Americas Cup

PUIG Women’s America’s Cup Press Conference

Jesse Tuke: In its 173 years of history, it’s fair to say that the America’s Cup has had quite a few firsts in its time, but this one feels just a little bit different. It’s a significant event and a very, very important step into the future. Never before have we seen an all-women’s edition of the America’s Cup and it is a privilege to witness the best female sailors from around the world come together for this inaugural event.

The sailors have taken over Port Olympic in the last week, some fascinating training racing around on the AC40s out in Barcelona. It’s buzzing to see the new faces take over the Olympic Village, Port Olympic, and really be the centrepiece for the next week or so of the 37th America’s Cup. Lighting an exciting pathway into the future.

I just want to make a note that there’s almost 80 female sailors from across the world, the world’s best coming here to Barcelona. They’ve already achieved some incredible things in the sport, but here in Barcelona we have 17 Olympic medalists. Of those 17, they boast 22 Olympic medals across six games from Athens in 2000.

There’s been four circumnavigations of the globe, racing the four extreme corners of the world. And in that as well, just an eye-watering 58 World Championship wins. We’ve got some real talent on display this week.

Now, what a week we’re going to have, twelve teams representing twelve countries all with one goal, battling to win the first ever PUIG Women’s America’s Cup.

We’ve got twelve teams total, but split into two groups. In Group A, we have the America’s Cup teams and then in Group B, we have the invited teams. Each group will have a qualifying series with a total of eight fleet races completed for each group.

At the end of that, the top three teams will progress through to a final series. Four races will be completed in that final series with the top two teams going through to a winner-takes-all match race final on the 13th of October. Bang smack in the middle of the opening weekend of the America’s Cup match, right in the spotlight of the world it’s going to be a fantastic day out there.

So we’re going to kick things off with our local team, Sail Team Barcelona, Silvia Mas, skipper for the team, we’ve got a question here from someone who you might know, a sporting star from here in Spain, Ona Carbonell.

Ona Carbonell: Hello, I’m Ona Carbonell, Olympic medalist in artistic swimming. What does it mean to you to represent Barcelona, Spain in the first ever PUIG Women’s America’s Cup?

Silvia Mas: Well, for me, of course, it’s a pleasure to have the first ever Women’s America’s Cup here in Barcelona, in my home. Actually, I live where Ona Carbonell lives, and we’re super happy that we have here all the family, all the friends and everyone supporting us is super warm.

JT: And obviously, we saw the Sail Team Barcelona youth team really have a huge amount of support from the locals here, they really got behind them. How do you kind of use that to your advantage as well? Does it give you extra motivation to just see how much support you have here? And have they given you any advice as well going into this?

SM: Yeah, of course, Spain we are a small team, but we are all one unit, all of us. We really help each other a lot. And I think this is a really special and extra motivation for us to go out on the water and even if the team is little, we are everyone in there.

JT: Question for Andoo Team Australia’s skipper and helm, Olivia Price. Quite a simple question on this one, what is it like taking the helm of an AC40? I mean, the bear-aways, the closing speeds on crosses, just in general, what’s it like out there?

Olivia Price: It’s exhilarating to be able to be doing these sorts of speeds, sailing some foiling craft with the best women in the world is honestly surreal. You know, it’s the first step of hopefully many to continue racing and also provide that pathway for a whole bunch of other youth and women sailors coming through as well. But definitely racing, it’s the most fun I’ve had sailing ever.

JT: And you have done a lot of sailing in your career. Has this been a real pinch yourself moment that you’re on the biggest stage competing for the very first time in the PUIG Women’s America’s Cup?

OP: It still gives me goosebumps to be able to say that we are part of history. This is the first Women’s America’s Cup, of course, we have had women in the past, but not one for ourselves and be racing, as equals altogether. So for us, for the Australian team, it is a pinch myself moment. We haven’t been involved in the cup for a number of years now, obviously, in 1983, we have great history in winning the America’s Cup. And hopefully we’ve got a great chance here with the women to make a step forward and continue being part of it in the future.

