2025 Rolex Fastnet Race, entry records demolished yet again

Entry to the Rolex Fastnet Race opened at 1000 UTC this morning and within just minutes staggering new records were set in terms of the speed with which boats registered and their quantity. Once again, the Royal Ocean Racing Club’s premier event, this year celebrating its centenary, has proved itself to be by far the largest offshore yacht race in the world.

From the moment the flood gates opened the RORC’s entry portal SailRaceHQ was already running red hot. With duplicate entries removed by 1100, 435 registrations had been received. As Race Director Steve Cole observed: “This morning 217 yachts had registered in the first minute compared to 178 last time. 420 had entered in the first five minutes which took two hours last time.”

The Admiral’s Cup fleet is guaranteed entry in the Rolex Fastnet Race, so these have yet to be added to the list, thereby swelling the fleet further. It is set to include the Rolex Fastnet Race’s defending champion, Max Klink’s Botin 52 Caro, racing as part of the team representing the Royal New Zealand Yacht Squadron. The Admiral’s Cup fleet will also include the 2009 and 2011 overall winner Niklas Zennström, trying for his hat-trick, racing his CF520 Rán 8. Already entered is the 2013 overall winner, defending champion and holder of the record for the most ever wins in IRC Two-Handed, Alexis Loison, aboard Léon, a brand new JPK 1050 model from Jean-Pierre Kelbert’s Lorient-based yard. Also entered are 2015 overall winner Géry Trentesaux with his Sydney GTS43 Long Courrier and 2017 winner Didier Gaudoux on his MN 35 2.30 Lann Ael 3.

If conditions during the race behave, then the winner of the Fastnet Challenge Cup, for the top place yacht under IRC could be one of the highly optimised grand prix racers in the Admiral’s Cup fleet. The RORC Race Office is anticipating as many as 16 two boat teams competing.

First yacht to successfully register was Frenchman Oscar Lenoel’s Pogo 12.50 Cléobulle within five seconds of entry opening.

The longest entry to date is the Armel le Cleac’h skippered 32m Ultim trimaran Maxi Banque Populaire XI, most recently winner of the Finistère Atlantique between Concarneau and Antibes. The smallest, hitting the race’s minimum size limit, are the 30 footers such as the First 30 Le Pti.Pere, the Sun Fast 30s Gaia of Sverre Reinke and Tok Sailing of Turkey’s Onur Tok.

In the offshore racing world, all eyes are currently on the finish of the Vendée Globe in Les Sables d’Olonne where Charlie Dalin and his flying IMOCA MACIF not only won, but demolished the record for, the solo non-stop around the world race. Dalin was followed by Yoann Richomme on Paprec Arkéa – their same result from the 2023 Rolex Fastnet Race, when they finished separated by just four minutes.

MACIF was the fastest monohull across the fleet, even finishing 15 minutes ahead of the fastest IRC monohull, Bryon Ehrhart’s 88ft Lucky. As there is less pressure on the IMOCAs and the other non-IRC classes to enter early, Dalin has confirmed he intends to be on the start line of the 2025 Rolex Fastnet Race. Several other Vendée Globe skippers are already entered, including Jérémie Beyou with Charal and Justine Mettraux on TeamWork-Team SNEF.

At present the monohull line honours battle looks set to be a three-way fight between the 100 footers, Black Jack 100, SHK Scallywag and Leopard 3. In the hands of original owner Mike Slade ICAP Leopard 3 was first home in 2007 and 2009, while SHK Scallywag competed in 2019 but was beaten by George David’s Rambler 88. Black Jack 100 as Igor Simcic's Esimit Europa II won line honours in 2013.

For Black Jack 100’s new Dutch owner Ramon Vos and his French skipper Tristan le Brun, this will be their first Rolex Fastnet Race, even if the rest of their crew are very familiar with it. “The Fastnet is one of the dreams for the owner and myself,” says le Brun. “We are really looking forward to taking part and that our first attempt will be the centenary edition. We will have great competition because Scallywag is coming and she can be competitive with us under certain conditions. We will have to put on our A game like we did in the Rolex Middle Sea Race, even though Scallywag won then.”

The preliminary entry has yachts registered from 19 countries, the furthest coming from Australia, while Peter Lezhnin’s J/112 GP Jenis heralds from Kazakhstan.

The giant IRC fleet will be divided into classes, and then sub-divided. But there is also informal competition between boats of the same type: already entered are 13 First 40s, 14 Sun Fast 3600s, 12 J/109s, 15 JPK 10.30s, 14 JPK 10.10s, 13 Sun Fast 3300s, nine J/99s, while the largest are currently the 18 Sun Fast 3200s competing.

“After our bumper 50th edition of the Rolex Fastnet Race in 2023, I’m delighted that numbers are so far on track to set a new record for this year’s race. Seven boats set sail on that first race in 1925. It is mind-blowing that 100 years later the same race is attracting 100ft flying trimarans, to the state-of-the-art monohulls in our IRC fleet, to keen cruiser-racers and mums and dads on board their family cruisers,” commented Race Director, Steve Cole.