me four months ago we’d be fighting for the podium and winning races, I would have taken that. It hurts a bit today, especially the way it happened with a terrible start in the last fleet race. But it was a great weekend, and the team did an awesome job.”
“I made a handling error on the first tack in the pre-start. We were pretty low on time to kill, I got too much heel going into it, and popped the rudder out of the water, so we went into H2 out of that tack and ended up late. That’s just a bit of rust here and there. Today was tough conditions to sail the boat in, and we’ve got some work to do in those challenging conditions. Yesterday was easier — that’s natural. It’s hard to let a potential podium slip away, but fourth in the first event is pretty good.”
Taylor Canfield, Skipper/Helmsman, United States
“Yeah, definitely. That was an incredible day — probably one of the hardest days in SailGP history, I’d guess. You’d have to ask the rest of the gang who’ve been here a long time – it was what we expected coming into Fremantle. It wasn’t our best day execution-wise. We’re disappointed for sure, but we made some great strides. It’s not that we weren’t comfortable sailing in those conditions — we just made a few silly errors. It was a long day, but good progress. We definitely have a solid base in the big breeze now, and we’re super pleased with that, as it was one of the areas we wanted to improve.”
“When you’re manoeuvring in those conditions, you never know what you’re going to get on the entry or exit, so keeping all four foils in the water is the name of the game. We had some tough starts and were on the back foot, but we battled back in the races and then had a tough manoeuvre. In the end, it came down to keeping it clean and sailing the boat around the racetrack, and I think the teams that did that today were at the front.”
Giles Scott, Skipper/Helmsman, NorthStar Canada
“Yeah, it doesn’t get much, much harder, like you’re fighting cavitation in the foils at the top end, so the boat probably can’t see it from the footage, but the boat is juddering around like anything at speed. The sea state makes it super, super hard to keep the boat locked in, really, really tricky for the pilots, and of course it’s windy, so there’s always plenty of jeopardy. Yeah, doesn’t it get too much harder than that.”
Phil Robertson, Skipper/Helmsman, Red Bull Italy
“Someone said it once, they said, you’re a rooster one day and a feather duster the next. I think it was actually my boss. So, you know, your seat’s never safe here. You’ve got to perform and you’ve got keep performing. And yeah, you it’s nice to have a bit of run time and lead time, but you got to show progress. And I think today I was really proud of the team and how we handle those conditions. We’re a new squad together. 50% sort of new on the boat, a new strategist and… People in the comms, new coaches. So to come out of a day like today with no injuries and no damage and some good points is, yeah, I’m really proud of how we handled it. So it’s a long season, you’ve got to keep the boat in one piece and keep the crew in one piece and then yeah, you’ve gotta play the game smart and yeah, hopefully we did that here this weekend.”
Nicolai Sehested, Skipper/Helmsman, Rockwool Racing
“Now luckily only crashes with the water and we agreed in the morning that let’s push hard but let’s just only crash in the water not with other boats and we managed to keep that rule today but we definitely sent it I would say above a skill level but you got to find the limit and have something to build on for Auckland so we did that and some of it was okay and a lot of it was under water.”
Erik Heil, Skipper/Helmsman, Germany presented by Deutsche Bank
“But that’s part of it. We did our best to you know to filter the most important stuff out but in the end today was very different back on the small wing lots of good things we we achieved today but there was always a big one in each race so yeah not the best weekend for us.”
Martine Grael, Skipper/Helmswoman, Mubadala Brazil
“I think the level of the play is pretty high and I don’t see like the rest of the plate was having a lot of trouble with the waves. It was quite tough for the boats. I made it for a flat water but it seems like the level is quite high and we still have a lot to get there.”
Grand Final Results
1. Emirates Great Britain
2. Bonds Flying Roos
3. DS Automobiles SailGP Team France
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