“The celebration of the Puig Women’s America’s Cup has not been questioned at any time,” says Leslie Ryan, organizational director. Grant Dalton, the head of Emirates Team New Zealand – and, by extension, the event – ??decided that the first women’s edition would be held in Barcelona. And so it will be. “It is not a second course, the sponsors have shown interest and the teams have thrown themselves into it… women’s sport is exploding and this is a bet for the future, there is no going back,” adds Ryan. And beyond this new competition, women are gaining space in all areas of the Copa del América.
Born in Ireland, Leslie Ryan inherited a passion for the sea from her family. She began sailing and competing at the age of eight and has always worked in this field. In marketing, communication, organization and management of events, with the British Olympic team or in the Ocean Racey and in a thousand and one other regattas… Now she is one of the executive hands of Grant Dalton whom she met in 2001, when she was working for the British team that was going to compete in the 2003 edition of the America’s Cup. She then traveled to Auckland, where she lived for a year and a half and in 2019 she met Grant again in a preliminary regatta that had to be held in London, but which the pandemic forced to suspend.
In the last edition of the America’s Cup, Grant signed her to join the team that would seek the venue for the 37th edition. “Clearly, we liked Barcelona from the first moment,” she reiterates. She was one of the first people from Emirates Team New Zealand to settle in the city. “There have always been women in the organization or communication teams but in other areas there was a large majority of men and that has been changing… in the last ten years they have been incorporated into almost all departments… but it is a change “That can’t be done overnight,” Ryan maintains.
New Zealand Olympic sailor and engineer Elise Beavis (29 years old) joined Emirates Team New Zealand in 2015 as a development engineer and has since celebrated the America’s Cup twice with her team. Aim for the triplet. “I have been able to combine my university studies with sailing, it was my dream.” Beavis is one of the key pieces of the design department led by Dan Bernasconi. In 2017, at just 23 years old, he was given a key task as the team studied what would be a winning strategy for the AC50 multihulls (15 meters long) with foils that would be used in the 2017 edition in Bermuda and the cyclors (crew members who generate power with their legs by pedaling).
Beavis then became involved in the development of Team New Zealand’s next-generation simulator, another key tool for the progress of the foiling monohull. Her work as an engineer has outweighed her profile as a sailor, “right now there are better athletes than me in New Zealand,” she says, adding that competing with the AC40s opens up many opportunities, “this is indisputable, but the important thing should not be whether you are a man or a woman, but that whoever wants to sail or work in whatever field can do so.”
This vision is shared by another veteran of the America’s Cup, Coraline Jonet, who debuted in this regatta in the Valencia edition with the Swiss team. Like Ryan and Beavis, she is also a sailor and started at the age of eight with Optimist, then Ynling, 420, D35… At the highest level.
“In Valencia I had to stop competing… I had too much work,” explains Jornet. She was in charge of sponsor relations. “I had to share the passion of sailing, I accompanied groups sailing to comment on training and regattas and taught the basics and the equipment,” she remembers. It is not surprising that she knew the entire workings of Alinghi Red Bull Racing inside out. From there she moved on to communication, social networks and today she is responsible for the women and youth team.
“I don’t really like the quotas but we have to get the same opportunities, in off shore or Sail GP there are some women but now they will be able to have much more experience and 360 degrees,” insists Jonet, who celebrates the design of the AC40, “because not It depends on physical strength but on many other qualities and in the end the important thing, competing and in all departments, is to achieve the objectives set, it does not matter if you are a man or a woman if you have the same opportunities.