JT: Now to the helm for Emirates Team New Zealand with Liv Mackay. Liv, we’ve got a question here from a nine-year-old from the Royal New Zealand Yacht Squadron back in New Zealand.

Mackenzie: Hi, my name is Mackenzie and I’m nine years old. What’s one piece of advice you would give to nine-year-old you?

Liv Mackay: Oh, that’s pretty sweet, isn’t it? Yeah, I’d say just enjoy it, you’re nine years old. And for me, looking at this competition, if I was nine years old, it would really drive me to get into the sport. I think when you’re that age, you just really need to do what you enjoy and then it’ll consume you. So just knowing and trusting that doors are opening and then don’t see any barriers, just fall in love with it and do what you enjoy.

JT: You’ve certainly done that, Liv. And speaking of the competition there, can you give us a bit of an insight into how the competition’s been going? Who do you think are the top teams going into this? From your group, who are the top three teams at the moment?

LM: I love a spicy question! I mean, these boats are incredible, the fleet and the level is going to be an incredible level. It’s going to come down to small margins and I think at this moment in time, the experience in the boat is a big defining factor. So I’d say you’ve got the British team that’s done quite a lot of time, you also can’t shy away from the Italians. I think everyone’s at a such good level that we’ll see some really good racing.

JT: You can say yourself in third as well! Next up with our Swedish Challenge powered by Artemis Technologies, Giulia Gross, helm for the team, you’ve been doing exceptionally well in practice racing so far, seen the results and a few bullets amongst the mix there. What do you put that down to and how confident are you that you can carry this through? Racing starts tomorrow and that’s when it starts to count. Does that add some extra pressure as well?

Giulia Gross: Well, I think we’re all feel pressured in the racing and in training every day. And I think the race in practice racing we had the other day, it’s just like any other training day we had. Nothing different, just more boats on the start line! And to come away with that with three bullets, of course, was really fun. But that’s what we’ve been working for all summer. And it’s been long summer of sailing the AC40 and having fun.

JT: Can you talk to us about your summer here? You’ve spent a lot of time on the waters of Barcelona. Can you tell us what that’s done for the team learning to sail in I guess quite difficult conditions out there?

JG: Well, we actually started our AC40 sailing in Belfast where Artemis Technologies has their base and which we were really grateful to start. And then we came to Barcelona and experienced the waves here. And I think we’ve all seen the pictures from videos from out there, it can be quite action field racing. So we’ve had a lot of pitch pulls, a lot of crashes. We’ve been pushing so hard, so I think now we actually feel really confident with sailing the boat, but it will all come down to just doing the things right when it actually matters.

JT: It seems to be going well at the moment. Moving on to Athena Pathways, Hannah Mills, skipper for the team. We’ve got a video here out of the Royal Yachting Association in the UK from Daisy.

Daisy: Hi, my name’s Daisy and I’m 12. My question for Hannah Mills is, had this PUIG Women’s America’s Cup existed when you were in the early stages of your sailing career? Would you have opted for the Olympic path where you have excelled over the years or America’s Cup or both?

Hannah Mills: That’s a great question from Daisy. 100% both. I think it’s just so cool to see the opportunity for women in our sport growing and growing and growing. And this is obviously a massive step in that. I definitely feel like, the generation before us were really knocking on that door. And for us, I feel like we’re trying to shove through that door and hopefully for people like Daisy and the next generation, the door will just be wide open and there will be endless opportunities in our sport.

JT: And speaking of, I guess, the differences between your Olympic campaign with two golds and a silver and then coming into these AC40s, do you expect the racing to have a similar amount of intensity, more or less? How do you see the racing this week?

HM: Oh, the same. Just sailing the boats is intense, the speeds, the adrenaline, everything is kind of new for all of us. But actually, when you get on a race course, it’s that intensity of racing and pushing yourselves, pushing the team and the teamwork, communication, all the same things you need to do on an Olympic race course, you need to do in this sailing as well. So yeah, it’s really similar, but obviously we’re just going a lot faster.

