Is the “Formula One of Sailing” Actually Fun?
Attending SailGP’s New York Grand Prix felt like being in an episode of Succession.
The high-tea confections are melting in the afternoon heat, squishing between manicured fingers. “Ew,” my friend Olivia squeals, failing to dislodge a disintegrating chocolate cookie from the tiered display. The posh spread comes courtesy of the Plaza Hotel. Only the finest are being rolled out for today’s VIP spectators, company men from Deutsche Bank, Rolex, and the like who’ve emerged from their skyscraping fortresses for today’s race. Wearing big leisurely smiles and polos, they admire the carbon-fiber boats zipping across New York Harbor, perhaps calculating how many Champagne flutes there are left to drain before they can start discussing business. Beautiful women bob around in sun hats, designer sunglasses, and flowy patterned dresses. Everyone here has wonderful teeth.
Occupying the middle of the lounge, right in front of the TAO sushi buffet, data analysts in humungous headphones lock into their computer displays, tracking wind patterns, watercraft speeds, and real-time video footage on multiple monitors. In front of them, a booming Australian announcer whips up excitement for in-person observers and YouTube-streaming posterity. It’s Sunday on Governors Island and the second day of the Mubadala New York Grand Sail Prix, the penultimate showdown of SailGP’s fourth season. Hence why the Big Apple’s financiers—and a few normies in the bleachers—have come out to play.
Founded in 2018 by Oracle CEO Larry Ellison and champion yachtsman Russell Coults, SailGP is a high-speed global competition with the objective of modernizing and popularizing sailing. The organization wants to prove that the water sport is for everyone, not just trust-fund New Englanders in deck shorts. So it has devised its own “Formula One for sailing.” As the pitch goes, though the America’s Cup already exists, that dinosaur competition is held irregularly every few years between only two teams. SailGP has monthly races, mixed-gender squads, an eco-friendly mission, and celebrity investors like Issa Rae. It has also devoted social media and broadcast crews pumping out digital-first content, including a high-intensity docuseries that’s their own Drive to Survive, sans Netflix deal. “We’re in this huge growth phase,” says Fiona Morgan, SailGP’s chief purpose officer, who has recently returned from Cannes Lions. “We’re doing some crazy creative campaigns. We want to win an award.” As part of their evangelization effort, they’re giving several reporters, including myself, the first-class, finance-bro experience.
A camera crew circles around an important-looking foursome with a prime seaside table. “I feel like I’m in an episode of Succession,” whispers Olivia, just as a server presents us with a platter of coiled vegetables. “Zucchini crudo?” he inquires. Just outside of the shaded lounge, the sun beats down on the champagne-less plebeians crowded behind a chain-link fence. (As one of them, a recent acquaintance, will inform me later: “It sucked.”)
The disparity seems at odds with SailGP’s intention of pitching sailing to the masses, which in and of itself is not a bad idea. Sporting fever has swept New York City, and possibly the rest of the United States. Suddenly, the activity du jour is watching the New York Liberty; all of my friends are schlepping to Cyclones games. I’ve been invited to kickball leagues, boxing matches, monster truck-rally birthday celebrations, and field days in Prospect Park. Why not boating races? Anything to disrupt the monotony of endless bar hangs. At the same time, accessible sailing opportunities for relative newbies have never seemed more abundant, whether they’re with the Communist Luxury Yacht Club or The American Small Craft Association or the aptly-named Free Sailing School. Last Wednesday, in preparation for SailGP, I practiced steering a 17-foot oyster-fishing vessel with some fellow novices in the Rockaways. We were cruising at about three miles-per-hour; our instructor, a scruffy guy named Sam, boasted that the SailGP catamarans could go up to 60.
Which is to say that I was pretty much sold on SailGP before I arrived at Governors Island. I had scrolled through the epic fail TikToks they’d had posted of vessels capsizing; I knew that the Australians were the reigning champions and the Kiwis were currently in the lead. Days before the competition, I had searched for civilian SailGP enthusiasts on Twitter but couldn’t really locate any, except an amateur botanist-ornithologist who didn’t respond to my DMs. Still, I was optimistic, which is why was disappointed to discover—maybe naively, given that the dress code stipulated “business casual”—that the event felt so stuffy. “How did you find out about SailGP?” I ask the person next to me, a well-groomed Asian man who’d just been vociferously pitched by a SailGP spokesperson. “Oh,” he replies, “one of my buddies founded it.”
After downing some seltzer, Olivia and I exit the lounge, desperate to find anyone not here for networking or affiliated with the organization. We briefly stop by a SailGP boat simulation station and chat with the eager young attendant overseeing sign-up. “What is Mubadala?” Olivia asks, pointing at the sign next to him. He hazards a response. “They are the sponsor of this competition and promote sustainability and accessibility in racing and stuff.” “But what do they do?” Olivia presses. He pauses and shrugs. “Promote sustainability?”
Well okay. Next to the station, I finally spot the rare attendee not dressed for vacation on the Amalfi Coast. She’s a queer 20-something woman in a pink “I Got My Lobotomy at Toyotathon” cropped baby-tee, and she’s here because, quote her fiancée, “we just thought it seemed like a vibe.” The fiancée works for Morgan Stanley; she’d heard about SailGP from a neighbor in their apartment in the Financial District.
An announcer cuts our conversation short, yelling that the race is about to begin. Olivia types on their phone and busts out laughing: “Mubadala is a state-owned global investment management holding company that acts as one of the sovereign wealth funds of the government of Abu Dhabi,” they read aloud.
Each of SailGP’s 10 teams speed on identical F50s, mighty basketball court-length vessels that hover above the water on hydrofoils, resembling a fighter jet more than your average racing yacht. The sail, a giant vertical wing, juts out between mesh netting that teams scamper across mid-race to reach the other side of the hull. (If you’ve watched Christopher Nolan’s Tenant, you’ve already seen the F50s.) Counting down the seconds, the boats advance toward the starting line, each team paging the data analysts for real-time weather information and steeling themselves for steep turns. Off they go. The course is sharp and angular, not straight, increasing the risk of collision.
But no crashes happen; really, nothing exciting at all. Despite my proximity to the action or the unflagging enthusiasm of commentators, the whole thing has the emotional stakes of watching toys floating in bathwater. The twisty path, whose contours aren’t outlined to live spectators, diminish the innate satisfaction of watching fast things go zoom; it isn’t quite evident who is in the lead. So everyone’s eyes stay glued to the flat-screen TV monitors, which sync graphics with commentary and give at least some sense of what is going on. Even then, we are unable to hear teammates talking to each other or see their worried faces. What risks are they taking? Which squads are the rascals, the alphas, the underdogs? The race ends in about 15 minutes. “Well, that was kind of underwhelming,” Olivia says. I agree. Everything seemed more engaging in the docuseries.
We reunite with “Lobotomy at Toyotathon” and her friends, who all seem puzzled. “I have no idea who won,” she says. Her fiancé chimes in, “We just got here and it’s already over?” Technically, there are more rounds, but they pass by as if they barely happened. New Zealand, Spain, and Australia conclude in the top three; everyone exits the park. Olivia and I approach a SailGP staffer for directions to a Governor’s Island landmark, having seen signs for New York’s longest slide on our way to the event. “Shit, I want to know where that is,” she says to us, sounding infinitely more excited in this moment than we were the past two hours.