A record number of athletes and projects have been nominated in this remarkable period for global sailing.

World Sailing Awards 2021 – make your voice heard

This year’s winners will be decided by public vote live on the World Sailing Awards 2021 online show on 2 December, vote now below!

Rolex World Sailor of the Year Awards: male and female categories

2021 marks the 20th year of support by Rolex for the World Sailor of the Year Award, the most prestigious individual awards of recognition in sailing.

A total of 13 athletes – including Olympic medallists, major offshore series winners, a kite world champion and new around the world record setter- have been shortlisted.

The winners will have their name engraved on the iconic marble and silver trophy depicting the globe, crowned with five silver spinnakers representing the continents, as well as a souvenir they will keep close to them forever.

World Sailing 11th Hour Racing Sustainability Award

World Sailing and 11th Hour Racing joined forces in 2018 to celebrate the delivery of high impact and replicable sustainability within the maritime industry aligned to World Sailing’s Sustainability Agenda 2030.

One of the four projects shortlisted will win the 10,000 USD prize to fund their continued sustainability efforts and the iconic trophy made from recycled carbon fibre from an America’s Cup boat infused with bio resin.

“The four finalists for the Award represent the incredible breadth of 2021 applicants,” said Todd McGuire, managing director, 11th Hour Racing. “I am enthusiastic for the future of our sport to see the variety of sustainability initiatives from working to increase diversity in sailing to removing the barriers to entry along with classes, design initiatives, and research and development working towards a circular economy.”

More about Rolex World Sailor of the Year Awards 2021

The Rolex World Sailor of the Year Award

World Sailing launched the World Sailor of the Year Awards in 1994 to reward individual sailors for outstanding achievements in the sport.

Since 2001, Rolex has sponsored these awards – this year marks the 20-year milestone of the Rolex Sailor of the Year Awards. Learn more about Rolex Sailor of the Year Awards past winners.

World Sailing’s 146 Member National Associations and its 119 Classes have nominated a record number of 39 athletes representing a total of 19 nations from across the entire discipline spectrum for the Rolex World Sailor of the Year Awards 2021.

These nominations have been shortlisted by an expert nine-strong panel, including five former World Sailing Award winners – Jo Aleh (NZL), Theresa Zabell (ESP), Santiago Lange (ARG), Mateusz Kusznierewicz (POL) and Shirley Robertson (GBR) – alongside Dee Caffari (GBR), Craig Leweck (USA), Yann Rocherieux (FRA) and Luca Rizzotti (ITA).

Rolex World Sailor of the Year Awards 2021: nominated athlete biographies

Anne-Marie Rindom (DEN)

After securing bronze at the Rio 2016 Olympic Games, Rindom went on to secure second and fourth at the 2020 European and World Championships respectively. But it was at the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games that she showed her true character – overcoming a rare starting penalty to win gold. She is now a member of the Denmark SailGP Team.

Martine Grael and Kahena Kunze (BRA)

Maintaining dominance is no easy feat, but that was the task for this duo following their gold medal at Rio 2016. As runners-up for the 2019 World title, and 12th in their last elite competition prior to Tokyo 2020, they had just 17 months to prepare for the Games. After finishing 15th in their first race in Enoshima, they leaned on their experience and found their groove to claim gold again in the women’s skiff 49er FX competition.

Hannah Mills and Eilidh McIntyre (GBR)

Mills considered a 49erFX campaign before setting out with a new teammate to repeat her Rio 2016 gold in the 470. The route was not always smooth, but placing second and fifth at the 2021 European and World Championships set them up for a dominating performance to win gold at Tokyo 2020. The 2020 Olympic result now makes Hannah Mills the most successful female Olympic sailor of all time. This was Eilidh McIntyre’s first Olympic gold, following in the footsteps of her father who won gold in the Star class at the 1988 Games.

Clarisse Crémer (FRA)

Completing the Vendée Globe – the single-handed, solo, non-stop round the world yacht race – is a major accomplishment, but Crémer, one of only six women in the 2021 field of 33 starters, shattered the women’s record in both the solo and open categories set in 2001 by Ellen MacArthur (GBR) in the same race.

Daniela Moroz (USA)

Nobody has dominated a discipline during the qualifying period of the World Sailing Awards like Moroz, who has set the standard for women through the entire evolution of kite competition. With gold at the 2019 World Beach Games contributing to her recognition in 2020 as US Sailing Rolex Yachtswoman of the Year, she stamped her authority on the Formula Kite Class by steamrolling the fleets in the 2021 European and World Championships, her fifth world title. Her ability is now being applied as a member of the United States SailGP Team.

Peter Burling and Blair Tuke (NZL)

When the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games were delayed, the carefully laid out schedule for this team suddenly became an impressive juggling act with the America’s Cup. While they followed up their Rio 2016 gold medal with wins at the 2019 and 2020 World Championships – and then successfully defended the America’s Cup – they dipped out of a second Olympic gold after a thrilling final race in Tokyo to secure silver.

Tom Slingsby (AUS)

Slingsby is one of the most successful sailors in the world, with Olympic gold at London 2012, nine World championships, the America’s Cup and numerous world records set, in addition to being crowned 2010 World Sailor of the Year. He has since been exerting his excellence among active Olympians in the Moth Class, bulleting nearly every race to claim the past two World titles – including winning the 2021 Rolex Middle Sea Race on the 100-foot Comanche – and has been setting the standard in the global sports league, earning the season 1 title and now as leader of season 2.

