Olympic great makes stunning SailGP debut
Quadruple Olympic gold medallist Sir Ben Ainslie has made a stunning SailGP debut, leading Great Britain to a first-day clean sweep in Sydney, where defending champions Australia have struggled.
The British team won all three races on Friday on Sydney Harbour to collect a maximum haul of 30 points.
Defending champions Australia, who dominated the corresponding event in last year's inaugural series, collected diminishing returns with each race, logging a second, third and fifth.
Tom Slingsby's team finished the day on 23 points, joint second with Japan, skippered by another Olympic gold medallist, Nathan Outteridge.
In winds ranging between 10 and 20 knots, the British boat dominated proceedings for most of the first two races, but came from behind to pip Spain for victory in the third.
Spain were penalised points for a first-race collision with France, who were off the line the quickest of the seven boats.
The French boat was unable to contest the last two races.
Japan, who were penalised for breaking the start in race one, collided with the United States a little later in the same race, but fought back to cross third behind Britain and Australia.
The second race was delayed due to telemetry issues, but the British held off a strong early challenge from the US to notch another win.
The Brits completed their sweep by proving they could win from behind, while Australia spent most of the third race towards the back of the six-boat fleet.
Two more fleet races will be held on Saturday with the top-two pointscorers after the five qualifiers meeting in a match-race final.
Australian Associated Press