Rivalry reignites as familiar Burling and Tuke foe joins SailGP fleet

By Christopher Reive

Dylan Fletcher’s return to SailGP came with a sense of poetry.

In the first season of the global foiling league, Fletcher was at the wheel of the Great Britain team, finishing fourth in the then-six-team league.

It was his only season in the role, with Sir Ben Ainslie taking over at the helm for season two.

Ainslie drove for the team in seasons two and three, before stepping away midway through season four to focus on the America’s Cup campaign.

He remained as the team’s chief executive, with Giles Scott taking over at the wheel for the rest of the season.

But with Scott transferring to the Canadian team for season five, Fletcher finally got his opportunity to return, capping off a span in his career that also saw him share the helm with Ainslie in the America’s Cup match in Barcelona.

“It’s almost poetic, isn’t it, that Ben, in reality, kicked me out of SailGP, but he also brought me back in driving the same boat,” Fletcher told the Herald.

“It’s been a fantastic 18 months or two years for me. It’s quite something to think back from the end of 2022 when I had just won the Moth Worlds and didn’t know what the future looked like.

“I was trying hard to get involved in Ineos [Britannia], and then to have done the America’s Cup, helmed and now be helming SailGP - life’s pretty good; I just need to win some more events.”

Fletcher said his return to SailGP came around quite late, but he had made sure Ainslie knew of his goal to get back behind the wheel of an F50.

He returns to a new-look competition, with twice the number of boats on the water, and more than twice the number of events in the season.

He joins the reigning impact league champions – with the team recently releasing an environmental and social impact report detailing the results of their season four commitments in that space – and comes in with the experience gained by working closely alongside Ainslie over the past year.

“I learned so much from sailing with Ben. He’s obviously a very formidable match racer and ruthless when he’s on the water,” he said.

“We both had different sailing backgrounds, and I’ve always sailed Moths and 49ers and everything, and sailed in a team like in the Olympics and Worlds. So, it was really interesting sailing with him. I won’t give too much away, but it was a big learning experience.”

Fletcher’s return brings a well-established rivalry into the SailGP fleet, with the British world and Olympic champion having spent plenty of time competing against Kiwi duo Peter Burling and Blair Tuke.

At the Tokyo Olympics in 2020, Fletcher and his crewmate Stuart Bithell – now sailing with the German SailGP team - took the gold medal in the 49er class ahead of Burling and Tuke. Current SailGP Germany driver Erik Heil took the bronze.

That rivalry resumed in Barcelona, with Fletcher earning the role of co-helmsman for Ineos Britannia’s America’s Cup campaign – the team opting to have him at the helm alongside Ainslie and Scott in an off-water role.

The Brits earned the right to challenge Emirates Team New Zealand in the Cup match – the first British syndicate to achieve that feat in 60 years – before ultimately losing 7-2.

“I’ve raced against a lot of the guys in the fleet, but especially Pete and Blair for a number of years and really enjoy racing them,” Fletcher said.

“They’re some of the best guys out there in the world, so to be back in SailGP and get that opportunity to be doing one-design again is awesome.

“They’re obviously the form boat, I’d say; they’re sort of the favourites, they won that first event, so we know we’ve got our work cut out to beat them, but there’s nothing I like more than chasing them down.”

This article was first published on nzherald.co.nz and is republished here with permission