5.5 Metre class World Championship preview

Twenty nine teams from 10 countries, including Australia and the Bahamas, are gathered at the Yacht Club de l’Odet for the 5.5 Metre class world championship.

Competition throughout this fleet, which includes several former Olympic sailors, as well as national and international champions across multiple classes, is always intense. This year is no exception and there are plenty of teams with the potential to win.

Defending champion Aspire (Przemek Gacek, Mateusz Kusznierewicz and Kilian Weise) is clearly a hot contender, but failed to qualify for the final races of the Scandinavian Gold Cup last week. Nevertheless, Kusznierewicz, who has won Gold and Bronze Olympic medals remains a formidable competitor.

Norwegian entry Artemis (Kristian Nergaard, Johan Barne and Trond Solli-Saether) was second in Porto Cervo last year, just one point behind Aspire. In the Scandinavian Gold Cup they demonstrated impressive speed and boat handling, but missed out on victory in the closing stages of the final race.

Bahamian entry John B (Gavin McKinney, Lars Horn Johannessen and Mathias Dahlman) also made it through to the Scandinavian Gold Cup finals and proved a close match for the eventual winner, Ali Baba (Flavio Marazzi, Julie Marazzi and Eline Marazzi)

Other boats to watch out for include The Jean Genie (Peter Morton, Andrew Palfrey, Ruairidh Scott) which won last year’s Scandinavian Gold Cup and is more optimised for stronger winds than many of the boats in the fleet. This team also won the 2022 world championship in Hankø, Norway, with Elliot Hanson standing in for Morton who was unable to attend, Andrew Palfrey and Sam Haines.

What makes it so difficult to win the 5.5 Metre world championship? “Although it's a development class, it feels like you're in a one design fleet, so it’s the details that matter: the teamwork, the communication on board and your preparation with sails, equipment and boat handling,” says Palfrey, who has raced in two 5.5 Metre world championship winning teams and has an Etchells world title to his name.

“There’s a lot of talent across the fleet, with a lot of world championship winners and people with a lot of experience in this fleet and other Metre classes,” he adds.

In addition to the overall world championship title, the older Evolution and Classic boats are also setting up for close competition. In the warm up regattas last week, the Hankø Evolution Cup and Royal Haag Classic Cup, two boats stood out in particular having won all their races: Ali-Baba (Wolf-Eberhard Richter, Beata Kallkowski and Jorg Grunewald) in the Evolution division and Manuela V (Guido Tommasi, Matteo Barison and Andrea Racchelli) among the classics.

However, there are more boats racing this week and the world championship will kick off in different weather to the light airs of the past few days, with a gusts to 20 knots or above possible.