The GC32 Class Association has been using the opportunity of this last event of the season, Marseille One Design, to make plans for the future.

Following Sharon Ferris-Choat’s participation with Flavio Marazzi’s ARMIN STROM Sailing Team on the GC32 Racing Tour and of the all-female crew on Team Thalassa Magenta at last week’s Extreme Sailing Series in Lisbon, so the class has revised its rules governing the make-up of crews.

From next season on GC32 crews will comprise either five male crew or six crew if at least two are female.

“We are keen to open up the sport and enable women to compete on equal terms with male crews. It will also allow mixed crews to race the GC32s,” explains Christian Scherrer, Class Manager of the GC32 International Class Association.

Sharon Ferris-Choat welcomed the change, especially as maximum combined crew weight will remain at 437.5kg. “It has opened up the GC32 fleet to all sailors, not just the big guys, there is to say: Women, youth and smaller men. On a six person crew, average weight will be 72kg, whereas that the moment it is 85kg. I am proud to be part of the driving force to have brought this change and provide this opportunity to other sailors.”

Ferris-Choat says that the optimum for 2017 will probably be four men and two women and she hopes that the team she runs with Flavio Marazzi may be able to field teams on both the Extreme Sailing Series and the GC32 Racing Tour in 2017.

At the Annual General Meeting for the GC32 Class Association, former Olympic Star sailor Flavio Marazzi was re-elected in for another two years as President. Marazzi is being joined on the GC32 Class Association board by Pierre Casiraghi, skipper of Malizia-Yacht Club de Monaco and Harry Spedding, Technical Team Leader of the Extreme Sailing Series.