For a brief stretch on the afternoon of 3 May 2026, the 61st Congressional Cup looked to be heading toward predictable conclusions. Both semi-finals at Long Beach Yacht Club had their early leaders firmly in control. By the time racing was done, each of those leaders had been beaten, and the day at Belmont Pier had delivered one of the more remarkable afternoons in recent Congressional Cup history.
The bigger shock, measured purely in qualifying form, came in Semi-Final 2. Chris Poole had been almost untouchable through the double round robin, posting a 17-1 record that put him well clear of the field. That solitary defeat had come at the hands of Johnie Berntsson, the only blemish on a qualifying campaign that made Poole the overwhelming favourite to reach the final. He carried that authority into the semi, winning the first two races against Cole Tapper and his Kairos Racing crew to move 2-0 ahead.
What followed was a complete reversal. Tapper's team won three races in succession, eliminating the round-robin leader 3-2 and earning a place in the Congressional Cup final. The scale of that comeback is sharpened by where these two skippers had stood after qualifying. Tapper had finished fourth on a 10-8 record, while Poole had dropped just a single race across eighteen starts. That Tapper could claw back from 2-0 down against the competition's dominant qualifier made it a result few would have anticipated.
Semi-Final 1 produced a near-identical script. Berntsson had moved to a 2-0 lead against Switzerland's Eric Monnin, and the path to the final appeared straightforward. Monnin is the defending champion, and he responded in precisely the same fashion as Tapper had in the adjacent semi. Three consecutive victories sealed the match 3-2, and Monnin booked his place in the final alongside Tapper.
The fact that both semi-final leaders surrendered commanding advantages on the same afternoon made it a genuinely extraordinary day. Poole and Berntsson, who had each looked destined for the final at the halfway point of their respective matches, will now meet in the petit-final instead.
Both the Congressional Cup final and the petit-final are to be sailed at Belmont Pier, where entry to the Congressional Cup Stadium remains free for spectators.
Semi-final results — 61st Congressional Cup
Long Beach Yacht Club • May 3, 2026
Semi-Final 1
| Sailor | R1 | R2 | R3 | R4 | R5 | W |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Eric Monnin SUI | 0 | 0 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 3 |
| Johnie Berntsson SWE | 1 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 2 |
Semi-Final 2
| Sailor | R1 | R2 | R3 | R4 | R5 | W |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Cole Tapper AUS | 0 | 0 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 3 |
| Chris Poole USA | 1 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 2 |
