Tom Slingsby's Bonds Flying Roos have won the ROCKWOOL Germany Sail Grand Prix, capping a weekend on the Baltic that produced an all-time SailGP speed record, a home win for the German team, and late collapses from the two teams that led their groups going into Sunday's deciders. Australia didn't win a single fleet race across the whole event but won the final, the only race that mattered.
Saturday: a new fastest boat in the world
Six fleet races across two groups opened the weekend on Saturday, and the story of the day was set in the very last race. DS Team France hit 107.63km/h rounding the first mark of Group A's third race, breaking the 103.93km/h record Rockwool Denmark had held since setting it at this same venue in 2025. They didn't turn that speed into a win in that race; Los Gallos Spain recovered from an early penalty to win the race itself, France came in second. Coming out of the first day of racing, the NZ Black Foils topped Group A outright on 12 points, their best day since February's Auckland collision, with France second on 11.
Group B told a different story. On Saturday, the Bonds Flying Roos won the first two races in dominant fashion, Emirates GBR clawing back from fourth to second in the second of them while NorthStar Canada faded to last. Then, in the final race, Germany won at home in front of their own crowd, and Australia's perfect day ended with a foul on Emirates GBR in the run to the line that dropped them to last. Australia still led Group B overnight on 10 points, with Artemis Sweden second on 9.
Sunday morning: Germany go back-to-back, New Zealand punch their ticket
On Sunday, racing resumed in heavy rain and gusty, patchy conditions that would define the whole day. In Group B, Germany won again, coming from last to first through a wind shift nobody else on the course found, while Australia sailed into a dead patch and were becalmed to fifth. That result locked Group B into a genuine four-way race at the top: Artemis Sweden and NorthStar Canada on 12 points, Germany and Australia on 11.
In Group A, Black Foils NZ led every mark of their race to secure their place in Sunday's final outright, a total nobody else in the group would catch. That left the second qualifying spot as a straight fight between DS Team France, who led on points, and Los Gallos Spain.
Sunday afternoon: both group leaders fall
Group B's deciding fleet race settled the four-way race to the final. NorthStar Canada won the race, and Bonds Flying Roos' second place was enough to leapfrog them into the final ahead of both Artemis Sweden and a German team that had just won back-to-back. Canada finished the group stage on 17 points, Australia on 15, Sweden on 14 and Germany on 12.
Group A's decider was the bigger shock. France arrived three points clear of Spain and needing only to beat them. Instead, Los Gallos Spain won the race outright, while France spent the entire race pinned behind Black Foils NZ with no lane to pass, made a heavy error late, and finished second-to-last. New Zealand ended the group stage convincingly on 19 points, Spain through in second on 16, and France missed the final by two points after setting the weekend's headline moment less than 24 hours earlier.
The final: Australia beat the wind
Sunday's four-boat, winner-takes-all final came down to timing as much as boat speed. Tom Slingsby's Bonds Flying Roos led from the start and crossed the finish line just as the breeze died completely, leaving NorthStar Canada, Los Gallos Spain and Black Foils NZ to finish the race off the foils in a tight group, in a genuine drift, hunting for patches of pressure on the water. In the end, in almost slow motion, Canada held second 'comfortably'. New Zealand and Spain arrived at the line together, overlapped at a boundary crossing where New Zealand were judged not to have given Spain enough room. The penalty dropped New Zealand to fourth and promoted Spain to third, even though New Zealand's raw crossing time was marginally the quicker of the two.
It capped an extraordinary weekend for Australia. They led Group B for most of Saturday, fouled their way to last in one race, were becalmed to fifth in another, and needed a strong final-race result just to scrape into the final. They then won the one race of the weekend that was worth the most: their first victory since New York earlier this season, $400,000 of the event's prize pool, and 10 championship points that take them to 76 for the season with four events left.
Final Sassnitz standings
Group A: Black Foils NZ 19, Los Gallos Spain 16, DS Team France 14, Rockwool Denmark 10, Switzerland 9, Red Bull Italy 7, Mubadala Brazil 0.
Group B: NorthStar Canada 17, Bonds Flying Roos 15, Artemis Sweden 14, Germany SailGP Team 12, Emirates GBR 9, US SailGP Team 8.
Event final: 1st Bonds Flying Roos (Australia), 2nd NorthStar Canada, 3rd Los Gallos Spain, 4th Black Foils NZ.
DS Team France leave Sassnitz still holding the outright SailGP speed record, even without a podium finish to show for the weekend. SailGP's next stop is Valencia, Spain, on 5-6 September.
