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Gold Cup Race 1

The Gold Cup Series is a collaboration with:

• Royal Akarana Yacht Club
• Bucklands Beach Yacht Club
• Richmond Yacht Club
• Royal New Zealand Yacht Squadron.

Led by RAYC, the four of the five races are between 35-48 nautical miles with the final race, The Balokovic Cup, being approximately 87 miles.

Saturday 25 September Race 1 – Spring Regatta (Richmond Yacht Club) / Approx. 50nm

Saturday 9 October Race 2 – Roy McDell Memorial (Royal New Zealand Yacht Squadron) / Approx. 35nm

Saturday 6 November Race 3 – Bean Rock Race (Royal Akarana Yacht Club) / Approx. 44nm

Saturday 4 December Race 4 – Percy Jones Memorial (Bucklands Beach Yacht Club) / Approx. 48nm

Friday 4 February Race 5 – Balokovic Cup (Royal Akarana Yacht Club Yacht Club) / Approx. 89nm The Balokovic Cup is Race 4 of the Ran Tan II Memorial Blue Water Championship

8 - 9 March 2024

THE GREAT SPRINT

Experience the adrenalin rush of being one of many yachts on the start line, at the same time.

Enjoy the spectacle of the sails and colours on Auckland Harbour.

Get amongst the atmosphere of a sailing village.

Be part of history (one day) - Guiness Book of World Records anyone!

It's a festival, a spectacle, a race

Bought to you by the organisers of the legendary coastal classic.

Get an overview of this one-of-a-kind race based on the Barcolana Regatta that now holds the Guinness World Record as the largest regatta in the world. 

It's a festival, a spectacle and a race.  

Take a look at the course where all boats start on the same starting line at the same time!

THE ORGANISING CLUB

All yachts are invited, but this race is

 c/0 the New Zealand Multihull Yacht Club. 

PIC Harbour Classic unleashes nautical spectacle with over 50 yachts on Waitematā Harbour

Smooth sailing ahead with an entry fee of $30

Rock star prizegiving on Te Whero Wharf

Friday 20 October

For the tracker, seeds  results, photos and videos: 

PIC Coastal Classic 2023 Wrap Up

Wrapping up PIC Coastal Classic, welcoming PIC Harbour Classic

Paying tribute to a remarkable man and an accomplished sailor

Melges 40 Clockwork takes top handicap honours and unofficial record in PIC Coastal Classic

Wired first boat home in 41st race

Startline shifted to Narrow Neck Beach

Kicking off the long weekend with an epic fleet and an easterly!

Back to the future: Ocean global race comes to Auckland

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Translated 9 sailing into Auckland. Photo / Michael Craig

Tamaki Makaurau welcomed the first of 14 yachts competing in the Ocean Global Race (OGR) with Italian entrant Translated 9 crossing the Royal New Zealand Yacht Squadron finish line of leg 2 at lunchtime.

The event celebrates 50 years since the first Whitbread Round the World yacht race using technology and yachts employed in those early days.

The crew have just paper charts and sextants to calculate their routes and books and cassette tapes to pass the many hours at sea between stops.

GPS, iPhones and computers are banned as are the latest developments in yacht racing technology with the likes of foils, daggerboards, canting keels and wing sails eschewed for good old fashioned nylon sails, ropes and heavy keels.

And the sailors themselves are described as ordinary rather than the professionals employed since the competition graduated to the Volvo Ocean Race in the early 1990s.

The youngest sailor, 17-year-old Ryder Ellis of Auckland, is on board the yacht Explorer sailing near the back of the fleet.

“I’ve been sailing since I was a little boy,” Ellis said before the yachts left Southampton in September. “My grandma Penny Whiting has run her sailing school for many years and taught thousands of people to sail. My father Carl has been in America’s Cup campaigns and done all sorts of sailing so I’ve always been around sailors and sailing.”

