SailGP Perth: Black Foils crash with Switzerland, forced out of opening day with damaged boat

The Black Foils collided with Switzerland on leg two of the first race in SailGP season six. Photo / SailGP

By Christopher Reive in Perth

With a new season comes new possibilities. A blank slate for teams to write a whole new story.

But an opening chapter doesn’t start much worse than the way the Black Foils began season six of SailGP.

The Kiwis completed fewer than two legs in the campaign’s opening regatta in Perth this weekend, a collision with the Swiss ending their day early in race one.

Switzerland had the right of way on after turning back to set themselves up for a right-hand turn at the top gate as the Black Foils were setting up for a left-hand turn at 60km/h. While they crossed in front of the Swiss, the Black Foils didn’t have enough room and Switzerland collided with the back of the Kiwi crew’s F50 catamaran.

The collision left some debris from the boats in the water and neither team were able to continue on the opening day of racing.

While the Swiss confirmed they would be back for day two, the Black Foils would not be.

“It’ll definitely be our weekend done in that boat and then we’ll just have to see what the plan is going forward,” Black Foils driver Peter Burling said.

“I mean, the whole transom’s gone off the yacht, so it’s definitely not the ideal situation, but we’ll have to just see what the plan is from here.”

With the umpires deeming the Black Foils to be in the wrong, the Kiwi crew launched a protest over that decision and were set to plead their case.

Should they still be found to be at fault, they would be docked penalty points in the season standings and begin their campaign in the negatives.

“We did everything we could to match the turn rate and then they’ve just taken off our transom. So, still blown away to be honest that the umpires think we’re at fault for the incident,” Burling said.

“I’m not quite sure what else we could have done, but yeah, pretty shaken up considering they went through our transom not too far away from where I was. Yeah, [we] have to review and go forward from there.”

Swiss driver Sebastian Schneiter believed his team had made their turn with enough time for the Kiwis to react.

“We were sailing on starboard for about three seconds until we met the Kiwis and somehow they didn’t have time to either duck us or avoid us,” he said.

“It should have been possible for them but I guess they had a little issue on board. It’s a bit frustrating for us to lose the day, but we’ll come back firing tomorrow.”

The incident meant the fleet was further reduced to 10 boats. Some 13 teams were set to begin their campaigns this weekend before Spain damaged their boat in practice earlier in the week.

SailGP newcomers Artemis Sweden led the fleet after the opening day of sailing, with Nathan Outteridge leading his team to two race wins, a second and a ninth to sit on 31 points.

They were joined on 31 points by France and the United States, with Australia and Great Britain leading the chasing pack on 24 points each.

Christopher Reive joined the Herald sports team in 2017, bringing the same versatility to his coverage as he does to his sports viewing habits.