The Yacht Club de Monaco team of Jolt 6, skippered by Pierre Casiraghi and Jolt 3, skippered by Peter Harrison, has won the 2025 Admiral’s Cup after a high tension finish to the event’s conclusion, the 2025 Rolex Fastnet Race.

Monaco finished with a 19-point advantage over the Royal Hong Kong YC entry after the leading boats in both the big boat AC1 and smaller AC2 fleets poured into Cherbourg in a frenetic night of finishes that saw over a dozen boats over the line within an hour from 2130 on Tuesday 29 July.

The final deadline for protests is six hours after the last boat in the event has finished. As the slowest boat in the fleet (Hamburg’s Edelweiss) wasn’t due to finish until this evening – and there were rumours aplenty of potential protests on the Cherbourg docks as the big boats approached – organisers RORC did not immediately confirming the Monaco team as winners, with the crews were being equally circumspect.

Monaco’s Jolt 3 team celebrate after moving into the lead of the Admiral’s Cup overall on the provisional results after the Rolex Fastnet Race.

Monaco win Admiral’s Cup

Ocean racer Will Harris was navigating the smaller Jolt 6 Carkeek 40, which won AC2 by just 2 minutes 45 seconds on corrected time. Harris explained on the dock straight after finishing:

“We were coming into this race in second place overall on the scoreboard with the Beau Ideal and Beau Geste team. And yeah, we think we’ve just managed to beat them into the finish line there, but we’ve still got to keep our fingers crossed and see how the other teams go.

“We know we’ve done everything we can and we’ll just have to see. But it’s a big relief to be here at the finish line.”

Ed Baird helms with an all-star team on the rail of Jolt 3 during the Admiral’s Cup. Photo: James Tomlinson/RORC

After the win had been confirmed, Jolt 6 skipper Pierre Casiraghi said: “Honestly, I still can’t believe what we’ve achieved.

“To win the Admiral’s Cup in its revival year and with Monaco’s first ever participation is beyond words. I’m not a professional helm and this was the most exhausting race I’ve ever done.

“We knew the Fastnet would be decisive and our team executed it flawlessly. Will Harris, our navigator, was just phenomenal, he didn’t miss a beat. From the moment we exited the Solent everything went to plan. This was a true team effort, from sailors to shore crew.

“Right now, I’m exhausted and can’t imagine doing another offshore race on a 42-footer any time soon, but this has been a magical journey. The Admiral’s Cup is an extraordinary event. I’m so proud to have been part of it.”

Jolt 6 in the RORC Admiral’s Cup 2025. Photo: James Tomlinson/RORC

America’s Cup legend Ed Baird was helming the 52-footer Jolt 3. “The points were close. We had to do well in our division and so did our 40-footer. Sounds like they are going to finish okay,” he said.

“I would say there hasn’t been a lot of tension amongst the team but everybody was very aware [of how close it is]. We have been racing both divisions of boats since April in Cowes, and we knew the whole time that it was going to come down to very, very tight margins.”

Seconds in it

Those tight margins initially dropped the Italian team out of the podium places in the provisional results.

“[The Fastnet Race] was very enjoyable and I think that we had a possibility to have a great result. Unfortunately, we lost by 55 seconds after 697 miles and that’s a little sad, but I think that I’m proud about what we were able to do,” said Vasco Vascotto, skipper of the newly launched WallyRocket 51 Django, the YCCS AC1 entry.

DJANGO WR51 rounds Fastnet Rock. Photo: Kurt Arrigo/Rolex

“But this was day 11 in the water for this boat and we were able to go around that Fastnet and that was a big challenge but we did it.”

However, the small Italian AC2 boat Django JPK finished 3rd in class some 12 hours later – just 18 seconds ahead of the New Zealanders, which also moved the YCCS team back up to 3rd overall ahead of New Zealand in 4th on the team series.

Admiral’s Cup Fastnet finale

The Admiral’s Cup fleet had its own start for the 2025 Rolex Fastnet Race, with the 15 two boat teams scored on handicap in the big boat (AC1) and smaller AC2 class. Twenty-nine boats started, after the dismantling of Red Bandit (GER) during the inshore series. Ino Noir (GBR) also had to retire from the Fastnet due to electronics issues.