Bringing the event to Auckland is special for the crews, organisers and observers honouring the memory of Sir Peter Blake, one of the greatest sailors to take part in the Whitbread racing. Blake competed in five Whitbreads, skippering Lion New Zealand to second place in 1985, then winning every leg of the 1989 event skippering Steinlager II. Both of Blake’s former yachts sailed alongside Translated 9 as she powered into the Waitemata Harbour.

Don McIntyre, founder of the OGR, said he wanted to recreate that feeling, where “ordinary” sailors could experience that special adventure.

“To sail into Auckland on the 50th anniversary of the Whitbread with the support of Tātaki Auckland Unlimited and a fleet of exciting yachts as they were 50 years ago is a dream come true for the 200 sailors, partners and supporters involved,” McIntyre said. “We know Auckland and our hosts the Royal New Zealand Yacht Squadron will turn on something special as they always have.”

Chris Simpson, Head of Major Events at Tātaki Auckland Unlimited said that Auckland is considered the spiritual home of the Ocean Globe Race and the region has a strong connection with this event. “It’s a thrill to be able to host the sailors and their teams for the race’s significant anniversary on the Waitematā,” he said, “and we encourage Aucklanders and visitors to get down to the Wynyard Quarter and enjoy the stopover.”

The Ocean Global Race yachts will be at the Wynyard quarter they leave for Punta Del Este in Uruguay on January 14. See more at oceangloberace.com

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A2T POSTPONED UNTIL 2025

Read the announcement here.

View the 2023 race results here and photo gallery  here ! ​

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Latest RNZYS News

Royal New Zealand Yacht Squadron & Emirates Team New Zealand launch brand new Elliott 7 Fleet

Small boat, big ambition

Enter Now: Helly Hansen Three Kings Offshore Race!

Megan Thomson’s 2.0 Racing Team Win 2023 Barfoot & Thompson New Zealand Women’s Match Racing Championships

It’s back to the future for Youth Programme

North Sails becomes Major Partner and Official Sailmaker of Royal New Zealand Yacht Squadron

RNZYS recognised as Yachting New Zealand Clean Club

Lighthouse New Zealand Match Racing Championships 2023: Nick Egnot-Johnson wins again.

Lighthouse New Zealand Match Racing Championships are underway thanks to last-minute venue change.

Adventure of a Lifetime

Upcoming events.

Bumbu Rum Race Series

PIC Insurance Brokers Wednesday Series

36 Degrees Brokers Squadron Golf Day

Helly Hansen Three Kings Offshore Race

Major sponsors.

The Royal New Zealand Yacht Squadron is New Zealand’s leading yacht club, with an illustrious history dating back to our formation in 1871. The RNZYS is still the official home of the America’s Cup after Emirates Team New Zealand, representing the RNZYS, defended the oldest sporting trophy in the world at the 36th America’s Cup in Auckland in 2021. The RNZYS has a wide range of events taking place to mark this momentous occasion. With thousands of races per calendar year, many social events and a Members Bar open seven days a week, we invite you to join us and enjoy what we have to offer.

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Royal New Zealand Yacht Squadron Inc 181 Westhaven Drive, Westhaven Marina, Auckland 1011, New Zealand (09) 360-6800

Regatta Schedule

Schedule of events - monday 29 january 2024, dragon boat racing.

0930-1600hrs

Viaduct Harbour 360 Dragon Boaters will race throughout the day, with great viewing from around the Viaduct Harbour.

Tugboat Race & Display

1000-1045hrs

Westhaven Tugboats will race from Westhaven to Orakei and back, followed by a Tugboat Display off Westhaven at 1105hrs.

Classic Launch Race

Westhaven Classic Launches will race from Westhaven to Orakei and back.

Classic Yacht Races

Westhaven (start) The spectacular fleet of heritage A Class vessels start their race at Westhaven. Come and see one of the biggest fleets of authentically restored vessels in the world.

1300-1700hrs

Orakei Wharf (finish) Classic Yachts will finish at Resolution Buoy, best viewed from Orakei Wharf.

