Miami’s Biscayne Bay will next week play host to the first ISAF Sailing World Cup regatta of 2015, with a strong British cast set to do battle across the 13 Olympic and Paralympic events, including windsurfing. The RYA report on Shaw’s chances and why Dempsey won’t compete…

More than 800 sailors from 63 nations will contest the regatta (26-31 January) as 2015 sharpens the focus towards Olympic and Paralympic qualification for Rio 2016.

The 64-strong British line-up can therefore expect to some tough competition at the six-day Miami regatta, where they claimed five titles at the last edition 12 months ago.

Bryony Shaw, kicked off her season with Miami World Cup gold last year, will also be hoping her current golden streak continues.

The 31-year-old has won three regattas over the past three months – the ISAF Sailing World Cup Final in Abu Dhabi, the Copa Brasil de Vela on the Rio 2016 waters in December, and the RS:X Midwinter Championships – a warm-up event to the World Cup held in Miami last weekend and where teammate Izzy Hamilton also claimed silver.

Tom Squires will fly the flag in the RS:X Men’s event with Olympic silver medallist Nick Dempsey failing to secure an entry in the over-subscribed men’s windsurfing event.

“Miami typically provides some great winter racing, and there’s a strong entry across the classes this year as nations start to increase their focus on which sailors might represent them at the Rio Games next year,” explained RYA Olympic Manager Stephen Park.

“There’s a larger entry than we’re used to seeing here which, in addition to the continually increasing quality of competition, sees many nations trying to take advantage of Miami as the final 200 point ranking event prior to the new sailing World Cup format being introduced for Hyeres in April with a limited entry of 40 boats per class.

“For the first time ever it appears that the world ranking system is going to have a true purpose for Olympic Classes sailing.

“It’s ironic that this event has such large fleet numbers and a system where some top sailors from around the world have fallen foul of an entry system based on ‘first come first served’ rather than quality on the ranking list or MNA nomination,” Park concluded.

The ISAF Sailing World Cup Miami kicks off on Monday 26 January, with final medal races for the Olympic Classes on Saturday 31 January.

Stay with us at www.britishsailingteam.com, on Facebook on Twitter @BritishSailing for all the action on Biscayne Bay.