Lawrence “Larry” Ellison is chairman, chief technology officer and co-founder of software giant Oracle. He gave up the Oracle CEO role in 2014 after 37 years at the helm which earned him a fortune a little north of 100 billion dollars.
Larry is also an avid sailor and a backer of the Oracle Team USA, a yacht racing syndicate formed to compete in the America’s Cup.
Larry’s latest sailboat venture, SailGP is designed to rival the America’s Cup. SailGP is the brainchild of Larry and prominent New Zealand yachtsman Sir Russell Coutts, a multiple world champion, Olympic gold medalist and five-times America’s Cup winner.
SailGP events take place all over the world in multiple iconic venues and in all kinds of weather conditions.
This means the racecourse is always changing, sometimes even multiple times at the same event if the conditions dictate.
This may at times appear confusing, but the fundamentals of a SailGP racecourse remain the same regardless of the actual course layout.
All teams race the same type of boat, a high-performance, fully-foiling, F50 catamaran. The boats are based on several of the AC50 cats that took part in the 35th America’s Cup in Bermuda, but have been updated and equalised at Core Boatbuilders in New Zealand.
The specs for the F50 are a height of 24 metres (78 feet 9 inches), a length of 15 metres (49 feet 3 inches), a width of 8.8 metres (28 feet 11 inches) and they weigh 2800 kilograms with speeds topping 53 knots (61 miles per hour).
The teams race with five sailors on board with the option to swap out one sailor during a race day.
Crew roles are Helmsman, responsible for steering, boat speed, and boat on boat decisions. The Wing Trimmer controls the setup of the wing sail for maximum speed. The Flight Controller is responsible for the flight of the boat, and the two Grinders who provide the power for sail trim purposes.
Racing is intended to be on windward (upwind) and leeward (downwind) courses, with the final course to be sailed designated by the race committee no later than five minutes before the starting signal.
One of the most intense parts of a SailGP race is right at the start, as the first leg takes the boats on one of the fastest points in sailing, a reach, to the first mark, or the speed mark.
From there, the boats begin heading to the leeward gate at the bottom of the course, and once a boat has passed through it starts heading upwind to the windward gate at the top of the course. The boats repeat the journey until the designated number of laps have been completed, before heading to the finish line.
There is no standing start in SailGP, all races begin with the entire fleet moving. Various signals are communicated to the boats during the starting procedure, with the entire fleet required to be inside the starting area at a set time. The fleet will then start moving towards the start line as the clock counts down to the starting signal.
Boats may cross the start line any time after the starting signal has been sounded to begin the reach for the first mark.
If a boat has crossed the start line before the starting signal, it is declared OCS (on course side) and penalised.
Six teams competed in the 2019 inaugural season of SailGP, Australia, China, France, Great Britain, Japan & the United States. The racing calendar ran from February to September, visiting Sydney, San Francisco, New York, Cowes & Marseille.
Points were awarded per race, with 10 points for the winner, 9 points for second place, 8 points for third, and so on.
Each event hosted multiple races, with the two highest-scoring teams after each round facing off one-on-one. The winner of that final race won the event. The two highest-scoring teams at the end of the season competed in Marseille with the winning team awarded the championship.
Australia took command of the season, winning in Sydney, San Francisco, Cowes & Marseille, and coming in second in New York. Japan came in second, overall.
In Season 2, SailGP saw big increases in viewers, attendees, online followers and athletes. On the water, the league grew from 6 to 8 teams and held 8 events, up from 5 in Season 1. SailGP also continued its push for greater diversity in global sport with 15 female athletes involved in competitive racing in Season 2, thanks to the Women’s Pathway Program, a new initiative for the season.
Fans clearly liked what they saw on the water, with broadcast and digital audiences experiencing exceptional growth. SailGP’s total broadcast audience saw an increase of 220% to 823.4 million viewers, with the dedicated broadcast audience of 39.2 million representing a 131% increase on Season 1. Over 700 broadcast hours were enjoyed per event in over 186 territories, as the league was seen by more fans than ever before around the world. At the same time, media coverage of the league greatly increased, with 23,943 press articles written about SailGP, an increase of 246% from Season 1.
