Australia's BONDS Flying Roos arrive at Lake Geneva carrying a point to prove as SailGP makes its first-ever appearance on one of Europe's most celebrated stretches of water. A fifth-place finish in France, where storms reduced the event to a single day of racing, left skipper Tom Slingsby and his crew frustrated and slipped them to third on the overall leaderboard, behind the Black Foils (NZL) and the French team.
For Slingsby, a skipper who has guided his side to three titles in four SailGP seasons, fifth place is simply not an acceptable benchmark. He was candid about it at the pre-race press conference ahead of the Rolex Switzerland Sail Grand Prix. "Our team is in a good position if we're calling a fifth place a bad event. We made some mistakes and we paid for it. We're going to rectify those problems and hopefully get back into the top three here."
The compressed schedule between France and Geneva has, if anything, worked in the Australians' favour mentally. Rather than spending weeks replaying a disappointing result, the team has had little choice but to move on quickly. "I think it's nice having a quick turnaround after not such a great event," Slingsby said. "You have less time to dwell on it all."
Despite the France result, Slingsby was clear that the team has not lost confidence in its ability to reach the podium race. "We all wanted to race, especially us having not had our best first day, but we're still in the hunt. If we do what we know we can then we'll make that final."
Geneva's conditions are expected to place a premium on adaptability, a quality the BONDS Flying Roos have shown throughout their time as the competition's standard-bearers. The Swiss debut adds a layer of novelty to an already high-pressure weekend, with SailGP's fleet taking to the water in a setting that has never previously hosted the series.
Slingsby's tone heading into the event was focused rather than rattled. One difficult event, he made clear, does not rewrite the story of a team that knows how to win.
