Emirates Team New Zealand won the America's Cup preliminary regatta in Jeddah last December. Photo / America's Cup
Emirates Team New Zealand won the America's Cup preliminary regatta in Jeddah last December. Photo / America's Cup
THREE KEY FACTS
The Royal New Zealand Yacht Squadron entered a performance partnership with the Saudi Sailing Federation to help fast-track a group of Saudi Arabian sailors ahead of two major events in Jeddah later this year
Jeddah hosted a preliminary America’s Cup regatta last December and has been linked as a potential host for the 38th America’s Cup should Team New Zealand successfully defend in Barcelona.
The Royal New Zealand Yacht Squadron are represented by Team NZ in the America’s Cup.
Following on from hosting the second preliminary America’s Cup regatta in Jeddah in December last year, the Saudi Sailing Foundation (SSF) entered a performance partnership with the RNZYS, sending sailors to learn from the Kiwi coaches ahead of the women’s and youth match racing world championships to be held in Jeddah later this year.
The city has often been linked as a potential host for the 38th America’s Cup should Team New Zealand successfully defend the Auld Mug in Barcelona, but Blakey told the Herald their helping to train the Saudi Arabian sailors simply came down to the strength of their youth training programme.
“One of the things we are most proud of is our youth training programme. That has existed for nearly 40 years, and what it has done is it has transformed New Zealand sailors to be world-class,” Blakey said.
“When we take sailing to a place like Jeddah, they see the quality of our sailors and the event so when they’re thinking ‘how do we develop our own talent?’ they look to where there is that expertise globally, and that’s where we play a part.
“They’re thinking about how they develop their sailors to be competitive in those events, so they’ve sent some of their sailors down to be trained by some of our coaches to improve their performance.”
The SSF is just one of several foreign entities to reach out to the RNZYS about development programmes, with the Kiwi squadron having developed a reputation for guiding sailors to higher levels.
That has been seen in arenas such as the America’s Cup and SailGP, where several of today’s stars are graduates from the programme, including a number of sailors involved in the current Team NZ set-up.
“You probably underestimate just how far the brand travels and, in the sport, how others look to us for what best practice looks like.
Royal New Zealand Yacht Squadron vice-commodore David Blakey with Matt Heath and Jeremy Wells during a media tour in August. Photo / Suellen Hurling, Live Sail Die for RNZYS
“You think the future of the club itself; how do you take it from an old white man’s club to what’s now relevant? Part of that is building diversity, and that’s women, that’s youth, ethnic diversity, but actually, some of that diversity can come from which other cultures we work with and having more of a global perspective rather than just being focused on what we’re doing.”
Blakey said it was about helping an emerging nation in the sport develop their talent and the financial return was not a big one, but said it created opportunities for the RNZYS to grow and develop the club in the future.
He said the partnership had no correlation to the chances of Saudi Arabia hosting the next America’s Cup, though the Middle East was named by team principal Matteo de Nora as a potential host should Team New Zealand win and look to host it again sooner than in four years time.
Saudi Arabia has made a big splash in the sporting world over the past few years, including bankrolling some of the world’s biggest boxing events, LIV Golf, purchasing Newcastle United in the EPL as well as luring some of the biggest football stars in the world to play in the Saudi Pro League. In mid-2023, the Guardian reported Saudi Arabia had spent more than $8b on sportswashing.
While Jeddah is believed to be among the contenders for the 38th America’s Cup in the event of a Team NZ win this week, Barcelona is also among that group after what has been an entertaining regatta over the last month.
Not everyone in the city is happy about it, however. Earlier this week, more than 1000 Barcelona locals marched in opposition to the city hosting the event, though Blakey said he was yet to have a negative encounter with a local in the city.
“One of our proud Kiwi moments is watching the waka, Te Kawau, from Ngāti Whātua Ōrākei, head out on to the course each day.
Ngāti Whātua Ōrākei paddling the waka Te Kawau to lead Emirates Team New Zealand off the dock in Barcelona. Photo / Georgia Schofield, Photosport
“I was standing on the edge of the wharf where they launched the waka to paddle it across to Team New Zealand based to lead the boat out and all; it’s the Spanish people that are lining the waterfront up taking videos because it’s something they’ve never seen before.
“They’re intrigued by it. The presence of that piece of New Zealand culture is something different for them and they’re really enjoying that aspect of what we’ve brought to the event as well.”
Thousands of Kiwis have made their way to the Catalan capital for this year’s event. Blakey said a group of 670 members made the trip as part of RNZYS programmes, but the large presence of New Zealanders in the city was a pleasant surprise.
It paints a different picture than the anger brought on when Team New Zealand announced Barcelona as the host city, and while that feeling still lingers for many fans of the sport at home, Blakey said the event was speaking for itself.
“One of the bits of feedback we get talking to different New Zealanders that are here is that they can see why the event is here,” he said.
“It is a world-class international event, the world’s oldest sporting trophy. This city is ideally geared up to host an event of this scale, and the city has really embraced the event for what it is.
“The challenge for us is how do we ever put something on of this scale back home? That’s a big challenge.”
As for exactly where the next Cup will be held, Blakey said the RNZYS had no concrete indications at this point and, critically, Team NZ had to continue in their rich vein of form and secure the three more wins they need to lock the Auld Mug away for a record third time in a row.
“I think we’re all very wary of not getting too far ahead of ourselves, [but] the conversation around where the event is held next, that’s yet to happen,” Blakey said.
“At this point, it’s a blank sheet of paper and I guess it’ll go on the merits of the different locations and, of course, each location has its pluses and minuses. There are trade-offs to be made and some of those will be commercial, some of those will be related to how well the infrastructure is set up to host the event, some of it will come down to the sailing conditions.
“No doubt the team, and we’ll hopefully have a part of that conversation as well, [around] who is actually interested in hosting it next time? What do those propositions look like, and what makes most sense for the event after what we’ve seen here?”
Christopher Reive joined the Herald sports team in 2017, bringing the same versatility to his coverage as he does to his sports viewing habits.
