Australia’s hopes of reaching the SailGP grand final have received a boost after a crash damaged France’s rudder ahead of the final regatta of the season in San Francisco.
The French boat hit an unidentified object - likely to have been either a seal or timber set adrift in San Francisco Bay - just after unmooring for Friday afternoon’s final practice session (local time).
French driver Quentin Delapierre deemed participating in the three crucial practice races too risky for his boat and watched on as the flotilla’s remaining nine vessels familiarised themselves with the Bay’s heavy conditions.
France will hope a replacement rudder can be installed for the first day of fleet races on Saturday and that further inspection reveals no additional damage.
"Obviously you've got to keep the boat in one piece on these windy days," New Zealand driver Peter Burling told AAP.
"I thought it was a bit weird they couldn't get their rudder on before the day's sailing but they obviously had some more things they wanted to check out, or something."
Currently fourth on the season leaderboard, France are jostling with Australia and Spain for the two remaining spots in the grand final after ladder-leaders New Zealand qualified early.
Denmark and Canada are also remote chances of making the cut, though their hopes hinge on higher-ranking boats incurring penalty points or finishing the event in last place.
Neither can oust Australia from contention unless the reigning champions lose points.
To qualify themselves, France need to shine in the weekend’s five fleet races and move into the top three of the season leaderboard.
But if the boat is unable to bounce back from the crash, second-placed Australia and third-placed Spain are all but assured of booking a spot in Sunday’s $US2 million ($A3m) winner-take-all grand final, provided neither lose penalty points.
Australia performed strongly in the final practice races, reaching speeds above 95km/h - just shy of the league record set by France (99.94km/h) in 2022.
Switzerland and Spain each came close to capsizing during the practice races, with Swiss skipper Nathan Outteridge pulling off a miracle recovery to save his boat.
Burling said on a day as windy as Friday it was lucky only one boat ended up damaged.
"There were a lot of close incidents across the race track," he told AAP.
"To not have a decent incident across the whole day across the entire fleet, apart from France, was pretty awesome."
Australian driver Tom Slingsby believes lessons learned during a tumultuous season will play into his boat's hands ahead of the last regatta.
Champions across the first three seasons of the high-speed sailing league, Australia have endured a lukewarm fourth campaign, especially since winning their home event on Sydney harbour in February.
Australia crashed into a race mark in the follow-up event in Christchurch, losing eight season points as a penalty and finishing the regatta in last place, before tech issues in Bermuda and a capsize in Halifax also conspired against Slingsby and co.
“It’s been highs and lows but I do feel like it’s only made us stronger,” Slingsby told AAP.
“We’ve been through so many different scenarios this year and we’ve pulled through as a squad and we’re going to continue to do that.”
Australia will draw confidence from their record on San Francisco Bay, winning the finals of all three previous events there.
“We’ve done three events and won all three, convincingly,” Slingsby said.