Jolt 3 leads a tightly packed group of finishers to the Admiral’s Cup fleet in the 2025 Rolex Fastnet Race. Photo: RORC

Going into the Fastnet, after one double-scoring Channel race and three days of inshore racing, the Royal Hong Kong YC team led on 36 points, ahead of Monaco on 44, the Italian team of Yacht Club Costa Smeralda in third on 59 points, and the Royal New Zealand Yacht Squadron’s team at 76 points in fourth.

The Rolex Fastnet Race counted for triple points, non-discardable, making some significant place changes possible on the overall leaderboard.

Intense racing

The Admiral’s Cup teams raced much of the 695-mile Fastnet course with the same intensity as the inshore series. “It was unbelievably intense racing with the other fast four teams,” said Harris. “We were racing like match racing the whole way around, neck on neck crossing each other really closely.”

A dominant north-westerly breeze also turned the Fastnet track into a 700-mile windward-leeward course. “A disappointing [result] in the end for us, but it was a cracking Fastnet race. Some beautiful conditions – and just a giant windward-leeward, but just a little shutdown at the end that tripped us up,” said Miles Seddon, navigator on Beau Geste, the big boat in the Hong Kong team.

Beau Geste finished 9th in AC1 in the Fastnet, and the smaller Beau Geste 8th, dropping the Hong Kong team off the top spot for the Admiral’s Cup win overall.

The smaller boat in the Hong Kong Admiral’s Cup team, Beau Ideal, rounding the Rock during the 2025 Rolex Fastnet Race. Photo: Kurt Arrigo/Rolex

Racing focussed on a single class, instead of competing against the whole 444-boat Fastnet fleet, also changed the strategy for the Admiral’s Cup teams. “When you’re racing IRC in general, you’ve just got to sail the boat as well as you can sail it. If it’s your conditions, it’s your conditions,” explained Seddon.

“But when you’re racing the Admiral’s Cup fleet, you’re just racing that fleet and you’re really focused on where they are all the time, which is quite draining.

“Just constantly keeping tabs on where everybody in the fleet is and how you’re going to manage them – and that’s 13 boats to manage. So it’s tough You’re constantly aware. I went into it knowing what we needed to do and then you’re constantly recomputing and looking at weather tracker updates, so you don’t get a lot of rest.

“Ultimately,with the finish here in Cherbourg, it’s fantastic. But it just adds that extra tidal gate and that’s brutal – it can be a real bonus, but it can take away as well.”

Dutch win in AC1

Huge celebrations for the Van Uden crew after winning AC1 in the 2025 Rolex Fastnet Race. Photo: RORC

The biggest celebration of Tuesday night unquestionably belonged to the Dutch team on Rost-Van Uden, winners of AC1 overall, whose supporters were out in force showering the team in traditional flowers, champagne and song.

The Rost-Van Uden team is led by Gerd-Jan Poortman, who was part of the winning Dutch team in the 1999 Admiral’s Cup, and made up largely of young sailors from Rotterdam. To take the class win against an entry list stacked with pro America’s Cup sailors, Olympic medalists and world champions was a phenomenal achievement for this team.

Rost-Van Uden raced representing the Royal Maas Yachtclub, along with a family team on the AC2 entry Baraka GP, a Ker 43, and finished 6th overall.

Admiral’s Cup return

There’s no question that for the crews, the Admiral’s Cup has been a hit. “It’s been really, really good. The racing in our division AC2 was just super close, you never really knew how it was going to pan out until the end – that was the way it should be,” said America’s Cup winner Dean Barker. Barker was part of a very high level crew on Callisto, the small boat in the New Zealand team. The Kiwis finished 4th overall.

“The Channel race was just amazing. Like that was some of the best downwind sailing I’ve probably done in my life actually. And then, the Fastnet on a 42-footer, it’s challenging,”

Callisto put in a strong performance for NZL in the 2025 Rolex Fastnet Race for the Admiral’s Cup 2025. Photo: James Tomlinson/RORC

“The [format] adds a huge dynamic to the event because there’s a lot of inshore races specifically and not a lot have a strong offshore component. So to mix it up is actually really challenging for all the teams,” added Barker.

“The equal weighting between inshore and offshore, I think it’s a really good way to do it. You need to be able to be strong on both. So I really enjoyed it. It’s hard – but at the same time it’s what makes it rewarding in the end.”

“It’s been absolutely fantastic. The heritage of it, the history, it’s been a great event,” said Seddon.

“The lead up to it was fantastic. Hopefully it goes on strength to strength and really showcases the sport because it does everything – it does offshore, it does inshore and it’s team racing as well. So it’s been a really, really good event. I thoroughly enjoyed it.”