On-site, 144,522 fans attended a SailGP event, an achievement made all the more extraordinary given it was a season heavily disrupted and restricted in terms of in-person attendance by COVID.
SailGP was once again supported by the Oracle Cloud and stream analytics system, which processed and delivered 30,000 data points every second from each F50 catamaran competing in a SailGP race. Oracle delivered about 80 billion data points to the cloud during Season 2.
SailGP’s rapid global expansion continued with the addition of Singapore to its Season 3 calendar, as the iconic city-state plays host to Asia’s first Sail Grand Prix on January 14-15, 2023. In the first event of a three-year deal, the ten teams competing in Season 3 – including new franchises Canada and Switzerland and returning nations Australia, Denmark, France, Great Britain, Japan, New Zealand, Spain and the United States – will race at Parkland Green in the picturesque East Coast Park in the eighth event on the calendar.
The Singapore event will join the nine countries that have already been announced for Season 3. Race 1 of Season 3 kicked off in Bermuda on 14-15 May. Two-time SailGP Champions Australia got their title defence off to the perfect start at the opening event, picking up maximum points. An excellent Race Day 2 showing by Tom Slingsby’s side secured them a place in the three-team winner-takes-all Final, in which Great Britain and Canada were defeated, moving the Aussies to a top of the Season Championship with an excellent 10 points to kick off their campaign.
Next up, the ten-nation fleet will head to Chicago, Plymouth, Copenhagen, Saint-Tropez, Cádiz and Dubai, ahead of Singapore, making it the biggest SailGP season to date.
After Singapore, the league will head to Christchurch, New Zealand and will conclude with the Season 3 Grand Final taking place at San Francisco Bay in May 2023. One further event is expected to be announced to complete SailGP Season 3.
According to SailGP CEO Sir Russell Coutts, “From our inception, we have made it clear that our ambition is to be a truly global championship, with some of the world’s most iconic waterfront cities as our backdrop. With the confirmation of our first Asian Grand Prix, the addition of Singapore to the line-up and Season 3 now spanning four continents, our vision is becoming a reality.”
One of the casualties from the new teams joining the league is Nathan Outteridge’s Japan team. Runner-up in both Season 1 and 2, Outteridge finds himself without a boat for the start of the season with only nine boats available, due to a series of external factors that has meant the tenth boat cannot be completed in time. In order for Canada to enter the league, the Japan SailGP Team will sit out the first events of the season. SailGP is working hard to get boat 10 completed and it is expected to be ready to race from the fourth event in Copenhagen allowing for shipping, structural testing and sea trials. The difficult decision – after much deliberation – was made based on logistical and commercial considerations.
New teams will have to get to grips quickly with the high-speed, hydro-foiling F50s. True to its ethos of innovation, all F50s have been fitted with upgrades for Season 3 – designed to increase speed and stability around the racecourse, which will likely see the F50 beat its current top racing speed of 98.3 kph.
For details on how to watch around the globe and buy tickets, visit SailGP.com.
SailGP Season 3 Schedule // 2022-2023
Year 2022:
May 14-15 Bermuda Sail Grand Prix presented by Hamilton Princess
June 18-19 United States Sail Grand Prix | Chicago at Navy Pier
July 30-31 Great Britain Sail Grand Prix | Plymouth
August 19-20 ROCKWOOL Denmark Sail Grand Prix | Copenhagen
September 10-11 France Sail Grand Prix | Saint-Tropez
September 24-25 Spain Sail Grand Prix | Andalucía – Cádiz
November 12-13 Dubai Sail Grand Prix presented by P&O Marinas
Year 2023*:
January 14-15 Singapore Sail Grand Prix
March 18-19 New Zealand Sail Grand Prix | Christchurch
May 6-7 United States Sail Grand Prix | San Francisco
Season 3 Grand Final
*One further event is expected to be announced to complete SailGP Season 3.