Lake Geneva plays host to SailGP this weekend, and the fleet arrives with more questions than answers than it has in months.
Brazil's campaign has been thrown into chaos just days out from racing. Driver Martine Grael has departed suddenly, leaving her strategist Paul Goodison to step into the hot seat. Former team strategist Kahena Kunze has rejoined the outfit at the same time.
Goodison isn't a stranger to the role. He filled in for Grael earlier this season in Halifax. Whether he can do it again, this time with the departure permanent, is the question hanging over the Brazilian boat.
Germany by Deutsche Bank will fancy their chances of a repeat. Erik Kosegarten-Heil's team won last year's Geneva event, SailGP's debut stop in Switzerland, beating home favourites Explora Journeys Swiss and repeat champions the Bonds Flying Roos in the process. It was a breakthrough result for the German outfit.
Since then, form has been patchy. Aside from a third-place finish in Bermuda, results have mostly come from the back of the fleet. Geneva will show whether last year's win was a turning point or a one-off.
The United States arrive without a driver. Taylor Canfield is injured, and so is his reserve, Henry Melges, leaving the American boat needing a late replacement at precisely the moment they can least afford one.
The team sits third on the season leaderboard after their win in Valencia, just a point ahead of Artemis in fourth, with only three events left before the Championship-deciding Grand Final. Pressure doesn't come much heavier than that.
Conditions may not help. SailGP meteorologist Chris Bedford is forecasting a light-wind event, the kind that traditionally favours the United States, ROCKWOOL Racing and Mubadala Brazil. It's awkward timing, given the Americans have no one to put behind the wheel and Brazil are adjusting to Goodison mid-race. Light air has a habit of levelling out a fleet, though, and Geneva may prove no exception.
Then there's the Swiss. No team has won on home water since New Zealand did it in Auckland three seasons ago. Explora Journeys Swiss came agonisingly close last year, topping the fleet racing and reaching the event final, before finishing third behind winners Germany by Deutsche Bank and the Bonds Flying Roos.
Swiss driver Sebastien Schneiter says a home win would be "amazing" but knows the pressure cuts both ways. "It can easily go the other way, where you feel a bit paralyzed and scared of all that extra attention and pressure."
The Rolex Switzerland Sail Grand Prix runs 19 and 20 September on Lake Geneva, with the fleet's frontrunners as unsettled as the forecast.
