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Sailing News for November 18, 2025

A major America’s Cup headline leads the day with Ian Walker stepping in to drive Athena Racing’s AC38 campaign. SailGP continues its chaos-filled season with new teams, faster foils, and plenty of drama. Brighton Marina YC showcases a winning model for growing club racing, while Australian Sailing opens coach spots for its 2026 youth pathway. World Sailing earns climate-action recognition and the tech front lights up with a cutting-edge performance cat and a new dehumidifier for midsize cruisers.

Sail GP/America’s Cup

America’s Cup Challenger of Record Taps Ian Walker as CEO (4 min read)
Athena Racing just signed Olympic medalist and Ocean Race winner Ian Walker as CEO for their AC38 campaign, and it’s a serious power move. Walker brings Cup experience, offshore grit, and the high-performance chops he honed running the British Sailing Team and North Sails. He steps in just as the new America’s Cup Partnership promises a more collaborative, commercially savvy future for the event. Pair him with Ben Ainslie again and Britain suddenly looks very ready to make another big run at the Cup.

Inshore & Offshore Racing

Club Class: A Pathway Into Yacht Racing (5 min read)
Brighton Marina Yacht Club has been quietly nailing the “get people into sailing” challenge with its long-running Club Class program. New and returning sailors get five hands-on sessions aboard members’ boats, plus practical shore training that covers everything from ropework to racing starts. A WhatsApp crew-match system and a lively social scene help keep newcomers engaged long after the sessions end. The result is a healthier racing fleet, happier skippers with full crews, and a steady stream of new members sticking around for the long haul.

Youth Sailing/Development

Coach Expressions of Interest Open for 2026 Youth Worlds and National Youth Squad (5 min read)
Australian Sailing is looking for coaches to help guide the country’s top youth sailors through the 2026 Youth Worlds and the National Youth Squad. These roles are all about shaping young talent, prepping athletes for international racing, and building the next generation of high-performance sailors. Coaches will run camps, collaborate with national staff, and support sailors through the full learn-perform-reflect cycle. If you’re passionate about youth development, the EOI window is open until 22 February 2026.

Sustainability

World Sailing Shortlisted for 2025 IOC Climate Action Award (3 min read)
World Sailing just made the finalist list for the IOC Climate Action Awards thanks to a project that tackled one of the sport’s sneaky biggest emitters: support boats. Their partnership with the Oria Marine Support Fleet Project at Paris 2024 tracked fuel burn and efficiency across the entire fleet and showed a path to cutting emissions by up to 20 percent with smarter management and training. It’s a real, data-backed win for cleaner events. With Milano Cortina 2026 on the horizon, sailing is positioning itself as a climate leader, not a follower.

Tech & Gear

Evening Star Set to Shine (3 min read)
Mahi Boats is wrapping up the custom Schionning 1520 catamaran Evening Star, and this thing is basically a floating showcase of Australian composite wizardry. The team used full 3D modelling, one-off CNC-cut molds, and ATL’s DuFLEX panels to keep the build light, strong, and impressively precise. The result is a performance cruiser designed for real bluewater miles, built with an eye toward sustainability and smart engineering. If you’re into cats or clever construction, this one’s worth a look.

RiteAire Marine Unveils New Dehumidifier for Midsize Boats (6 min read)
RiteAire Marine just rolled out the RAM 30, a slim whole-vessel dehumidifier built specifically for 40 to 50 foot cruising boats. It pulls nearly five gallons of moisture a day and fits into tight spaces where the bigger RAM units can’t squeeze in. For owners battling humidity, mold and swampy cabin air, this is a serious quality-of-life upgrade. With a growing dealer network and a design aimed at real-world cruising, the RAM 30 makes whole-boat humidity control way more accessible.

Sailing Highlight of the Day

SailGP’s 2025 season has been absolute chaos in the best way, starting with Brazil joining the league and scoring their first fleet race wins under the sport’s first female driver. Italy’s new Red Bull-backed squad shook things up too, delivering big results right out of the gate. The tech team rolled out new T foils and light-air rudders that cranked the speed and tightened the fleet, then spent half the year patching boats after dramatic crashes in San Francisco and Germany. With seven different winners so far, Abu Dhabi is shaping up to be a wild finale.