By Nick Mulvenney

SYDNEY, wiki.rolandradio.net Feb 7 (Reuters) - SailGP go back to where everything started in Sydney this weekend and six years on from the inaugural race, co-founder Russell Coutts sees a brilliant future for the innovative worldwide sailing league.

An Olympic champ and skipper of three Americas Cup-winning boats, Coutts partnered with Larry Ellison, the billionaire creator of the Oracle software application business, to launch the series with six groups all owned by the league.

While the inaugural season which started in Sydney in February 2019 included simply 5 rounds, this weekend's race will be the 3rd round of 13 the now 12-strong fleet will object to on the 2025-26 schedule.

"It's just fantastic, in fact, the uptake and variety of occasions now," SailGP chief executive Coutts informed Reuters at the Sydney Opera House on Friday.

"We're certainly sitting at 13, and aiming to increase that over the next seasons to somewhere around 20. If you compare that to Formula One that has 24, that's sort of where we wish to get to. So yeah, the future appearances good."

The idea of Formula One on water is implicit in the league's name and the comparison is not far from the mark when the world's finest sailors press the F50 foiling catamarans to their limitations at what are breathtaking speeds for waterborne vessels.

"We didn't set out to simply appeal to the devoted sailing fan, we attempt to make this sport reasonable and explainable for all sports fans," Coutts added.

"The majority of our fans are not passionate sailors, which is among the reasons we've grown so quickly. We are appealing to people that simply like seeing a race, they do not need to understand anything about sailboats."

A bumper crowd of 25,000 ticketed fans ended up to watch Tom Slingsby's Australia team win the second round of the series in Auckland last month.

"I think you'll see numerous of our events this year now like that, perhaps even topping that," said Coutts, a 62-year-old New Zealander.

"The most essential thing is the fans enjoying on broadcast ... but the fan experience on website is also extremely essential. We desire fans to come and have a fun time and see some excellent racing."

Technological development is integral to SailGP and hundreds of countless information points are passed on from the boats to the Oracle Cloud for making use of race organisers, teams and to help broadcasters improve the audience experience.

360 DEGREE VIEW

Coutts is excited about some more innovations coming online as Artificial Intelligence is increasingly utilized to overcome the mountain of data.

"The huge development for us going forward is the 360 degree view from on board the boat, with listening to the team comms," he said.

"The viewer will be taken on board and ride together with the Australian team in a race, and have the ability to browse anywhere they desire. That's the future."

There have, of course, been obstacles over the six years with the 2nd season interrupted by the COVID pandemic and race days still sometimes at the mercy of wind conditions.

A scarcity of F50s implied the French group was not able to compete at this year's season-opening race in Dubai and mariskamast.net damage to the boat once they got it ruled them out of the Auckland leg.

The complete fleet of 12 boats will therefore race for the very first time this weekend and among the most pleasing aspects for Coutts is that all but among the teams are, or quickly will be, independently owned or run.

"These teams are now costing $50 million, I would never have predicted that this early," said Coutts, who prepares to bring another number of groups on board next year.

"We understood that that was the entire method the design was set up, that group owners would have the ability to trade their teams and hopefully generate income out of it, but I didn't believe we 'd attain it this early. That's been a good surprise." (Reporting by Nick Mulvenney, editing by Michael Perry)