Burling and Black Foils lock in Halifax final spot with back-to-back silvers on return

Four months away from competition is a long time in professional sailing. For Peter Burling and the Black Foils, that wait came to an end in Halifax Harbour on a grey, near-windless Saturday that demanded patience long before it rewarded it. By the close of racing, the team had secured back-to-back podiums and booked their place in Sunday's final, leaving no doubt that the extended break had cost them nothing in terms of sharpness.

Good SailGP racing tends to require either strong breeze or dramatic chaos. Halifax's opening day offered precious little of either. A rain cell passed through the harbour shortly before the first start, taking most of the usable wind with it. What remained was patchy, shifting, and deeply uncooperative, flickering beneath the city skyline while crews constantly adjusted their setups just to keep the foiling machines airborne. The racing that followed was long, sometimes tedious, and a genuine test of composure.

The day's format was already out of the ordinary before the conditions complicated things further. Race management, factoring in both the forecast and the particular constraints of Halifax Harbour, elected to divide the 13-boat fleet into two separate groups for the weekend. Group A brought together Australia, France, Spain, Denmark, New Zealand, Canada, and Brazil. Group B comprised Britain, USA, Switzerland, Germany, Italy, and Sweden's Artemis. The two groups would race independently of one another, with Sunday's decider expanded to a four-team final rather than the usual three-boat format, drawing the top two finishers from each group. It was an arrangement the series hadn't used before.

The difficulties of the day were made plain early in Group A's racing. Tom Slingsby and the Bonds Flying Roos had led throughout their opening race and were approaching the finish line when the nine-minute time limit expired with them just two or three seconds from crossing. Under the rules, no race result stands in that situation. Officials scrubbed the contest entirely and scheduled a redo for later in the day, sending Group B, who had been readying for their own start, back to wait.

The redo suited Slingsby's crew well. Australia won it, then went on to win Group A's second counting race too, closing out the day at the top of the standings with 10 points.

For New Zealand followers, the real storyline was the Black Foils' return. The team had been absent from competition since the Auckland collision nearly four months earlier, and bringing three damaged SailGP boats back to race-ready condition before Halifax had required an enormous effort from the shore team. When racing finally started, there was nothing about the Black Foils' performance to suggest they'd been away.

In the Group A redo, Burling's crew ran in close company with the Australians for much of the race, eventually settling into second. A tactical call at the bottom gate closed off their best opportunity to challenge for the lead, but second place was a measured and composed result for a team returning after months off the water. Race 2 unfolded in almost the same way. A tight upwind contest with Australia came down to reading the final wind shift correctly, and New Zealand came up fractionally short, finishing second again. Two races completed, two podiums recorded, and their place in Sunday's final confirmed as Group A's runner-up.

Burling was open about what the day meant. "It's awesome to be back and to have successfully made it through our first day of racing for the season. They were tricky conditions to return in but it was also exciting as a group to be back racing and to have put ourselves in a position for a crack at making the final tomorrow."

He reflected on the racing itself as well. "We had a good battle with the Australians in our last race and it's great to be in the heat of the battle again. Conditions like we had today can create those tight finishes. It's tough out there and even more so when you've had four months away. We will review as we always do tonight and be ready to go again tomorrow."

The Black Foils were not the only team with a significant return to mark. DS Automobiles France brought strategist Manon Audinet back aboard for the first time since she was hurt in the Auckland incident that also sidelined New Zealand. Returning to the physical demands of SailGP racing after an injury layoff is rarely straightforward, yet Audinet stepped straight back into her role and France finished third in Race 2.

Group B delivered some of the day's more engaging moments despite the same frustrating conditions. Switzerland's Sebastien Schneiter took Race 1 by gambling on a move to find pressure well away from the rest of the fleet, then added a third place in Race 2. The group's standout performance came from Artemis. Competing under the Swedish flag and skippered by Emirates Team New Zealand's Nathan Outteridge, the team also features Kerikeri pair Andy Maloney and Brad Farrand. Artemis topped Group B on 9 points after posting a second and a first, with their Race 2 victory coming in the tightest finish of the entire day. Outteridge crossed the line ahead of Britain's Dylan Fletcher by under two seconds. Further down the Group B order, Phil Robertson, the New Zealand-born two-time match race world champion racing for Red Bull Italy, endured a quieter day than he would have hoped for.

Before Sunday's racing gets underway, the scheduled third fleet race for each group has been dropped from the programme after the weather failed to produce conditions suitable for running it. Each group will now complete one remaining qualifying race before the four-team final. After day one, the Bonds Flying Roos lead Group A and Artemis top Group B, with the Black Foils and Explora Journeys Swiss also through to the decider. Within the wider standings, the margins remain tight across the middle of both groups, with just a single point separating the Black Foils in fourth from Los Gallos in fifth.

Day one in Halifax was short on spectacle. The wind never delivered what the racing needed, one race had to be repeated before it could count, and there were stretches where the fleet went nowhere particularly compelling. Even so, between the Black Foils' return from a four-month absence and an Outteridge-led crew with strong New Zealand connections heading the other half of the fleet, there was more than enough reason for New Zealand sailing fans to stay tuned.