Josh Hyde has claimed his first senior international title, winning the Chicago Grand Slam on Lake Michigan after finishing the round robin as low as sixth seed. The World Match Racing Tour event ran from 14 to 16 August at Chicago Yacht Club, with an eight-boat fleet made up of sailors from New Zealand, the United States, Australia and Canada.
It’s a big result for the young Royal New Zealand Yacht Squadron sailor, and one that happened only a fortnight after a heartbreaker at the Governor’s Cup in Newport Beach, where Hyde led the round robin all week before losing a 3-2 semi-final. This time he made sure of it. Match racing puts two identical boats head-to-head over a short course, with the win decided by starts, boat-handling and umpired rule calls rather than boat speed, since neither crew has a speed advantage. It’s a format that rewards whoever’s sharpest when it counts, and Hyde was that sailor when it counted.
The round robin didn’t suggest what was coming. Hyde went 2-5, good for only sixth of eight seeds, while American William Stratton topped the table 7-0 and Australians Marcello Torre and Tom Picot tied for second at 5-2. From there, though, Hyde won nine of his last ten races. He swept Picot 3-0 in the quarter-final, beat Torre 3-1 in the semi, then closed it out with a 3-0 final win over Christian Prendergast, without needing a fifth race in any of the three series.
Stratton’s perfect round robin didn’t survive the knockout stage. He lost 3-2 to Prendergast in the other semi-final, then dropped the petit final 1-2 to Torre, a result that pushed the top seed all the way down to fourth overall and handed Australia its best finish of the week through Torre’s third place.
Picot’s tournament unravelled after a promising start. He’d matched Torre stroke for stroke through the round robin, then ran into Hyde in the quarter-final and lost every race. A 1-2 record in the 5th-to-8th placement round robin left him seventh overall, some way short of where his round-robin form suggested he’d finish.
It’s the third time in as many seasons Boating NZ has tracked Hyde through a title run, after wins at the 2024 New Zealand Youth Match Racing Championship and the 2025 New Zealand Match Racing Championship trials, and this is his biggest yet. Where the Governor’s Cup exposed a gap between leading all week and closing it out, Chicago shows that gap has closed.
The Chicago Grand Slam opens the 2026 USA Grand Slam Series, with the winner earning an invitation to the prestigious Congressional Cup 2027 at Long Beach Yacht Club.
Sixth seed after the round robin to Chicago Grand Slam champion in three days, that’s the whole story of Josh Hyde’s week on Lake Michigan. Nine wins from his last ten races, three separate series closed out without needing a fifth race, and a first senior international title that comes with a ticket to next year’s Congressional Cup. A fortnight after the Governor’s Cup slipped through his fingers in Newport Beach, Hyde has answered the only question left about him, whether he could close out a big week as well as he opens one. Chicago says he can.