Yannick Bestaven (FRA)

The rapid design evolution of the IMOCA had eight of the newest breed on the start line for the Vendée Globe 2020-21, but it was Bestaven and

his earlier generation yacht that toppled the fleet of 33 starters for the win in 80:03:44:46. But before he claimed victory in the solo non-stop round the world race, the 48-year-old took part in the rescue of Kevin Escoffier whose boat effectively broke in two off the tip of South Africa, and who most likely would have died if not for the selflessness of Bestaven and others.

Kiran Badloe (NED)

The Netherlands have had a stranglehold on the men’s Olympic RS:X Windsurfing event, with Badloe offering little opportunity for others to stand above him on the podium. Within the 2021 World Sailing Awards qualifying period, he won three RS:X world titles on his road to Tokyo 2020, and then secured Olympic gold. Badloe also won the 2020 iQFOil European Championship – newcomer sport to the Olympic Games, débuting at Paris 2024.

Giles Scott (GBR)

Balancing his duties with the British Sailing Team for Tokyo 2020, and as tactician for the INEOS TEAM UK America’s Cup, Giles Scott had his hands full to repeat his gold medal winning performance in Rio 2016. Ahead of Tokyo 2020, he turned his full focus to the Finn Class, and after finishing ninth in the 2021 class world championship prior to the Games, Scott exerted his will on the fleet in Enoshima winning over half the races to take gold.

Sailing 11^th Hour Racing Sustainability Award 2021

Sail Africa Youth Development Foundation

In 2008, sailing in Durban was dominated by elite white males.

The Sail Africa Youth Development Foundation set out to change this by growing the number of sailors from across South Africa’s diverse ethnic groups – this has been successful with several sailors having been youth captains at yacht clubs, sailed the two-handed Nastro Rosa Tour, been sailor of the year at different clubs and have received Provincial sailing colours.

This earned the Sail Africa Youth Development Foundation the National Award “for changing the lives of fellow South Africans through sport” in 2016.

The Foundation has also:

focused on growing the number of girls from diverse groups through its school and University programs to empower and increase the number of girls racing and their local podium places. The Foundation coupled this with a life skills program to ensure positive sustainable outcomes. This program was profiled as a #SteeringTheCourse case study (2021).
supported the South African Government’s Blue Economy thrust, through quality maritime education programs linked to sailing. This has earned the Foundation the Ethekwini Maritime Cluster Award for Empowering Youth in 2017. The programs enhance sailing sustainability by raising awareness in non-sailors, including government, of the impact of sailing, bringing people into sailing that would never have had the opportunity and reducing inequality and ensuring social sustainability, while investing in human capital by developing education, reducing poverty and creating environmental awareness.

Foiling SuMoth Challenge

The SuMoth Challenge brings together students across the world in a competition to design, manufacture and sail a Sustainable Moth (IMCA).

The ultimate goal of the SuMoth is to promote novel sustainable design and manufacturing techniques to the industrial ground.

The students start from a blank page, allowing them to include sustainability in different aspects of the boat, from innovative design features, to material selection for its components and moulds, to the manufacturing processes and the end-of-life plans.

Unfamiliar with traditional Moths, the soon-to-be engineers are not constrained to follow the state-of-the-art manufacturing methods of foiling boats. Their innovative ideas will be the tipping actions from the traditional manufacturing methods towards more sustainable ones by putting the target into a negative CO2 emissions industrially. The three SuMoth challenge evaluations held since its foundation in 2019 allowed the teams to showcase their ideas, challenge the carbon-composites status-quo designs using bio-based alternative materials and manufacturing techniques that surprised the experts in the Jury.

To support the students coming from different backgrounds, an open-access ongoing series of technical masterclasses was developed with the most prominent academics, designers and builders around the world.

International Optimist Dinghy Association

In 2021, the international Optimist Dinghy Association (IODA), the largest youth sailing class in the world, introduced a new Program called ROPE (Recycled Optimist Parts and Equipment).

IODA aims to promote sustainability and social responsibility with its ROPE program by engaging the sailors worldwide to recycle and re-use Optimist Parts and Equipment by sharing with their peers all around the World. The purpose of the program is to promote sustainability, the circular economy, and peer-to-peer support from sailors to sailors.

The program involves sailors bringing extra equipment to IODA Championships, so it can be collected, catalogued and distributed to local sailing schools in need as well as to specific schools, clubs and countries that are in dire need of this equipment, giving it a second life and good use.

The pilot project was successfully introduced at the 2021 Optimist North American Championships in Mexico, and again at the World Championships in Italy where numerous sails and other equipment were generously donated. The recipient at the Worlds was The Yacht Club of Hyderabad Foundation Program in India, that introduces young children from under privileged families to sailing in the Optimist Dinghy.

Other sustainability initiatives of IODA include the recent introduction of a ‘Paperless Measurement System” and Mobile APP to completely eliminate the use of paper at IODA events.

Last year IODA introduced a co-branded IODA version of the World Sailing Sustainability Education Programme to Members and Optimist sailors around the globe.

Northern Light Srl

After the launch of the first eco-dinghy in 2020, this year Northern Light Srl has presented the first recyclable sportboat in the world: ecoracer.

It is the first recyclable racing boat – 7.69 meters long and built with recyclable technology including thermoplastic resin, recyclable cores and natural fibres.

The boat will be unveiled at Genoa Boat Show in September 2021.

Details of processes and tools that ensure that support World Sailing Race Officials to apply the rules of the sport consistently.