JT: A question now for Orient Express L’Oreal racing team, Manon Audinet, skipper and trimmer for the team. This is the first staging of a Women’s America’s Cup, how important is that for women’s sailing in general? And do you see this competition as a genuine pathway for you into a full America’s Cup campaign?

Manon Audinet: Yeah, I think it’s what we’ve been missing for a while now, having a chance to sail on these kind of boats. I think it’s just the beginning now and we are just getting more experience and I think we all want to sail on the 75 for the next campaigns. But for myself, I want to be involved on this kind of project only if I deserve it. So I think now we are just getting more experience and I hope that soon we are going to be good enough to share the project with the other guys. I think it’s just perfect what’s happening now, we are going to have just more women involved in the America’s Cup for the next events and can’t wait to see women on the big boats for the next one.

JT: And speaking of the big boats, obviously the big team bowing out early and then the youth having some disappointment there. How much extra drive does that give you to fly the flag now for France to have some real success in this America’s Cup?

MA: Yeah, for sure we have some pressure on our shoulders. It’s been really, really sad and disappointing to see the youth having that much trouble with the boat. Now all the team is behind us and we really want to make them proud. So we’re going to give all we have and hopefully get a good result at the end.

JT: Question for Tina Lutz, helm for PUIG America’s Cup team Germany. Now this question comes from Blanca on video who I think has a bit of a similar history to you. Let’s have a look.

Blanca Ferrando: Hello, my name is Blanca Ferrando. I’m from Valencia, Spain, and I am the current Optimist World Champion. I want to be sitting where you are sitting one day. My question is, you are the woman at the pinnacle of our sport, but what are the key training differences from dynamics like the Optimist? I raise it to this AC40 foiling yacht.

Tina Lutz: First of all, congratulations to the current Opti World Champion.

JT:Because what year did you win the Optis?

TL: 2004 and 2005, twice the girls’ title and in 2005 also with the boys. So we can defeat the boys, obviously.

JT: So yeah, what are the key differences? Obviously, there’s a lot in the speed. So what are the key training differences from dinghies like Optimist and these AC40 yachts? Question there from Blanca.

TL: I think the Optimist is this classic three-person boat, it’s the child and the parents. We rig up the boat within half an hour. We set the sails and we push the boat into the water down the slip ramp and we go sailing. Now we are here, now we need a crane. We need the crane, we need a lot of onshore crew to get the boats finally in the water. Then it’s two hours of effort to get the sails up to the boat, to prepare everything, to do the system checks. And then we need this chase boat to finally pull us out on the water. In the Opti, yeah, you also need a rib sometimes if there is no wind to go outside, but it’s not the same. Arriving at the race course, we pull up the sails. It takes quite a lot of time, and then we finally can go sailing. But to be able to sail, we need first a simulator to train, that’s a big difference in Optimist, we did not need a simulator there! And then you start flying and I think that’s pretty cool. It’s amazing.

JT: I guess just quickly then on the simulator training, how has that transferred? You’ve spent a lot of time in the sim, not a lot of time on the boat. How’s that transition been?

TL: I think the simulator prepares you very well to push the buttons right, for sure. But when I had been two days ago the first time on the boat, we have only had two training days so far, it was very tough to sail the boats. So it is ways harder to get the boat up on the foils and we are struggling at the moment a lot with that. So I hope that on our racing day we have enough wind so we manage to get up on the foils. You need a lot practice in these boats for sure. It is quite challenging.

JT: A question for Luna Rossa Prada Pirelli’s skipper and helm, Giulia Conti. Giulia, I mean there’s been some great success so far from the Luna Rossa Prada Pirelli youth team and the senior team has been going deep into the competition as well. They’ve set the bar high in Barcelona. What does that do for your team? Does it put some extra pressure on there knowing that everyone else has been going really well or does it give motivation and support knowing that you’ve got this great team and Luna Rossa Prada Pirelli behind you?