Modern Keelboat Races

Westhaven (start) Modern Classics start at 1205hrs, followed by the prestigious Division 1-3 keelboats, then B Classics, at 5 minute intervals.

Orakei Wharf (finish) Keelboats will finish at Resolution Buoy, best viewed from Orakei Wharf.

Waka Ama & Waka Hourua

Westhaven Waka Ama paddlers are scheduled to start their race off Westhaven.

Westhaven Waka Hourua are scheduled to start their race off Westhaven.

Keelboat Passage Races

Mahurangi (start) Keelboat passage races start from Mahurangi.

Rakino (start) Keelboat passage races start from Rakino.

Dinghy, Foiling & Skiff Racing

Royal Akarana Yacht Club Optimist & Starling 3 day Auckland Championships

Murrays Bay Sailing Club 420; 29er: 49er; 49erFX

Narrow Neck Beach Sea Scout Cutters; Navy Crown; Sunbursts

*Update 28 Jan, 2030hrs: Due to the forecast, Sea Scouts will relocate to Lake Pupuke

Northcote Birkenhead Yacht Club RS Quest; RS Aero

Manly Sailing Club O’pen Skiff; RS Feva; Zephyrs; Cherubs; Wingfoil

Takapuna Boating Club 27-29 January 2024 Two Day Event and One Day Event FOILING Classes: Windfoil; Kite foil; Nacra 15/17; Waszp; Moths; A Class DINGHY Classes: Farr 3.7

Tamaki Yacht Club Laser; Laser Radial; Laser 4.7

Radio Controlled Yacht Racing

Westhaven Marina Electron fleet

St Mary’s Bay International One Metre fleet

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Published on December 12th, 2023 | by Assoc Editor

Ocean Globe Race: Roaring into Auckland

Published on December 12th, 2023 by Assoc Editor -->

The Italian Swan 65 Translated 9, skippered by Vittorio Malingri, crossed the finish line on December 12 to take first in line honors, provisional IRC and Flyer Class in the 2023-24 Ocean Globe Race. The second leg of the race began on November 5 for the 7250nm course to Auckland, New Zealand.

This will herald their second IRC win, having taken the title in the Leg One race, Southampton to Cape Town. The ten-strong crew were determined to retain the prestigious title in the Cape Town to Auckland leg and their dogged determination paid off.

“We went south, you have to go south, that is how you sail around the world,” said Malingri. “Some days in the fog it was one degree, four degrees. We didn’t see the sun for two weeks! But we are so happy to be here. New Zealand is an amazing country.”

Vittiorio, whose father Franco, and uncle, Doi, took part in the first Whitbread Round the World Race in 1973. And now his son Nico, is the first mate on board Translated 9.

“It feels so good to be here,” noted Nico Malingri. “It feels just amazing. It was a technical leg and we didn’t have any big storms so we managed to push at the right time and keep cool when it was necessary. The crew performed amazingly.”

The OGR, a race celebrating the 50th Anniversary of Whitbread Round the World Race, means Translated 9’s triumphant return to Auckland is particularly poignant. The yacht and her crew have deep historical connections to the Whitbread and Auckland. In 1977, she sailed into the city under the name ADC Accutrac, skippered by Claire Francis, the first woman to skipper a Whitbread yacht.

“It was a very mild Indian Ocean,” observed Translated 9 navigator Simon Curwen. “Loads of high pressures, no big systems, not too much damage. We’re short a spinnaker pole that folded in half, but apart from that we’re in pretty good shape.”

Translated 9 took the most southerly route of the fleet only being forced north to round the third-way point enroute from Cape Town. They battled with Pen Duick VI throughout the leg with things getting particularly interesting when Pen Duick VI, skippered by Marie Tabarly, took the controversial decision to sail through the Bass Strait between Tasmania and Australia.

