No2

The Daily Sail speaks to world no2 match racer Jes Gram-Hansen currently taking part in the Bermuda Gold Cup

With the America's Cup in full swing, the usual stars of the Swedish Match Tour are in Auckland and the ranks are somewhere depleted. The Dane admits this makes the competition easier, but also presents a different challenge. "On paper should make it easier and it is easier, but there is also a lot of talent out there. There's a lot of the young sailors coming up from Denmark and Sweden. They do a lot of practice and they are very good sailors and fleet racers. There is a depth of talent out there, so the absence of the America’s Cup teams gives them an opportunity to come and race."

One trend in match racing at present is the number of Scandinavians who are getting very very good at it. Remarkably all of the eight seeded skippers at the Bermuda Gold Cup are from there.

In Denmark this can be attributed to the Danish Match Race School of which Gram-Hansen is a product along the other Danes on the Tour. In Denmark there are two such schools, one set up in Copenhagen 10 years ago, the other in a small town called Middlefart. Remarkably these are not funded by the Danish Sailing Federation, who Gram-Hansen says, concentrate their efforts on the Olympics, but by the clubs themselves.

"The clubs owns the boats and finds the sponsors and they do a lot of corporate sailing with the boats and it gives us the chance to go practice," he explains. "What you see now is all the effort that was put into that. Now you see sailors coming out of that school where they've had the opportunities to do a lot of practice and get a lot of racing in their home waters, and now they are trying to take on the world and see how good they are. I’m just one of that bunch. Morten Hendriksen, Jesper Radich have all done very well. There are maybe 3-4 teams in Denmark now that are at an international level and I’m just one of them."

For match racers the America's Cup is the obvious ultimate goal and one senses some
frustration from Gram-Hansen that Denmark, with their talent base, isn't fielding a team. He has after all spent most of his recent sailing career lining up against most of the America's Cup helms from Russell Coutts, Dean Barker and Peter Holmberg down, on the Swedish Match Tour. It must feel a little like not being invited to the party.

"For the last year, we raced a lot of the guys. I have the greatest respect for people like Dean Barker and Russell Coutts," says Gram-Hansen. "They are fabulously good sailors and they have shown they are good when it counts. And I am very impressed with the way James Spithill is doing now. I feel I am the same generation as James. It is great to see that he can do so well. Of course I know this is a team effort and not just about James Spithill I know that a lot of the other guys are quite young."

Obviously the perfect scenario would be to field a Danish challenger. Carlsberg sponsored, for example? "So far it has been impossible to find the funding needed for an America’s Cup campaign," he confirms. "But we’re all very excited about what’s happening now, because it seems like the AC is getting a lot of media coverage and if someday it comes to Europe, it could be a great boost to a Danish campaign."

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