Martin Wrigley and Bettine Harris are the 2026 470 World Champions, winning in Enoshima, Japan despite a tough start to the week. Germany's Theresa Löffler and Christopher Hoerr took silver, with defending champions Jordi Xammar and Marta Cardona of Spain claiming bronze.
The Medal Races ran in barely a breath of wind, first gun at 9am after equipment checks. Local pair Tetsuya Isozaki and Yurie Seki won the opening race to keep their medal hopes alive. Wrigley and Harris finished seventh. Their points buffer from earlier in the week held firm.
The second race settled it.
Wrigley and Harris led from the first upwind leg and were never seriously threatened. Behind them, the fight for silver and bronze went to the wire, with Afrodite Zegers De Kleine and George Kavvas also in the mix. The Germans had taken a penalty at the start and were forced into risk-taking, dropping to the back before hauling through to second on the final lap. The Spaniards crossed ninth. That was enough for Germany.
For Harris, the venue carried obvious weight. Enoshima was host to the Tokyo Olympic regatta, and standing on the medal dock there had a particular texture to it. "It's so surreal after we had such a tough start. I mean, I don't even know what to say. It's unbelievable. And I think it's especially special being here in Enoshima, where obviously Tokyo Games weren't that long ago. It feels like the home of the 470. Like, we've had so many boats here." She added: "Biggest world since it went mixed. And I just, I'm so unbelievably happy. I'm proud of Martin. I'm proud of our coach Gidi. I'm proud of Hannah and James. It's just been a great kind of two months."
Wrigley was candid about the nerves of the final day. "With the week we've had, with the tricky conditions, we knew how easy it is to get a bad race. And for things to be, yeah, not so good. And then we had a really tricky first race."
Silver was a first major championship medal for Löffler and Hoerr, the pair having missed last year's Medal Race by a single point. On the final downwind, the realisation began to land. "Suddenly it started hitting and we were both like, oh my God," Löffler said. Hoerr was equally frank: "We never had a big medal at any event. We had a medal at Kieler Woche Week, which was not a lot of people, so we believed in it, but we knew it's kind of unlikely."
Xammar was measured about handing over the title he and Cardona had held since 2025. "It's very hard to get a medal in a World Championship and obviously, yes, you always want to win, but I think it's also important to value how hard it is to get a medal in the World Championship. So, to be honest, we are very happy. Obviously, the hard work continues."