For a while, it looked like the gamble might have paid off but Translated 9’s position continued to offer the better winds, aiding her perfectly around the often difficult Cape Reinga. It’s notorious for producing some surprises for rounding the North Island but not so on this occasion.

Translated 9’s finish was followed by Pen Duick VI, Spirit of Helsinki, and Maiden.

The third leg will start January 14, taking the fleet 4980 nm to Punta del Este, Uruguay.

Event information – Race rules – Entry list – Tracker

No longer racing: • Swan 51 Godspeed (USA) – quit after Leg 1

The 2023-24 Ocean Globe Race (OGR) is a fully crewed, retro race, in the spirit of the 1973 Whitbread Round the World Race, marking the 50th Anniversary of the original event. Racing without computers, GPS, and high-tech materials, they navigate with sextants and paper charts. Seven of the fleet are former Whitbread competitors.

Starting in Southampton (UK) on September 10, the OGR is a 27,000-mile sprint around the Globe, divided into four legs that passes south of the three great Capes. The fleet is divided in three classes with stop-overs in Cape Town, South Africa; Auckland, New Zealand; and Punta del Este, Uruguay before returning to Southhampton in April 2024.

2023-24 Ocean Globe Race: FIRST LEG: Start 10 September 2023. 7670 miles. First boats finish 9-21 October 2023. SECOND LEG: Start 5 November 2023. 7250 miles. First boats finish 14-23 December 2023. THIRD LEG: Start 14 January 2024. 4980 miles. First boats finish 9-18 February 2024. FOURTH LEG: Start 5 March. 6550 miles. Finish 1-10 April 2024.

Source: OGR

Tags: Ocean Globe Race

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Final leg for 2023-24 Ocean Globe Race →

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• America's Cup Sailing Experience

Feel the thrill of the wind in your face as you sail across the Waitematā Harbour. Join our professional crew to help sail an authentic America’s Cup race yacht...

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Do you want to join the fleet click here for more information on ownership/share options, who and what we do, the mrx fleet in auckland is made up of  of 11 identical 10.3m bruce farr designed, nz made purpose-built racing yachts. they are used for national and international match racing, fleet racing and club racing., available for charter, these yachts give the thrill of racing and a chance for everyone to race like dean barker and russell coutts on the sparkling waters of waitemata harbour..

The fleet has been a key element in the development of NZ's vast talent of young sailors to national and international elite keelboat sailing culminating for many in successful America's Cup careers.

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Latest News: Pen Duick VI Man Overboard Crew Recovered at Start of McIntyre Ocean Globe Race

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× The live OGR tracker and app will be available from 1 August 2023. In the meantime, we are including a link to the live tracker page of the Golden Globe Race as an example. This is the 2022 edition but all of the features are still active if you have never seen a live map before. You can play/experiment with the top bar features and if you look at the sliding bar at the bottom you can actually replay the video of the race tracker from start to finish. We will have tutorial videos later on how to get the most out of this live tracker.

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Alone on the Ocean, With 400,000 Friends

As Cole Brauer sped to the finish of a solo race around the world, she used Instagram to blow up sailing’s elitist image.

Before she could begin the Global Solo Challenge, a nonstop solo race around the world, Cole Brauer had to sail First Light, a 40-foot yacht, from Rhode Island to Spain. Credit... Samuel Hodges

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By Chris Museler

• Published Feb. 29, 2024 Updated March 7, 2024

Video dinner parties, spa days, stuffed animals, favorite hoodies and cozy, colorful fleece blankets. Cole Brauer’s Instagram feed hardly feels like the work of someone racing a 40-foot sailboat around the world in the Global Solo Challenge. But Ms. Brauer, 29, is not an average ocean racer.

In 2022, Ms. Brauer had tried out for another competition, the Ocean Race, which is considered the pinnacle of professional ocean racing. Sailors in that race are highly trained, wear matching foul weather gear and have corporate sponsors. And most of them are men. Ms. Brauer, who had sailed thousands of miles on high performance ocean racing boats, felt she was ready to join their ranks.

