Wednesday of North Sails Cowes Week’s 200th edition belonged to the Britannia Cup, the trophy King George VI put up in 1950 for the regatta’s biggest boats. For the past few years organisers have combined IRC Class Zero, Class One and the Cape 31s into one super-fleet to contest it, and with North Sails CEO Sam Watson firing the start gun, it was the TP52s that made the long, tide-against-wind beat to the west pay off: Karl Kwok’s Hong Kong-flagged Beau Geste took the top four places on the water for TP52s and carried the Britannia Cup home.
The Cape 31s had already had their moment earlier in the week. When the same three classes combined for day one’s Queens Cup, presented by the Royal Southampton Yacht Club, Dean Barker’s IRC Zero boat Ino Veritas looked the likely winner until Barker was called over the start line early. That put the Cup in the hands of Julian Metherell’s Cape 31 Bullit instead, Metherell’s second win in the combined trophies after taking both of them in 2025.
Beau Geste went on to beat the Cape 31s again on the Thursday, adding the New York Yacht Club Challenge Cup to its Britannia Cup. But across the week’s own Cape 31 series, raced separately from the combined-trophy days, it was Bullit that came out on top, ahead of Lance Adams’s Katabatic and Christian Hamilton sailing Guy Gillon’s Khumbu, when the regatta’s 156 trophies were handed out.
First raced in 1826, Cowes Week drew more than 640 boats and around 5,000 sailors across 36 classes for its 200th year, under new title sponsor North Sails. Friday night’s fireworks over Cowes Green returned after a six-year gap to close out the week; Lone Star, sailed by Phil Lawrence, David King and Nik Froud, topped the regatta overall.
