Dream team unveiled: Slingsby, Simmer and Ashby to lead Team Australia America’s Cup challenge

Tom Slingsby, Glenn Ashby and Grant Simmer will head up the WInning’s Team Australia challenge. Crosbie Lorimer reports from their America’s Cup team unveiling

Nestling snugly amongst some of Sydney’s most desirable real estate on the shoreline of the exclusive Point Piper headland, the Royal Prince Edward Yacht Club – invitation only, membership 500 – would not be well known to many, even amongst regular Sydney Harbour sailors.

But all that changed very suddenly with Wednesday’s official announcement that the club is to be the sixth Challenger for the 38th America’s Cup. The club hosted the first Australian bid for the Auld Mug in 26 years, funded by the highly successful – and aptly named – Winning family.

With a large media contingent packed tightly on the club’s sunlit terrace, overlooking a sparkling Sydney Harbour, the core members of Team Australia were introduced.

Tom Slingsby to co-helm

Led by team CEO Grant Simmer, for whom this will be a record-breaking 13th America’s Cup campaign, the nominated team thus far comprises Tom Slingsby as Head of Sailing and co-helm, Glenn Ashby leading Design and Performance, and Tash Bryant, who has been the Flying Roos SailGP strategist for the last four years.

Tom Slingsby (left) co-helmed for American Magic in the 37th America’s Cup with Paul Goodison (right). Photo: American MagicSimmer’s current focus is on selecting the remaining team members. Even allowing for the number of Australians already signed up for other teams (Nathan Outteridge at Emirates Team New Zealand for one), he is left with no shortage of impressive candidates from which to choose.

“My job is to pull together a good team and create a culture in that team. And if we can create the sort of culture that we had in the team of Australia II that would be a huge achievement,” said Simmer, who also feels confident that their tight program has some advantages:

“The nice thing about tight on time and a pretty tight on budget – tight but adequate – is that you don’t waste time on science projects!”

Speaking online while in transit from the recent Bermuda Sail GP event, Tom Slingsby was clearly delighted to be skippering an all-Australian team, having previously been a member of the US Oracle team that won the Cup in 2013.

Winning the America’s Cup with Oracle in 2013. Photo: Gilles Martin-RagetReferring to the long gap between Australian challenges for the Cup, Tom Slingsby recalled a conversation he had with his then room-mate Glenn Ashby just prior to the 2008 Olympics,

“I remember us saying ‘One day we’ll get our shot’ and it’s been almost 20 years since then, but here we are!”

Ashby comes in swinging

For Glenn Ashby, just being present in person at the announcement was an extraordinary achievement, barely five days after breaking his leg in Bermuda during a SailGP race and undergoing surgery, before flying home to Australia.

Channelling his own gritty character, which has seen him making little of a very significant injury, Ashby responded to a question about how the team would deal with the challenge of a very short runway to the Cup racing in 2027 with some classic Aussie idiom:

“One of the strengths of our country is that we’re happy to lean in, swing hard and have a go!”

Glenn Ashby after the 2017 America’s cup win. Photo: Emirates Team New Zealand

Tash Bryant wasn’t even born when the 26-year-old Grant Simmer navigated Australia II to its famous 1983 victory and was only a nine year old novice sailor when she watched Tom Slingsby and his skipper Jimmy Spithill pull off the much-celebrated comeback win for the US Oracle team in 2013.

Bryant recalls watching women in the Olympics and aspiring to be an elite sailor like them, so she is well aware of the role she can now play for the next generation.

“To see those 13 and 14-year-old girls around the world watching us race on a huge stage, at the highest level of our sport, it gives me goose bumps to think about it,” she said.

Australia II powers to victory in 1983. Photo: Gilles Martin-Raget

New Zealand collaboration

Team Australia has acquired New Zealand’s 2021 Cup boat Te Rehutai which is currently undergoing significant surgery with the help of Emirates Team New Zealand, with whom Team Australia is collaborating on design and construction. A new bow section is being built in Australia, while all of the electrics, hydraulics, foils, rigging and sails will also be renewed.

The six other Challengers and Defender Team Emirates will no doubt be pleased to see an Australian team back at the Cup, but they will also have good reason to fear them.

The post Dream team unveiled: Slingsby, Simmer and Ashby to lead Team Australia America’s Cup challenge appeared first on Yachting World.