Tom Slingsby and the other SailGP drivers are expecting adrenaline fuelled racing and possible carnage after practising on the tight race track ahead of the first ever Dubai Sail Grand Prix presented by P&O Marinas this weekend.
In the press conference, Slings by commented on the course saying, “It’s very tight, and if we get a bit of breeze, which is expected on Sunday, it will be a handful. It will be exciting for you guys but it will be scary for us.”
“It’s your equivalent of a street track in F1 where whoever gets off cleanly and gets in front will be pretty hard to overtake,” Slingsby added.
On the current Championship leaderboard, it is a condensed mid-fleet line up, with just 10 points separating Denmark in sixth and New Zealand in second. Two-timing defending champion, Australia, meanwhile remains in first place with 50 points.
Although the Australian’s sit at the top of the leaderboard, the team’s absence on the winner’s podium for the past four events hasn’t gone unnoticed.
Slingsby defended his team’s recent performance saying: “Nothing’s been going wrong, it’s just a testament to SailGP that it’s just getting stronger and stronger. We’re still improving and getting better all the time but the other teams have caught up.”
“It is weird making the finals and not winning them, because we’ve had a good run for a while, but we’re still really happy that we’re at the top of the scoreboard.”
Racing takes place in Dubai between 22:00-23:30 AEDT today and Sunday. Australian fans can tune in live on Fox Sports and on Kayo in Australia to watch the racing. Kayo is offering fans free access to both the live and replay racing, via its Kayo Freebies offer.