But after competing in trials in France, Ms. Brauer was told she was “too short for the Southern Ocean” and was sent on her way.

In spite of her small stature — she stands 5 feet 1 inch — Ms. Brauer rounded Cape Horn, Chile, on Jan. 26, the last of the three great capes of her journey to finish the Global Solo Challenge. It is a feat most of the Ocean Race sailors picked instead of her have never even attempted. And despite being the youngest competitor in the race, she is ranked second overall, just days away from reaching the finish line in A Coruña, Spain.

Along the way, her tearful reports of breakages and failures, awe-struck moments during fiery sunrises, dance parties and “shakas” signs at the end of each video have garnered her a following that has eclipsed any sailor’s or sailing event’s online, even the Ocean Race and the America’s Cup, a prestigious race that is more well known by mainstream audiences.

“I’m so happy to have rounded the Horn,” Ms. Brauer said in a video call from her boat, First Light, after a morning spent sponging out endless condensation and mildew from its bilges. “It feels like Day 1. I feel reborn knowing I’ll be in warmer weather. The depression you feel that no one in the world can fix that. Your house is trying to sink and you can’t stop it.”

Shifting gears, she added, “It’s all getting better.”

Ms. Brauer’s rise in popularity — she has more than 400,000 followers on Instagram — has come as a surprise to her, but her achievements, combined with her bright personality, have struck a chord. And she has set a goal of using her platform to change the image of professional ocean sailing.

“Cole wants to prove you can go around the world and watch Netflix every once in a while and wear your pajamas,” said Lydia Mullan, Ms. Brauer’s media manager. “As for her mental health, she’s really creating a space in her routine for herself, to create that joy she hasn’t seen in other sailors.”

Four months after she began the Global Solo Challenge, a solo, nonstop race around the world featuring sailboats of different sizes, Ms. Brauer is holding strong. Sixteen sailors began the journey and only eight remain on the ocean, with the Frenchman Philippe Delamare having finished first on Feb. 24 after 147 days at sea.

Ms. Brauer, who was more than a week ahead of her next closest competitor as of Thursday morning, is on track to set a speed record for her boat class, and to be the first American woman to complete a solo, nonstop sailing race around the world.

Her Authentic Self

Ms. Brauer has been happy to turn the image of a professional sailor on its head. Competitors in the Ocean Race and the America’s Cup tend to pose for static social media posts with their arms crossed high on their chests, throwing stern glares. Ms. Brauer would rather be more comfortable.

She brought objects like fleece blankets on her journey, despite the additional weight, and said solo sailing has helped give her the freedom to be herself.

“Without those things I would be homesick and miserable,” she said of her supply list. “We need comfort to be human. Doing my nails. Flossing. It’s hard for the general public to reach pro sailors. People stop watching. If you treat people below you, people stop watching.”

Other female sailors have noticed the same disconnect. “The year I did the Vendée Globe, Michel Desjoyeaux didn’t mention that anything went wrong,” Dee Caffari, a mentor of Ms. Brauer’s who has sailed around the world six times, said of that race’s winner. “Then we saw his jobs list after the finish and we realized he was human.”

Ms. Brauer, as her social media followers can attest, is decidedly human.

They have gotten used to her “hangout” clothes and rock-out sessions. Her team produces “Tracker Tuesdays,” where a weather forecaster explains the routes Ms. Brauer chooses and why she uses different sails, and “Shore Team Sunday,” where team members are introduced.

“In the beginning I looked at what she was doing, posting about washing her knickers in bucket and I was like, ‘No! What are you doing?’” Ms. Caffari said. “I’ve been so professional and corporate in my career. She’s been so authentic and taken everyone around the world with her. Cole is that next generation of sailor. They tell their story in a different way and it’s working.”