Giulia Conti: Maybe a little bit of both, but mostly motivation. We feel a lot of support from all the team. Obviously seeing the youth team winning, it was a good moment for us to realise that maybe the work we did all together these past few months worked out pretty well. So it gave us quite a lot of confidence also in that. We are a big team, it’s not only women, it’s not only youth. We are youth and women and we’ve worked together the whole time and it’s been super cool to watch them winning. Actually, I had a little bit of tears in my eyes when they crossed the finishing line. So it’s the best experience of my life for sure so far.

JT: And how confident are you in the team being able to repeat that and win in the PUIG women’s this week?

JC: Well, we had some good racing at the practice racing but it feels like when you have the best start of your life and then all of a sudden you have general recall. So yeah, we need to try to repeat tomorrow and just go out there and be focused and mostly enjoy because racing with these boats is just amazing. It’s the best racing I’ve ever done for sure.

JT: A question for Concord Pacific Racing,  Isabelle Bertold, skipper on the team. Now this question comes from Barca FC’s Ellie Roebuck.

Ellie Roebuck: My name is Ellie Roebuck, FC Barcelona player. My question is how does it feel to be a part of something so crucial for the visibility in women’s sport?

Isabelle Bertold: Yeah, that’s a great question because I think it definitely touches on one of the coolest parts about being on this stage and it’s the biggest stage in sailing and to have women out on the water sharing a race course with the 75s. We have just as many people that are going to tune in and finally watch us and that’s not only the five-year-old, eight-year-old girl that finally is going to be able to have a female role model on the sport. But it’s also on the commercial side and we’ve seen more and more data over the last two years that women’s sport has some of the most engaged fans and that drives sponsorship revenue for the teams as well and drums up even more support and so really I think this is just the start and we’re going to see women’s sport and women’s sailing continue to progress and at a rapid pace.

JT: And on the racing side of things how much have you studied the fleet racing that happened in the youth a couple of weeks ago and what are some of the key things that you picked up on that you’re going to take into your racing?

IB: Yeah, I think the first time I watched the racing was for entertainment value and then I’ve watched it multiple times since. I mean I think on our side of the pool there’s less experience on the boats, so it’s going to just be about keeping it simple and learning as quickly as we can but I think that my biggest takeaway is the racing looked really fun and so I can’t wait for Sunday for our first race.

JT: Question for Jajo Team Dutch sailor Odile Van Aanholt, skipper on the team. This question comes from someone you know very well I’m sure, Rosalin Kuiper.

Rosalin Kuiper: My name is Rosalin Kuiper and I’m skipper of Team Holcim PRB and my question to you is how important is this all-woman regatta for a professional sailor who achieved already so much in their careers like yourselves?

Odile Van Aanholt: Yeah, so I think you can already see it from this conference. All of us are talking about how cool it is to be here. We’re not talking about winning and it’s not because we’re not competitive sailors with a lot of drive, which I know we all are, but it’s because we all know this is very special and we’ve worked very hard towards it and coming from Olympic sailing I’ve had that dream since I was four and I’ve been able to have that dream because I knew it was a possible reality. I only knew that this was a reality until two years ago so yeah it’s a big step and I hope it’s just the first step.

JT: And you’re coming off the back of some success in the Olympics as well. How much confidence does that give you going into this racing?

OA: It’s completely different. Like I said I’ve been working towards the Olympics for a very long time, like Tina said, we’ve only sailed this boat two days so it’s a different mindset but it’s super cool, it’s a lot of fun. I think it’s a very well-designed boat and the first day that we actually got sailing the boat went really well and it was a lot of fun. So I think that’ll be our main mindset and take confidence from that having fun.

JT: Question for Sarah Stone, skipper of New York Yacht Club American Magic. Sarah, your youth team made it to the final losing out to the Italians. How much would it mean to go one better here in the PUIG Women’s America’s Cup?

