Ryan Reynolds scored a vital victory over Hugh Jackman in their head-to-head race in F50 catamarans. That was on Friday during the practice session ahead of the Spain SailGP in Valencia this weekend.
The two Hollywood stars are co-owners of the Bonds Flying Roos, the high-flying Australian team dominating the current SailGP season. For their match race Friday, however, while Jackman was steering the Australian boat alongside regular driver Tom Slingsby, Reynolds joined his fellow Canadians to take the wheel alongside driver Giles Scott. The race will no doubt feature in the Disney+ sports documentary which will profile the progress of the Flying Roos when the series goes online in April.
While Canada gained the upper hand in Friday’s fun race, the outcome was very different in Saturday’s racing proper. With the 13 teams split into Groups A and B, Australia topped Group A while Canada finished last in Group B.
Referring back to the superhero race of Friday, Canada’s Scott told The Athletic: “We managed to win Ryan a nice bet, which is great. Get a little bit of bragging rights against the Aussies there. Unfortunately, it didn’t translate into today, which was a little bit disappointing. I know which win I’d prefer from yesterday or today, but it was great fun to have Ryan on board.”
Hugh Jackman and Ryan Reynolds are co-owners of the BONDS Flying Roos SailGP Team. (Ricardo Pinto / SailGP via Getty Images)
As for Jackman being on the losing boat, Slingsby joked with The Athletic: “He was not happy with us. Hugh made it very well known. Every time we’d split from Canada around the mark, he’s like, ‘How are we doing?’ I go, ‘I don’t know. We’re going to find out here in a minute.’ But Hugh loved it. Anyone new you can show the sport and make them fall in love with it. There’s a video of him, and you screenshot one part, and we said, ‘That’s the moment he fell in love with the sport.’ … I’m glad to create a new fan out there.”
Slingsby, along with SailGP and long-time supporters of the sport, hopes the presence of stars like Jackman and Reynolds will provide the next big light to shine on the little-understood sport of sailing. SailGP is sailing’s best opportunity to emerge from obscurity. Judging by the rousing local reception in Valencia, however, it seems like Spain already understands what the fuss is all about. Valencia, after all, was the city that hosted the 2007 America’s Cup, one of the most fondly remembered editions of the 175-year-old sailing contest. All that action took place far out to sea, though, whereas this weekend’s SailGP action takes place just a stone’s throw from Valencia’s popular Malvarrosa Beach.
Saturday’s racing took place in light airs, challenging all the crews to work hard to keep their delicate F50s foiling above the water. Inevitably, there were long moments when the F50s fell back to the surface, making it a constant battle to keep the boat moving efficiently.
While Australia and Spain won their respective groups, some more surprising names were close behind. Red Bull Italy won the first and third races of the session, although Phil Robertson’s team finished last in the second race. Yet even with such a yo-yo performance, the Italians sit just one point off the Aussie lead in Group A.
Spain dominated the opening race of Group A and was comfortably ahead in the next race. However, in the dying stages of the two-lap course, Denmark managed to stay on the foils longer and close the gap to Los Gallos, who had fallen back to the surface. “That was a tough one,” Spain’s strategist Nicole van der Velden told The Athletic, “because the Danish managed to get foiling a bit more than we thought they would. The only thing we could do there was try to sail the boat as well as we could. We knew we would meet them at the mark, and it would be about who would pop and accelerate as well as possible to the finish line. We focused all efforts on trying to do that as best as we could.”
In a photo-finish, Spain just held off the fast charge of the Danes, although in the third race Nicolai Sehested seized the early initiative. Denmark led around the first mark and all the way across the finish line, their victory sufficient to put the crew in second on the Group B scoreboard.
The biggest shock of the day was to see the usually metronomic and reliable Black Foils from New Zealand finish at the bottom of the Group A scoreboard. Skipper Pete Burling was bemused by their inability to handle the soft breeze. “It’s a condition we really enjoy as a group,” he told The Athletic. “We feel it’s one of our strengths in the light air. Today, with that tricky start box with the back right up against the wall, we didn’t quite manage to take the right options.”
Race management also put a fly in the ointment at the start of the second race of the session when they added an extra minute to the countdown. It caught a few teams off guard, New Zealand included. “We found it super hard in the second race with the really late addition of time,” said Burling. “We were about 1:30 minutes to start and then a minute [of extra time] got added. We struggled to get back into position.”
Robertson echoed Burling’s disgruntlement, also suffering in the confusion of the Race 2 start.
“We got pretty stitched up in that start,” Italy’s driver told The Athletic. “I’m a bit disappointed in the race management and how they conducted that second start for both fleets. They changed the timing as everyone was approaching their entry, and then they added another minute.
“It throws you completely out of position. We ended up in the worst position possible, and I think we were probably 20 seconds late for the gun in the end. We could have managed it better, but it’s disappointing to have a change so late when they can foresee that. We’ll give them a lot of feedback on that. Hopefully, it doesn’t happen again.”
Such is the ever-changing landscape of SailGP. All the sailors know they have to take the rough with the smooth. But going into Sunday, Robertson and Sehested will take heart from another light-wind forecast, the tricky conditions in which Italy and Denmark seem to excel. It gives them a genuine opportunity to challenge the unrelenting dominance of Australia and Spain.