Organizers for the Royal Bermuda Yacht Club’s Bermuda Gold Cup match racing tournament regret to announce that the 2021 regatta will not be held. The regatta, an event of the World Match Racing Tour, had been planned for the end of September, but will be rescheduled to next year at a date to be announced.
Last year the Royal Bermuda Yacht Club hosted the Gold Cup and the Open Match Racing World Championship amid the global pandemic, but its continuing effects have made sponsorship difficult to secure.
“Planning and hosting an international event with competitors from many countries is a challenge in any given year, and even more so this year. Although we had many sponsors committed, we have been unable to secure a title sponsor. Rather than consider putting on a sub-par event, we will refocus our efforts for 2022 and beyond,” said Gold Cup chair Leatrice Oatley.
The King Edward VII Trophy, awarded to the winner of the Bermuda Gold Cup, is the oldest trophy in the world for competition involving one-design yachts. First presented in 1907 by King Edward VII at the Tri-Centenary Regatta at Jamestown, Va., honoring the 300th anniversary of the first permanent colony in America, the trophy is the only King’s Cup ever to be offered for competition in the United States which could be won outright.
