Defending champions highlight list of favorites for 2025 Rolex Invitational Cup

by Stuart Streuli, New York Yacht Club 5 Sep 10:03 NZST September 6-13, 2025

2025 Rolex New York Yacht Club Invitational Cup © Rolex / Daniel Forster

With three consecutive podium finishes, culminating in a highly rewarding win in 2023, the San Diego Yacht Club (above, in 2023) is at the top of the list of favorites for the 2025 Rolex New York Yacht Club Invitational Cup.

"San Diego has done very well at this event," says Jake La Dow, the team's tactician in 2019 and 2021. "We want to keep building on that. We're still hungry to keep getting better."

Those could be ominous words for the other 19 teams competing this September. La Dow is taking over the helm from Tyler Sinks, with tactician Adam Roberts, main trimmer Rick Merriman, and core crew members Lucy Wallace, Nick Martin and Max Hutcheson all returning from the winning 2023 crew. It's a potent mix of experience and new blood. But a closer look reveals that the West Coast club has company at the top of the form guide, and the chase for the ninth edition of the biennial regatta is more wide open than it initially seemed.

How to Follow the 2025 Rolex NYYC Invitational Cup.

Twenty teams from 12 countries will compete in the ninth Rolex New York Yacht Club Invitational Cup, a biennial regatta hosted by the New York Yacht Club Harbour Court in Newport, R.I. Since the event was first run in 2009, it has attracted top amateur sailors from 52 of the world's most prestigious yacht clubs from 23 countries.

After five editions in the Swan 42 class, the 2025 event will be the fourth sailed in the IC37, designed by Mark Mills. The strict one-design nature of this purpose-built class, combined with the fact that each boat is owned and maintained by the New York Yacht Club, ensures a level playing field not seen in any other amateur big-boat sailing competition. The regatta will run from Saturday, September 6, through Saturday, September 13, with racing starting on Tuesday, September 9. A live broadcast on Facebook and YouTube, starting on Wednesday, September 10, will allow fellow club members, friends, family and sailing fans from around the world to follow the action as it happens. The 2025 Rolex New York Yacht Club Invitational Cup is brought to you by title sponsor Rolex and regatta sponsors Helly Hansen, Safe Harbor Marinas and Peters & May.

For those that place a lot of value on experience, Royal Thames Yacht Club is an easy add to the list of favorites. The team didn't sail in 2023 but finished second in 2021 and won the event in 2015. Helmsman John Greenland, who has sailed in seven Invitational Cups, returns, as does tactician Ian Dobson and the father-son duo of William and Freddie Edwards.

2025 Rolex New York Yacht Club Invitational Cup - photo © Paul Todd / OUTSIDEIMAGES.COM

"We've got a slightly different team [than 2021]," says Dobson. "But we think our team this year is the best it's ever been on paper. It's about turning that paper into practice, learning from the mistakes that we make, make sure we don't make them again, and progressing, and progressing."

In addition to training on their home waters of the Solent in an IC37, the team made a trip to Newport to compete in the IC37 Nationals in July, finishing a respectable sixth of 26 entries.

"There's a huge correlation between the teams that come here and do the training events and the results in the Invitational cup," says William Edwards, who will once again serve as the team's emotional center. "I think there were 10 Invitational Cup teams [at the National Championship]. I will put money on the fact that at least eight of them will be in the top 10 or 12 in the [Invitational Cup final standings]."

2025 Rolex New York Yacht Club Invitational Cup - photo © Rolex / Daniel Forster

Royal Hong Kong Yacht Club (at right) is another one with a tremendous depth of experience. Team leader Nick Burns sailed in the inaugural edition in 2009 and nearly each one since. The team has largely toiled in the mid-fleet, but found a successful combination in 2023 with helmsman Peter Backe and 19-year-old tactician Duncan Gregor, and finished fifth.

"I've got a couple years more experience racing, so hopefully we'll use that a do a bit better this year," said Gregor. "We'll see how we get on."

Corinthian Yacht Club of Marblehead, Mass., can't match the collective experience of the Royal Thames or Royal Hong Kong teams, but that didn't stop it from finishing second in its first Invitational Cup in 2023. The club has been on something of a tear of late winning the Global Team Race Regatta in Italy in 2024 and World Sailing's Team Racing World Championship a few months ago. And it returns with seven of the nine sailors that sailed in 2023.

"We had a meeting at the beginning of the summer, and really just took a look back at things we did well, and things we needed to work on," said returning skipper Wade Waddell. "We thought our speed outside in the ocean was something we needed to work on. And then just this idea that everyone's getting better, every iteration of the Invitational Cup the level keeps going up. If we roll back to Newport at the same level that we were at in 2023, that might not even get us in the top five."

2025 Rolex New York Yacht Club Invitational Cup - photo © Paul Todd / OUTSIDEIMAGES.COM

Of course, one should never dismiss the home team. Competing on home waters comes with a unique set of advantages and disadvantages, the latter of which may be less obvious but has played a roll in the team's consistently good, but not spectacular, finishes in the IC37 era: sixth, fifth and fourth respectively. Skipper Hannah Swett (at left) is a first-time Invitational Cup competitor, but a tremendously accomplished sailor, having competed in the 1995 America's Cup and campaigned for the Olympics a handful of times. She and her team, including tactician John Alden Meade and main trimmer Dave Scott, have spent the summer aggressively sailing the IC37.

"It's high pressure because there are going to be a lot of eyes on us," says Swett. "But the great thing about this team is that we've all done pretty high-pressure regattas. We're going to be able to check it in a little bit; we'll be able to handle it."

Yacht Club de Ilhabela from Brazil is a complete newcomer to the Invitational Cup, but the performance of Corinthian and Royal New Zealand Yacht Squadron, both of which made the podium in 2023 despite little previous experience with the event, shows that rookies can succeed. In the search for a wild card to add to the list of teams to watch, Yacht Club de Ilhabela of Brazil, with 2008 Olympic silver medalist Gintare Scheidt calling tactics, is worth a look.

2025 Rolex New York Yacht Club Invitational Cup, invited clubs: