2025 Etchells North Americans

The 2025 Etchells North American Championship attracted 38 teams on May 16-18 in San Diego, CA. While winning no races, Luke Lawrence (USA) and his team of John Kostecki and Brian Ledbetter took the title by three points over Simon Cook (NZL) with Jim Cunningham (USA) completing the podium, five points off the lead.

“It was amazing to sail with some of my heroes,” noted Lawrence. “John Kostecki and Brian Ledbetter were such a pleasure to be around for the week. We learned a lot about Etchells and San Diego from Rodney [Hagebols] and Fuzz [Grant Spanhake] who were incredibly helpful with their feedback from the coach boat. We can’t wait to come back next year!”

The 2026 Etchells World Championship will be held May 11-15 in San Diego, CA.

“We couldn’t have asked for a better day of sailing as half a dozen teams had a shot at winning the championship,” said Cunningham about the final day.

“With light oscillating south southwesterly breezes for both races the challenge was to get good starts and be able to sail the lifted tack. It’s not always easy to do that especially when you have such depth and quality of teams racing all around you. In the end, both the Corinthian and open champions sailed extremely well and earned their spots at the top of the podium.”

In the Corinthian division, Will La Dow (USA) and Ethan Doyle (USA) took it to the final race, with La Dow holding on to take the title by one point with Paul Taylor taking third in the Corinthian standings.

Event information – Results – Photos