Full Race Recap: Rolex Switzerland Sail Grand Prix 2026: Slingsby’s Swiss soul-searching and glory for Los Gallos
Los Gallos win at 8.33, Tom Slingsby misses out in dramatic circumstances for a second event running, two teams are all but in the Grand Final and how two of our pre-event tips came good; here’s your betting lowdown on what happened in Geneva this week.
Los Gallos make it three from four
When all was said and done, Los Gallos SailGP Team won the Rolex Switzerland Sail Grand Prix after going off at pre-event odds of 8.33.
It was their third event win of the season, but proof of the fact that they’ve been the dominant, in-form team in the second half of the season so far is that it was also their third win in five, after also finishing top of the pile at the Canada Sail Grand Prix in late June and the Emirates Great Britain Sail Grand Prix in late July.
But when they weren’t winning, they were still making the podium; add two runner-up spots and two third-place finishes to those three wins, and, as ever, consistency has been the name of the game for Diego Botin and his crew.
They’re now on 78 points for the season, and though overtaking the the Bonds Flying Roos SailGP Team, on 94 points, seems unlikely, that won’t matter one bit to the Spanish team.
That’s because their latest victory means they’ve now virtually booked their place in the Mudabala Abu Dhabi Sail Grand Prix 2026 Season Grand Final presented by Abu Dhabi Sports Council.
They’re ‘mathematically’ there, as they say in football, barring any penalty points awarded from here to the end, so it would take a ‘complete disaster ’, as we put it in our Switzerland SailGP event review, to stop them from being in that Grand Final.
So they’re highly likely to be in that Grand Final, with an excellent chance of adding to the Championship title they secured a couple of years ago.
Slingsby’s missed opportunity…again.
What the above doesn’t tell you is that Tom Slingsby should really have been the one celebrating in front of the fans at the end of Sunday’s racing.
Slingsby himself called it a “copy-and-paste performance of September’s Valencia event”, when the Americans stunned the Aussies in the final.
So what happened when it mattered most in Geneva?
In the words of SailGP’s Miranda Blazeby:
“An excellent start off the line set the Australians up for a commanding race, but their decision to turn right at Gate 1 proved a mistake.
“Diego Botin’s Los Gallos split the course in response and gained the upper hand when the pair came back together.
From there, Los Gallos moved ahead, defending their lead and crossing the finish line to seize the event title.”
It was a missed opportunity acknowledged by that man, Slingsby, after the day’s racing:
“I’m never happy with second, and to come second twice in a row and lose a lead – that’s what’s breaking me.”
High standards indeed, but that’s why Slingsby won the Rolex SailGP Championship in each of the first three seasons, and why he’s currently top again this year.
Will we get a fifth different winner before the season is up?
On another note, yet another win for Los Gallos keeps us at four different event winners for the season, with the Bonds Flying Roos, the Emirates Great Britain SailGP Team and the U.S. SailGP Team as the others.
Last season, eight different event winners emerged after five different teams won the first five events of the campaign.
We know there certainly won’t be eight this season with just two events to go, but it will be interesting to see if we at least get a fifth different team celebrating on Sunday evening before the season is up.
Tough to split the Bonds Flying Roos and Los Gallos for 2026 glory
It wasn’t so long ago that, before that win in Halifax, Los Gallos were available at some big odds to win a second SailGP title, but with their place in that Grand Final now all but guaranteed, the bookies have cut them to a price of 2.74, unsurprisingly the lowest price they’ve been all season.
That’s still a shade shorter than the 2.6 the Aussies are available at – who are also guaranteed their place in the Grand Final barring penalty points – with the next most-likely team to win the 2026 season being the Artemis SailGP Team, on offer at 4.68.
Can Artemis win it in their debut season?
The Swedes are on 59 points after a seventh-place finish in Geneva that, in hindsight, wasn’t actually a bad result for them.
That’s because the teams most likely to steal that third spot from them – the U.S. SailGP Team and the Emirates Great Britain SailGP Team – both finished below them in Switzerland, with the former rock bottom in 13th and the latter ninth.
However, the Americans’ performance needs some context.
In a barely believable double-injury blow, inspirational driver Taylor Canfield was ruled out through injury, as was reserve athlete Harry Melges, leaving driver duties to Martine Greal, who had recently left the Mubadala Brazil SailGP Team and was available to step in. But as we know, things didn’t go their way anyway.
As SailGP commentator Stevie Morrison put it:
“It was always going to be a challenging weekend for the Americans.”
So the Brits are now on 53 points, the Americans on 56 points, and it’s still all to play for in that regard, though the Swedes’ current points lead means both those two are longer in the betting than Nathan Outteridge’s team.
It’s 14.5 that Dylan Fletcher defends the title he won last year, and 8.51 that the Americans become only the fourth team to win a SailGP Championship.
A good weekend for readers of our betting previews
Finally, a reminder that our betting previews of the SailGP Championship are mostly there to talk you through the latest odds on different betting markets, recap past results, and highlight some stats, rather than acting as a traditional tipping column.
Still, we do mention some good value bets where possible, and last week’s advised bets were on Los Gallos to make the final at 2.33 and for the Bonds Flying Roos to get a better event result than the Black Foils SailGP Team at 1.64, which they did.
We would have had a clean sweep had Artemis also made the final at 3.85, but as Slingsby will know only too well after this weekend’s events, it wasn’t to be.
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