The America’s Cup marks its 175th anniversary this weekend, tracing its origins to the schooner America’s famous victory around the Isle of Wight on 22 August 1851. What began with a Victorian silver ewer and a race involving the New York Yacht Club schooner has developed into sailing’s best-known match-racing contest and one of international sport’s longest-running trophies.
The anniversary comes as the Cup enters another period of change, with Naples preparing to host the 38th America’s Cup in 2027 and women set to race alongside men aboard the foiling AC75s.
America Wins Around Isle of Wight
America was owned by a New York Yacht Club syndicate headed by the club’s first Commodore, John Cox Stevens. After defeating the British fleet around the Isle of Wight, Cox Stevens returned across the Atlantic with the trophy that would ultimately take the yacht’s name.
Queen Victoria visited America the following day, 23 August, adding a royal connection to an event that would attract monarchs, politicians, business leaders, and celebrities for the next century and three-quarters.
Cox Stevens died in June 1857. A month later, syndicate member George Lee Schuyler presented the trophy to the New York Yacht Club under the Deed of Gift. Its defining purpose was to promote “friendly competition between foreign countries”.
New York's 132-Year Winning Run
The first challenges came from Britain in 1870 and 1871, beginning an extraordinary period of New York Yacht Club dominance. The club successfully defended the trophy for 132 years as the yachts themselves evolved through successive generations of design.
Cup fever – Spectator boats crowd the waters off Newport during the 1983 America’s Cup, when Australia II defeated Liberty 4-3 and brought the longest winning streak in sporting history to an end. Photo: Ian Dear Archive
Wave-line schooners and cutters gave way to the great J-Class yachts of the pre-war era. When the Cup resumed in 1958 following a 21-year hiatus, the smaller 12-Metre class began another chapter. The NYYC remained unbeaten until 1983.
Australia II Ends America's Dominance
That run finally ended when John Bertrand's Australia II, backed by Alan Bond, defeated Dennis Conner's Liberty 4-3 off Newport.
The Australian yacht's radical winged keel became one of the defining technological innovations in Cup history. The victory took the trophy to Fremantle, Western Australia, where the 1987 defence attracted a worldwide audience.
Australia’s breakthrough – Syndicate chief Alan Bond with skipper John Bertrand after Australia II ended the New York Yacht Club’s extraordinary 132-year hold on the America’s Cup at Newport in 1983. Photo: Grace Trofa
Conner responded by winning the Cup back for the United States with Stars & Stripes 87, earning a ticker-tape parade in New York.
Cup Enters Multihull and Foiling Era
The following decades produced increasingly radical developments.
A controversial Deed of Gift Match in 1988 pitted a 90-foot New Zealand monohull against Conner's much smaller catamaran. The dispute went through the New York courts before the trophy remained in San Diego.
The International America's Cup Class subsequently provided the platform for racing through much of the 1990s and 2000s. New Zealand became only the third country to win the Cup in 1995, before Switzerland became the fourth with Alinghi's victory in 2003.
Cup aloft – John Bertrand raises the America’s Cup after Australia II’s historic 1983 victory, a triumph that took the trophy away from the United States for the first time in its 132-year competitive history. Photo: John Nash
Those four nations — the United States, Australia, New Zealand and Switzerland — remain the only countries to have won the America's Cup.
Emirates Team New Zealand Drives Foiling Revolution
One of the most dramatic transformations came in San Francisco in 2013 with the 72-foot foiling catamarans.
Emirates Team New Zealand helped pioneer sustained foiling in the AC72, but Oracle Team USA recovered from an apparently overwhelming deficit to defeat the Kiwis 9-8 in one of the competition's most remarkable comebacks.
Three-hull revolution – BMW Oracle Racing’s giant trimaran represented another radical turn in America’s Cup design during the 2010 Deed of Gift Match, when multihulls pushed the competition into a new high-speed era. Photo: Gilles Martin-Raget
New Zealand responded in Bermuda in 2017 with another major innovation, replacing traditional grinding with pedal-powered “cyclors”. The Kiwis reclaimed the trophy and subsequently retained it in Auckland in 2021 and Barcelona in 2024.
Their success made Emirates Team New Zealand the first team of the modern era to win three consecutive America's Cup Matches.
Women and Youth Provide Cup Pathway
The introduction of the smaller AC40 has created another strand to the competition's development. The class provided the platform for the return of the Youth America's Cup in Barcelona in 2024 and the first Women's America's Cup.
That pathway will develop further at Naples in 2027, when female sailors are due to compete alongside men aboard the AC75s.
Foiling future – Emirates Team New Zealand’s AC75 flies at speed, illustrating the technological leap from the displacement yachts of 1851 to the foiling machines that define the modern America’s Cup. Photo: Sam Thom
The technology has changed almost beyond recognition since America raced around the Isle of Wight. Where single-digit boat speeds represented the cutting edge in 1851, the modern foiling generation has recorded speeds exceeding 55 knots.
Yet the central premise established by the Deed of Gift remains: international yacht clubs competing for the same silver trophy first won 175 years ago.
Three-time America's Cup winner Dennis Conner has reduced the requirements for success to something rather less technical. “The three basic ingredients for winning remain the same: attitude, attitude, attitude,” he said.
