SailGP: Peter Burling vents frustration as New Zealand SailGP Team awarded fifth place for event they can’t compete in

An equipment malfunction left the New Zealand SailGP team unable to compete in this weekend’s event in Italy. Now, a league decision on their scoring has left the team with mixed feelings.

The New Zealand team will be awarded fifth place for the Italian SailGP stop, picking up six event points, after being unable to compete because the league did not have spare parts readily available for their league-supplied equipment.

At the previous regatta, at Saint-Tropez in France this month, the New Zealand team’s 29m wing sail imploded following the first day’s racing after going out of alignment, collapsing on top of the sailors onboard. There was no spare sail on-site and the team had to pull out of the regatta with no redress to make up points they missed out on by not being able to take part in the second day.

While the league’s decision to award them fifth place for this weekend is a better outcome than the eighth-place finish they had to settle for when the incident occurred, co-chief executive and driver Peter Burling wasn’t completely satisfied with the outcome.

“It’s frustrating that, in this instance, organisers haven’t considered our performance in Chicago, Los Angeles and on day one in Saint-Tropez,” Burling said. “It means that on top of a bad result in Saint-Tropez because we weren’t able to compete on day two, we’re also now carrying a fifth heading into Cadiz and the rest of the season.

“At the same time, we’re ready to accept it and move on. This is what’s been decided - it’s good to get something and have provisions in place if this were to happen again.”

The New Zealanders got off to a perfect start to the season, winning the opening regatta in Chicago, before struggling to a seventh-placed finish in Los Angeles. At Saint-Tropez they were in contention for a spot in the podium race with 21 points from the first three races before being ruled out of the weekend.

Now after a missed opportunity in France and a mid-table finish in Italy, they will be well and truly chasing the top teams when they are able to return to the water – which should be at the next event in Cadiz, Spain, in mid-October.

However, once the wing sail arrives from the SailGP workshop in New Zealand, it will require extensive setup and testing on-site to ensure the Kiwi boat is fully ready to race.

The situation did force SailGP to revisit and reconsider its rules around redress for teams who have been left unable to compete due to equipment failures and a lack of spare parts required for the team to return to action. After consulting with race management and chief executives of all 10 teams, the league has ruled that up to six points (fifth place) can now be awarded by the class authority for each of the events missed in that situation.