Start: 26 July 2025
Marking the 100th anniversary of the Royal Ocean Racing Club, the 2025 edition of the Rolex Fastnet Race is certain to be a special one.
Marking the 100th anniversary of the Royal Ocean Racing Club, the 2025 edition of the Rolex Fastnet Race is certain to be a special one. From its humble beginnings, the race upon which the RORC was founded, has grown to become the world’s biggest offshore race, with 430 yachts competing in 2023. The next edition will start from Cowes on 26th July 2025 and finish, for a third time, in Cherbourg-en-Cotentin, France; a course of 695 miles.
Rolex Fasnet Race at Needles © ROLEX/Kurt Arrigo
MAKING HISTORY
In 1925, before offshore racing was even a sport in the UK, seven cruising yachts and their valiant crews embarked on what was then called ‘the Ocean Race’. Inspired by the Newport Bermuda Race, the UK equivalent was started from off Ryde by the Royal Victoria Yacht Club, headed anti-clockwise around the Isle of Wight, before beating west to Land’s End, crossing the Celtic Sea to the Fastnet rock and back, then returning to finish off Plymouth.
The first race was won by Lt Cdr E G Martin, RNVR and Jolie Brise, his converted Le Havre pilot cutter (to date the only boat to have won the race three times). At the finish, during a party at the Royal Western Yacht Club, the Ocean Racing Club was founded (becoming ‘Royal’ in 1931) with Martin its first Commodore.
Since then the race has been won by some of the world’s most famous racing yachts, such as Dorade (1931-33) - the boat that launched designers Sparkman & Stephens; John Illingworth's Myth of Malham (1947-49); Dick Nye's Carina II (1955-57); Eric Tabarly's Pen Duick III (1967); Dick Carter's Rabbit (1965) and Red Rooster (1969); Ted Turner's Tenacious (1979); Ludde Ingvall's Nicorette (winner of the 'double' - overall and line honours in 1995); Hasso Plattner's Morning Glory (1997); Charles Dunstone's Nokia-Connecting People (2003) and Niklas Zennström's Rán 2 (2009-2011).
Jolie Brise rounds the Fastnet © Rick Tomlinson
ADMIRAL’S CUP RETURNS
To celebrate their centenary, the RORC has reintroduced the Admiral’s Cup, recognised in its day as the premier event in offshore racing. While originally this was for three boat national teams, to encourage participation the 2025 Admiral’s Cup is for teams of two boats (1: IRC TCC 1.280-1.464 LH 13.41-17.20m; 2: IRC TCC 1.100-1.276 LH 11-13.40m) entered by yacht clubs or countries. To emphasise the Admiral’s Cup’s grand prix credentials, there are no restrictions on professional crew. Its programme will start with the short offshore Race (19th July) followed by three days of inshore racing (22nd – 24th July), culminating in the Rolex Fastnet Race.
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Team Caro with the Fastnet Challenge Cup © ROLEX/Kurt Arrigo
The RORC’s Racing Manager and Admiral’s Cup Race Director, Steve Cole comments: “The take-up we are seeing for the Admiral’s Cup is very encouraging. It looks like some of yacht racing’s very top teams will be taking part and several are building new boats especially, just like they did back in the heyday of the event in the 1980s… Even though it is 22 years since it was last held, the Admiral’s Cup is still recognised as one of the top competitions in sailing.”
Rolex Fasnet Race fleet © ROLEX//Carlo Borlenghi
DIVERSE FASTNET FLEET
The bulk of the fleet will once again race under the worldwide respected IRC rating system and will compete, just as they did in 1925, for the Fastnet Challenge Cup. As usual the IRC fleet will be divided into classes - IRC Super Zero, Zero, 1-4 (with 1-4 having two sub-divisions), plus an ever-growing IRC Two Handed class. The closest racing will be found here alongside the battles-within-a-battle inside the classes such as the 16 Jeanneau Sun Fast 3600s that competed in 2023.
Entries will span maxi yachts to former VO70s and VO65s of the Ocean Race, to leading grand prix 40 and 50 footers (many racing for the Admiral’s Cup), to more casual weekend racers and family teams, plus others from sailing schools for whose crews the Rolex Fastnet Race is likely to represent the pinnacle of their sailing careers. The fleet will be augmented with the latest running of ocean racing’s oldest event, the Transatlantic Race (first held in 1866), running west to east from Newport, RI on 18 June 2025 bound for the Lizard and Cowes.
The majority of the fleet will race under the RORC’s IRC rating system © ROLEX/Carlo Borlenghi
However, some of the Rolex Fastnet Race’s most high-profile entries will race outside of the IRC fleet - the Class 40, IMOCA, Ultim 32/23, MOCRA multihull and Ocean Fifty. In 2025 all eyes will be on the IMOCAs which over the previous winter will have been racing round the world singlehanded in the Vendée Globe. In the last two editions of the Rolex Fastnet Race, the IMOCA winner has been Charlie Dalin, first on Apivia and in then, in 2023, on MACIF, winning by four minutes, from Yoann Richomme’s Arkea Paprec. The Rolex Fastnet Race is in the official class programmes for the IMOCA and Class40.
Ultim 32/23, the 32m long ‘flying’ trimarans © ROLEX/Carlo Borlenghi
The fastest offshore race boats on the planet are also expected to return in the Ultim 32/23, the 32m long ‘flying’ trimarans. Earlier this year six Ultims raced solo non-stop around the world in the Arkea Ultime Challenge Brest with the resounding winner being Charles Caudrelier's Maxi Edmond de Rothschild (the 2021 Rolex Fastnet Race’s Open Multihull Class winner). In 2023 first home in the Rolex Fastnet Race was Francois Gabart’s SVR Lazartigue. Over next winter many are planning attempts on the Jules Verne Trophy for sailing around the world non-stop in the shortest possible time.
Prior to the start the RORC will be hosting a party featuring many of the past winners of the race at its expanded and newly refurbished clubhouse in Cowes.
Entry for the Rolex Fastnet Race will open on 14th January 2025 and the RORC is confident that with the extra entries from the Admiral’s Cup and the Transatlantic Race, 2023's record of 430 starts will be broken.
The much coveted Fastnet Challenge Cup © Arthur Daniel/ROR
Once again the RORC is working on the finish with L’Association Arrivée Fastnet Cherbourg in partnership with the town of Cherbourg-en-Cotentin, Communauté d’Agglomération du Cotentin, the Départemental de la Manche and Régional Normandie.