Sarah Stone: Our youth team came out and they did an amazing job. They had really top end conditions as all the youth teams did throughout the regatta and they took it one race at a time and they tried to get better every single time they got out on the course so we will be showing up with the same philosophy. I mean anything can happen out there. It’s really good racing. There are really good sailors across all of these 12 teams so you have to be good but you also have to learn all the way through. So we’ll see what we can do.

JT: Speaking on the racing there I guess for us that haven’t seen it yet is it going to be similar to the youth that we’ve seen out there or is racing completely different in this? Where do you see I guess the key moments in the women’s events going into the weekend?

SS: Yeah I think similar to what the youth saw, there are a few key moments and some of them are just the starting. You’ve got to be able to start well and the better you can be on the line, on time and at speed then the better you will be entering the course. How you go on the first cross, how you manage your mark roundings, all of those things that are the same for all the sailing you do in any class of boat. Those are the key moments. You’ve got to sail clean and you have to sail smart and have good communication and sail fast.

JT: Sounds easy, great! Question for Alinghi Red Bull Racing. Natalie Brugere, skipper and helm for the team. Now this question comes from a bit of a legend, alpine skiing champion Lindsay Vaughan.

Lindsay Vaughan: Hey it’s Lindsay Vaughan. As an athlete or former athlete I guess I know a little bit about competing under pressure but what I really want to know is how you prepared mentally and physically to get your team ready for this historic event and also what would you tell young girls who want to be in your position one day?

Natalie Brugere: Well I physically I think we are a little bit we don’t need to push so much weight than her so physically it doesn’t require so much physical preparation but I do believe if you’re in a good shape then mentally you are in a good shape as well. We did work quite a lot on our decision making because everything goes very fast and I believe we need to have the right reflex at the right time.

JT: What do you tell young girls that want to be in your position one day?

NB: I think enjoy the sport like sailing is such an amazing sport that teaches you great life skills and I believe that right now we have women more and more in the best competition at the Olympics, at the America’s Cup and offshore so I believe if you trust yourself and if you keep working hard you you’re gonna reach your goal.

JT: And just one final question from me, what’s it like being around Port Olympic in the last week shoulder to shoulder with these amazing women the best sailors from around the world how’s that atmosphere been?

NB: Well I’m pretty sure we have seen each other on the race course on the Olympic level and it’s really nice to right now to be able to race each other on the fast boat on a new boat for everyone and I believe we there’s a lot of friendship but I’m sure on the water we’re gonna give the best to to yeah to give a great show.

JT: I’m sure it’ll be a great show indeed well thank you, that’s all from me. We’ll open the questions to the floor

Mark Reed Latitude 38: This question is for Sarah on American Magic, what were your expectations about this event when you first heard about it then when you joined the team and now today?

SS: My expectations for the event have definitely changed from the time that I first heard about this event and when when I first heard that this was going to be a thing I think I was really excited but also didn’t want to be too excited and then get my hopes up and be disappointed. At that point the boats hadn’t been built, we were just hoping that they would come together and work and be good. Then over time we’ve seen the boats out there the cup teams raced on, these same boats in Jeddah and Villanova and so we got our first taste of what it could be like for us and so over time my personal expectations have grown as we’ve seen all that’s possible in this class and as we’ve had more and more time on the water we’ve been able to learn more and then to be able to come out here and race against some of the best women in the world I mean we’re all going to be pushing the edge and we’re all going to see if we can sail as cleanly as possible in whatever conditions we get. So no matter what it’ll be an amazing event and it’ll be the first in history so that in itself is a is a pretty incredible thing to be a part of .

Niall AC media: Just a question for Odile Van Aanholt, there feels like there’s a lot of respect among the competitors, which I’m sure is the same for any fleet of great racers, but for yourself i’m just wondering how much this win, this performance, would would mean to you from going from a fantastic summer that you had in Paris and what it would mean to kind of come on the water and perform as strongly as you did there. How how much of a rivalry is there and how much of a desire to win is there?

