The SailGP series is a professional sailing league featuring national teams from various countries around the world competing in identical high-speed F50 catamarans.
The teams compete in a series over several individual events, each held over the course of a weekend. The events typically include two days of racing, with a number of fleet races followed by a final match race between the three teams with the most points. The teams earn points based on their finishing position in each race, with the winner receiving 10 points, second place receiving 9 points, and so on. In addition to the individual event results, points are also awarded for the overall championship standings. At the end of the season, the team with the highest number of championship points is declared the winner of the SailGP championship.
The Great Britain SailGP team is skippered by Olympian and America's Cup sailor Sir Ben Ainslie and consists of a crew of five members. The team is currently in 4th place on the overall leader board, but with a good performance in the Final event in San Francisco on the 6-7 May, they could finish on the podium.
Spinlock have been working for many years increase the number of products that are fully made in the UK to reduce lead times and excessive international logistics. All Spinlock products are currently assembled in our factory in Cowes IOW, where we also make the inflatable elements of our lifejacket range. We were keen to ensure the Great Britain SailGP teams new SailGP Pro jacket benefitted from our progress with UK based technology, materials, and processes.
The SailGP Pro jacket has exclusively been designed and produced with our new UK based supply network allowing Spinlock and Great Britain SailGP team to develop new flotation much faster in time for Season 3. At the same time this UK production has removed the need for excessive air transportation of people and materials to global locations.
Rather than produce new, the team have chosen to use fabrics that they already owned from previous garment production which ensures the most sustainable use of existing fabric, a potential reduction of landfill as well as removing the need for new fabrics to be machined and dyed.
The foam used in the flotation is also manufactured in the UK. This foam uses a unique inert nitrogen expansion process that removes many of the chemicals including Chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs) that are associated with more regular buoyancy foams – resulting in a cleaner, greener, and lighter material.
With team members, supporters and sponsors often changing and the need for new products required, the new SailGP Pro jacket has removable printed panels which can be replaced and updated with new sailor names, sponsors etc. In the past a complete new set of the flotation may have been required, requiring materials, energy, and transportation.
