Organisers of the The World Match Racing Tour have issued a brief statement announcing that The planned Qingdao Match Cup has been cancelled. The tour cite local organising authorities being unable to commit to hosting the event as the reason for the cancellation.
In June, the WMRT did a deal with the former Olympic sailing venue to bring the tour and it’s elite sailors to China. The Qingdao Match Cup was to offer a total prize pool of USD$500,000 and the initial deal was for 5 years. 10 Beneteau First 40 yachts were to be provided for the event to take place. The statement by the WMRT says that local authorities have been unable to meet the requirements outlined by the Tour.
It’s understood that with only 8 weeks until the new race was scheduled to go ahead, organisers of the WMRT were presented with new conditions by the event promoters in China that were unacceptable. While the cancellation is a short-term blow to the Tour’s plans to create up to 15 events per year in important growing sailing markets, the breakdown in relations between the WMRT and Qingdao may allow other cities in China to bid to host the match racing series.