OA: Yeah rivalry I don’t know so much we feel definitely like underdogs, it’s quite nice to be in that position for a change. I’ve got a lot of respect for these girls but what’s fun is when you’re out there it just feels like a normal sailing race so it’s still about the shifts it is about where you see more pressure and that’s a skill we’ve got in our team so I think we will focus on that and if we can progress throughout the events that would mean a lot. We’re super excited about the practice racing yesterday and especially if we can do well it would mean a lot for future sailing, for all the girls in our team its a big step up to be here but it will also hopefully open a lot of doors to the future and hopefully combine more of Olympic sailing with professional sailing.

Alberto Barcelona Local TV: My question is for Silivia Mas, in terms of percentages what is under pressure or is motivation in this?

SM: Of course we will have a bit of pressure but it is in our blood. We re all sailors racing but its more like extra motivation. We are really enjoying this and all the boats are super fast and super fun racing, the racing is also super tight, Australia can tell you this! I think we have to take this opportunity and enjoy it.

Jan Pearson Sailing Scuttlebutt News: Question for Olivia Price, Thoughts on the AC40 being a crossroads into AC75’s as helm and trimmer don’t require typical male strength.

OP: Yeah I think its a question a lot of us have been asked, when are women going to be on the big America’s Cup teams. As an Australian we don’t have a parent team we just have the Youth and Women, but if Australia was to begin putting in an entry for the greater America’s Cup why wouldn’t we start training up women now. We’ve been training up a whole bunch of people you can see Australians competing for multiple other countries and you look at the greater America’s Cup teams and theres always an Aussie around there if not onboard. So if we were to pull our own team together theres obviously a huge amount of sailing experience sailing these style of boats in the men but we hope to bridge that gap in what we’re doing now and thats the first step towards that. If we were putting a new team together why wouldn’t we bridge that gap with the women as well so when it comes down to team selection if women are better or theres a women thats doing the job better why not select her. So this does really bridge that experience gap that we’ve been seeing over the last 173 years so if we were to pull an Australian team together or any of these invited teams putting a team together why wouldn’t we start training women with the men so we can compete for all those same spots as equals.

Christina from Switzerland: Have you had the chance to jump in the AC75 and if yes, how is it?

No one replies

NB: I’ve not stepped on the boat, but from the outside it looks really great!

Tatiana German Newsagency and Yacht magazine: The question goes to Odile and Tina, for both of your teams you’ve not had the opportunity to sail AC40’s before you came to Barcelona so you intensely trained and now you have a steep learning curve, how steep is it and can give us some more detail on the experience.

TL: I think as I already said the sim prepares you well for pushing the button but not for putting the sails up correctly because only if your out on the water do you have to pressure of the sails and the experience of the boat and speed to realise how the boat reacts and you only get that if you’re out on the water. You only get to be a better sailor if you’re here sailing so my only wish is to have had more time to practice and be out on the water, two days is for sure not enough but we will do our best. Its much harder than expected and you could not train that on the sim so lets hope for the best.

OA: I think that what the sim has brought to our team is that we’ve actually sat in these cockpits as a team, we’ve all come from different area of sailing so it was great to spend that time together to work on our communication and see how we can help each other get better so for team building it has done a lot and from when we stepped on the boat we felt confident and comfortable as a team so thats already a big step. If you go into uncomfortable scenarios to at least be confident in your team but we would’ve loved to have sailed the boat more so if theres any sponsors here we are open and we’re great sailors and great people but we will make the best of it for now!

Pedro La van Guardia: First for Silvia, In training a lot with boys, now that they’ve been sailing, do you see a difference in performance when you’re out on the AC40 and for Giulia what would you say to your colleagues out on the AC75 today, what’s your advice?

JC: Di Acatzo Boys!!

