Jordi Calafat joins Doyle Sails as Grand Prix designer

Doyle Sails have announced that Jordi Calafat is the latest addition to join the ever-expanding Doyle Sails Grand Prix sailing and design team, entering the role in early December 2021.

Working alongside design director Richard Bouzaid, the wider Doyle design team, and the global Doyle sailors, Calafat will be an influential and integral addition to the group. Calafat also has experience with America’s Cup, Volvo Ocean Race, 52 Super Series, Club Swan classes and a significant number of one-design fleets globally.

Calafat said, “I have been pretty successful in the Grand Prix classes – specifically the TP52, Swan 50 and Swan 36s and Maxi 72s, which is where I have worked the most. We have won the worlds in every one of these classes over the last few years. We’ve won the previous six Maxi World’s with the Maxi 72s and the TP52 Worlds twice”.

Calafat has previous experience through many Doyle Sails collaborations in the Maxi 72 campaigns, and commented, “Doyle are the leaders in the Cableless or the Structured Luff technology – they started this evolution and are still the leaders. There are endless development opportunities, and in this case, so many other positive changes can be made to yachts because of it – rig structure and boat structure included. It is a matter of time now to see how far we can keep evolving this”.

Calafat started sailing in 1980, and in just three years he won the Optimist World Championship. He was a naturally talented sailor; his success continued when he won the 1985 420 Junior World Championship, placed second at the 470 Worlds in 1989 and 1990, then took sixth at the 1991 470 Worlds. In 1992, Jordi won a gold medal in the 470 class at the 1992 Summer Olympics in Barcelona.

Calafat continued, “There are many different reasons for me joining Doyle Sails, Doyle has the best lamination, which means the best membranes, so this gives me a lot of comfort as a sail designer to create custom designs. The other key thing is working with Richard Bouzaid, Doyle’s Design Director. That is a big plus for me to improve my skills and share my knowledge with the design team.”

Mike Sanderson, international CEO at Doyle Sails, commented, “We’ve always been about building the strongest group of people at Doyle Sails, and it is a pleasure to officially welcome Jordi to our team as both a high-profile sailor and one of the world’s best sail designers. I am lucky enough to have actually been working with Jordi for the last five years with Bella Mente, and so it’s wonderful now to be part of the same sail making team officially!”

For more information, visit Doyle Sails.

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