Finding a Purpose

Ms. Brauer was introduced to sailing at the University of Hawaii at Manoa. Those days of casual racing on the turquoise waters of Kaneohe Bay informed her vision of an inclusive sailing community. That image was shattered when she came to the mainland to try her hand at professional sailing.

“When I came to the East Coast it was so closed off,” she said of those early experiences. “I couldn’t get a job in the industry. Pro sailors were jaded. They didn’t want anyone to take their job. It’s a gig-based economy. Competition, we’re pinned against each other, especially women in high-performance sailing since there are fewer of us.”

“This whole process of being a pro sailor over the past five years, I feel mentally punched in the face and my legs kicked out from under me,” she added. “I screamed and I cried. Without those experiences I wouldn’t be as mentally tough. It made me callused.”

A big break happened when she landed a gig as boat captain for Michael Hennessy’s successful Class40 Dragon. The boat was a perfect platform to hone her ocean sailing skills as she ripped up and down the East Coast delivering it to races, often alone, pushing Dragon to its limits. Her Instagram posts of those adventures drew attention, and she was invited to tryout for the Ocean Race, a fully crewed race around the world in powerful 65-footers.

“I was crushed,” Ms. Brauer said of being rejected after the trials.

Ms. Brauer, though, found a new purpose. After months of living in her van and working on Dragon, she found a benefactor in F.K. Day, the president of World Bicycle Relief and the executive vice president of SRAM Corporation, who, along with his brother Lincoln, agreed to buy a boat and fund a massive refit for the Global Solo Challenge, which was only three months away.

Conducting the hurricane of activity last summer in Newport, R.I., Ms. Brauer knew this was her moment to shine. But representatives for her new sponsors had reservations about her bold social media experiment.

“I got a massive pushback: ‘How can you be so vain. This isn’t important. We don’t want to pay for this,’” she said. “I said none of this is going to matter if the world can’t see it.”

Her boat was covered with cameras her shore team could monitor, with technology allowing for constant recording that could be used to capture unexpected twists. Ms. Brauer got some immediate traction, but nothing prepared her for the numbers she would hit once the race began.

“We were taking bets in Spain,” said Ms. Brauer, who had to sail First Light nearly 3,000 miles from Newport to Spain as a qualifier for the race. “There was a photo of me excited we hit 10,000 followers. Ten thousand for a little race? That’s massive.”

A few months later she has 40 times that count.

A Dangerous Journey

Only a handful of solo ocean racers have been American, all of whom being male. Now Ms. Brauer has a larger following than any of them, pushing far beyond the typical reach of her sport.

“This is a really good case study,” says Marcus Hutchinson, a project manager for ocean racing teams. “For me she’s an influencer. She’s a Kardashian. People will be looking for her to promote a product. She doesn’t need to worry about what the American sailors think. That’s parochial. She has to split with the American environment.”

Unlike her peers, Ms. Brauer is happy to do some extracurricular work along the way toward goals like competing in the prestigious Vendée Globe. “I’m part of the social media generation,” she said. “It’s not a burden to me.”

The playful videos and colorful backdrop, though, can make it easy for her followers to forget that she is in the middle of a dangerous race. Half her competitors in the Global Solo Challenge have pulled out, and ocean races still claim lives, particularly in the violent, frigid storms of the Southern Ocean.

“She was apprehensive,” Ms. Caffari said of Ms. Brauer’s rounding Cape Horn. “I told her: ‘You were devastated that you didn’t get on the Ocean Race. Now look at you. Those sailors didn’t even get to go to the Southern Ocean.’”

The question now is how Ms. Brauer will retain her followers’ desire for content after the race is over.

“She will be unaware of the transition she went through,” Mr. Hutchinson said. “She’s become a celebrity and hasn’t really realized it.”

Ms. Brauer, however, said she received as much from her followers as she gave them.

“They are so loving,” she said. “I send a photo of a sunset, and they paint watercolors of the scene to sell and raise money for the campaign. When I start to feel down, they let me stand on their shoulders.”

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