SM: Well I haven’t sailed with the boys but I think what we can see in the teams is we don’t have enough experience when we’re out on the boat. A lot of experience in simulator but I think the good thing is that everyday that passed we saw the boys get tighter and tighter in the race course and I think that will happen with us also. We already experienced it in on the first practice race, it was a bit so so  but we will see how we develop.

Karen While, Southport Talk: The experience going around a mark on the tac and what does it feel like going around on the foils, what does it feel like to try and keep that in balance?

SS: A lot of chat has been had with these boats and how many different or similar they are to boats that we’ve been more familiar with sailing or displacement style boats and some of the women here have commented on it and the tactics it comes down to racing. Certainly on any  boat you race on all of the positions on the boat have their own responsibilities when you’re going around a top mark for example and about to bearaway and the same can be said for this boat. What your windward helm and leeward helm are doing in a bear-away is different to what your windward trimmer and leeward trimmer are doing and everyone knows their role. For the trimmers, I myself am a trimmer, and if I’m doing a bearaway to windward then I’m controlling the main sail as my primary responsibility so I’m really thinking about the keel of the boat and trying to keep our keel stable through that bear-away so we don’t spin out or touch down to the water and slow down. My windward helm, we’re talking together a lot to ensure the timing when the turn begins that the angle is reached for your downwind angle that thats communicated to everybody on board so I can adjust the mainsail and my leeward trimmer can adjust the jib to get the boat around that top mark as fast as we can.

Shirley Robertson AT TV: Question to Hannah, having just witnessed the practice racing, what is this racing going to look like?

HM: I think everyone came off the water after practice racing with the biggest smiles on their faces and I think it’s probably the best racing any of us have done. I think the same will be true tomorrow, we will all want to win and everyone has put a lot of time and energy into trying to prepare as best as we can and we’re gonna push each other incredibly hard and everyone is going to learn so much throughout this regatta. No one has raced AC40s with five other boats on the race course before so its gonna be tough each day and I really think it’s going to be whoever can learn the fastest it going to be tighter and tighter.

SR: Same question to Giulia

JC: It’ll be really tight. Only a few moments ago Hannah and I were joking saying “yesterday you were too close, no you were!”. Everyone has the drive and wants to win. All of us are connected by something deeper because we all know we are part of history so we will share a bond forever in the future so I’m super proud to be part of this.

Americas Cup Media: Question for Hannah, looking back what were the biggest hurdles to get here and what are the biggest hurdles left and how of we address them?

HM: How long have we got?! I think for us some of the biggest hurdles were around raising money and this is such a big program and opportunity to get experience on these boys. We’ve all talked about it and the experience gap is real. We’ve all raced Olympic boats but this is new, foiling era of sailing and theres very little opportunity and experience as women sailors so this really for me marks a huge step forward. To have twelve teams from around the world all getting massive experience sailing these kind of sail boats is huge and so suddenly we’re going to have 48 or more than that female sailors at a really good level sailing an AC40 so hopefully a lot of the cup teams will see that and we will get more teams, not just twelve from other countries who have incredible females sailors as well. I think it is just such a step in bridging the gap and show what female sailors do and we all feel the responsibility to demonstrate that. What we need to do is make this event the biggest success we can and make sure to share it and shout about it to really gain traction going forward and hopefully whoever wins the Americas Cup sees this as part of it going forward.

Francesca, Sailing: how much are you enjoying as top athletes the learning process and how much fire are you bringing to racing?

OP: I think the teams are all on a different journey to get here but I do think each team has put so much time and effort and really realised what an opportunity this is. Everyone’s taking it seriously, we are all the top level of our sport so I think you will see an incredible level out there tomorrow and you will see it for the rest of the week. The journey to get here has been massive and I do think everyone has spoken really well I do feel really inspired to be honest and I think it will continue to grow throughout the week. Each team will come with their own strengths and their own weaknesses so you will see the best of the best and maybe so mistakes out there this week but I really hope its just the beginning.

Watch the full press conference here

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