Hoist the Flag

Asia’s first Beneteau Cup brought 21 luxury yachts to the southernmost tip of Hong Kong for a two-day, over-the-top sailing contest

-  Zabrina Lo

On a clear Saturday morning in May, the city’s sleekest and most enviable sailboats are docked, as they normally are, at the pontoon of the Aberdeen Marina Club, which today is emptier than normal. It’s only 9am, but Mike Simpson, the founder of yacht sales and charter company Simpson Marine, and his team are already sweating onboard his Beneteau Oceanis 46.1, a large performance cruiser. They are carrying out final checks, readying the sails and polishing the hull in the sweltering heat, which is already a blistering 33C. Freedom, Simpson’s boat, is their “chariot” for the day. A team of seven sailors steers the gleaming vessel from the quiet Sham Wan shelter, past the defunct floating seafood restaurant Jumbo Kingdom that once hosted Queen Elizabeth II and into the rough waters of the East Lamma Channel, where they meet 20 other sailboats gathered to compete in what will be Asia’s first Beneteau Cup.

The Beneteau Cup, a sailing race organised among Beneteau owners, was founded in France in the Nineties and has since expanded around the world, including one of the largest and most prestigious races in the UK, where boats sail from other parts of the UK and Europe to Cowes in the Isle of Wight.