The annual highlight of the 44Cup season gets underway tomorrow with the opening day of the World Championship for the twelve RC44 yachts. This year’s 16th edition will be the first time that the high performance owner-driver one designs have visited the Netherlands.
That the World Championship is taking place here in the Netherlands is courtesy of Team Charisma’s owner, Monaco-based Dutchman Nico Poons. “I'm more than pleased with how its developing,” said Poons earlier from the Yacht Club Scheveningen, whose waterborne clubhouse is based in the Tweede haven within Scheveningen Harbour. “The weather is of course a variable. So far so good but let's see what it gives.”
Most significantly, this is a World Championship, the event to which all the teams, owners and sailors annually aspire. “We all have new sails for the Worlds, so that's all normal, but we do put in more effort too,” says Poons, who knows all about this, having won back-to-back RC44 World Championship titles in 2021 and 2022. “The crew naturally is more focused for this event. I think all the boats and crews are more focused. I'm more than happy with the team. But Team Nika is also very strong these days.”
Of the 12 teams, there is strong Dutch representation across the fleet. Another Dutch owner joined the fleet for the last event in Marstrand, Sweden as a prelude to competing at this week’s Worlds. Jan Scholtes’ Warp 5 is back with a new tactician in Britain’s double Olympic silver medallist Nick Rogers plus German Siri Segger. Scheveningen is one of the homeports for Scholtes’ boats and he is pleased to be part of the 44Cup’s debut in his country. So what can we expect this week? “Big waves, currents,” he says. “It's deep enough water that you can get pretty close to the shore. But because of all the infrastructural works along the coast, the Port of Rotterdam and some other artificially created structures, you have very interesting currents.” Scholtes has been training with his crew for the last two days. “The aim is not to be last at this event.”
He has three Dutch crew with him in main trimmer Wouter Roos, grinder Jelle Janzen and offside trimmer Sander Speet. “We can expect a variety of conditions,” comments Speet, who last raced here seven years ago in the ORC World Championship. “It looks like the next few days are going to be quite nice with up to 15 knots. Then on Sunday it could be pretty windy. And with the wind comes the waves as well, so it could be quite bumpy too.
“The current has a massive effect on the race course – one hour either side of the tide turning it gets super interesting.”
Naturally of the teams, Team Charisma has the strongest Dutch contingent in Olympian Nicholas Heiner, Dimitri Simmons, Robin Jacobs and Ivan Peute, but the most capped Dutch sailor is certainly Dirk ‘Cheese’ de Ridder, main sheet trimmer on Team CEEREF Vaider. His enormous sailing CV includes winning the 2001-02 Volvo Ocean Race with illbruck Challenge (whose teammate Don Cowey is coaching Warp 5 here), winning the America’s Cup in 2010 as wing trimmer on Larry Ellison’s monster trimaran USA17 and winning the Audi MedCup on Mean Machine in 2006.
De Ridder has reached that stage in his career where most of his professional sailing usually takes place in warmer climes. “I think I did one day of a national championship with my uncle here probably 10 years ago.That was the last time I sailed here,” says de Ridder. “It's nice to be here. The family will be around and there'll be people I know coming.” Typically the sailing in his youth was to south of here, in Zeeland, but he says: “There was always the annual regatta here and the North Sea Regatta, which has been a huge regatta here in Holland and I did a lot of those.”
As to the form going into this World Championship, the favourite is certainly Vladimir Prosikhin’s Team Nika, which is not only leading the 2025 44Cup, having won the last two events in Marstand and in Porto Cervo, but is also the defending RC44 World Champion from 2024.
Charisma has the know-how having twice been World Champion in recent history and winning the first event of the 2025 season at Nanny Cay in the British Virgin Islands. Similarly Team Aqua of RC44 Class President Chris Bake has won the World Championship twice (in 2019 and 2021) but has struggled to find consistency this season.
Hugues Lepic is back on the helm of Aleph Racing which has posted two seconds at events this year. Both Artemis Racing teams have enjoyed podium finishes in 2025 - Torbjörn Törnqvist’s Artemis Racing was second in Porto Cervo where GeMera Racing, skippered by his son Markus, was third. Team Ceeref Vaider has not won a World Championship since 2016 when she also won the season (as the Slovenian team did again in 2017 and 2019). Christian Zuerrer’s Black Star Sailing Team was second at last year’s World Championship which his team hosted in Brunnen, Switzerland.
Beyond this the new 44Cup teams of Warp 5, Daniel Calero’s Lanzarote Calero Sailing and Mehmet Taki's WOW! Sailing Team will have their own race within a race.
Conditions for the next four days are forecast to be modest from the southwest tomorrow and steadily building over the weekend.