ORC Superyacht

ORCsy superyacht fleet racing under ORC PCS corrected-time scoring

Mediterranean Caribbean New Zealand
332 boats 45 events 380 races 1,369 obs Global corpus · as of 2026-04-21 · build a2e90234
Kinship

Every fleet’s waters hold their own story.

Grand-prix superyacht circuits across the Mediterranean and Caribbean — find their waters.

 Hidden Shape

11 archetypes across 31 dimensional features.
How this fleet clusters before the results arrive.

How the ORC Superyacht fleet races, before the results arrive.
Character

Professional crews. Extreme parameters. ORCsy — a class apart.

ORC Superyacht racing is where 24-metre hulls, professional crews of 20 or more, and extreme sail inventories create a competitive dynamic that exists nowhere else in rated racing — centred on Palma de Mallorca, home of Mediterranean superyachting, and measured through ORCsy, the rating innovation built specifically for the largest yachts. The fleet numbers 332 boats worldwide, concentrated in major maritime centres and classic race locations. Superyachts range from 60 to 100+ feet and represent a cross-section of contemporary yacht design — modern high-performance platforms, classic yachts restored and refit for competitive racing, Swan racer-cruisers across the full hull-form lineage.

The Superyacht fleet is characterised by technical sophistication, professional crew training, and substantial resource investment. Superyacht racing demands expertise in large-boat sail handling, advanced navigation systems, optimised rig configurations, and crew coordination at scale. The boats themselves often incorporate leading-edge materials, advanced electronics, and custom design features. Superyacht ownership is split between professional racing programmes and owner-operated campaigns, often with hybrid crew models. The quality of racing data is very high due to professional measurement standards, experienced crew consistency, and the significance of competitive outcomes.

FleetEdge tracks 332 boats in the ORC Superyacht cohort — 317 ORC-rated + 15 IRC-synthetic attributed across 11 archetypes (318 classified). KEELFLEX leads at 25.5% (81 boats), AEROMAX follows at 22.6% (72 boats), and BALANCECORE completes the top three at 13.8% (44 boats). Together those three archetypes account for 61.9% of the fleet — a balance-sensitive + rig-power upwind + heel-tuned platform mix that covers everything from J/Boats sportboats to Swan maxi campaigns inside the same ORCsy membership. Rod Johnstone anchors the designer signature at 19.3% (64 boats) — J/Boats hulls form the single largest designer cluster by a wide margin, with Farr Designs at 10.8% (36 boats) and Gerän Frers at 10.5% (35 boats) behind. The J/Boats presence spans J 88 / J 99 / J 105 / J 111 / J 120 / J 121 / J 122, cutting across the full ORCsy LOA range.

Key 2026 anchors include the next Rolex Swan Cup (Porto Cervo, biennial) and the Mediterranean superyacht circuit through the Maxi Yacht Rolex Cup, Giraglia Rolex Cup, and the IMA ORC Superyacht Championships. The Swan Cup 2024 at Porto Cervo is the regatta ORC built ORCsy around, and the 2024 cohort's archetype concentration (AEROMAX + BALANCECORE = 76%) reflected the invitational Swan-hull lineage the event draws.

Fleet DNA

How the ORC Superyacht fleet is built.

332 boats in the fleet. 317 ORC-rated and 15 IRC-synthetic attributed across 11 archetypes.

The ORC Superyacht Fleet Signature

The ORCsy fleet is a balance-and-power collective spanning 60 to 100+ feet of LOA inside a single rating membership. KEELFLEX leads at 25.5% (81 boats) — narrow-balance-window platforms where small heel changes produce large speed changes across the Swan and custom maxi lineage. AEROMAX follows at 22.6% (72 boats), the rig-power upwind specialist. BALANCECORE completes the top three at 13.8% (44 boats). Together those three carry 61.9% of the classified fleet — a long-running structural preference across the full LOA range of the ORCsy membership.

  • KEELFLEX 25.5% · 81 boats
  • AEROMAX 22.6% · 72 boats
  • BALANCECORE 13.8% · 44 boats

Dimension emphasis: Comparative Time · Crew Effectiveness · Upwind VMG

Rod Johnstone (J/Boats) anchors the designer signature at 19.3% (64 boats), cutting across the full LOA range from J 88 through J 122. Farr Designs at 10.8% (36) and German Frers at 10.5% (35) carry the Swan and classic-maxi tradition. Top classes: J 120 (10), First 36.7 (8), J 111 (8), J 99 (6), J 88 (6). The next Rolex Swan Cup runs in Porto Cervo on the ORC biennial schedule.

High confidence Production

The full 11-archetype distribution.

Keelflex

Narrow stability window; fast when perfectly balanced, punishing when not.

Boats 81
Share 25.5%

Aeromax

Upwind-power specialist with the fleet's strongest rig-driven VMG.

Boats 72
Share 22.6%

Balancecore

Heel-sensitive platform with a wider, more forgiving performance envelope.

Boats 44
Share 13.8%

Glideform

Low-drag hull with strong downwind bias through efficient waterline-to-beam ratios.

Boats 37
Share 11.6%

Deepframe

Deep-hull efficiency paired with a stiff platform for drag-optimised flow.

Boats 25
Share 7.9%

Gravityrun

Heavy-mode momentum boat with strong downwind power in sustained breeze.

Boats 17
Share 5.3%

Steelform

Compact-rig stiff-platform with the fleet's lowest race-to-race variance.

Boats 15
Share 4.7%

Headforce

Pressure-driven compact-rig hull that punches through chop at the windward mark.

Boats 12
Share 3.8%

Stormline

Big-rig heel-sensitive platform with the fleet's highest rig-power-to-stability ratio.

Boats 11
Share 3.5%

Aeroblade

Refined-rig platform with sharp heel sensitivity and rapid trim response when sailed flat.

Boats 3
Share 0.9%

Ironwind

Stiff, stable-drive platform with predictable load behaviour.

Boats 1
Share 0.3%

KEELFLEX and AEROMAX account for 48% of the classified fleet — two balance-sensitive and upwind-power hull families that cover everything from J/Boats sportboats to Swan maxi campaigns inside the same ORCsy membership.

Latest story

Rolex Swan Cup 2024: SOLANO's double-dimension + FROM NOW ON's class title.

The 2024 Rolex Swan Cup ran in Porto Cervo in September 2024 with 25 of 332 fleet boats across 24 races — the regatta ORC built ORCsy around. A Swan-heavy cohort concentrated AEROMAX + BALANCECORE at 76% of the race field (up from 36.4% fleet-wide), and the dimensional leaderboards surfaced a clean balance between class-winning discipline and raw-pace under-conversion. Four stories the Swan Cup 2024 edition told.

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Looking forward

The 2024 Rolex Swan Cup handed its signature to SOLANO (FRA-99 A SWAN 44, BALANCECORE) as the only boat to lead both Comparative Time and Crew Effectiveness — a double-dimension dominance with wide margins (55 sec/nm on Comp Time, 5 sec/nm on Crew). FROM NOW ON (ARG-5835 SWAN 45, AEROMAX) took the 7-boat Swan 45 class with 3 points. On the other side of the dimensional space, DEFIANCE (USA-52575 JV 66, KEELFLEX) posted the 2nd-best Upwind VMG at 6.99 kn and finished dead last on both allowance-facing families — a 66-foot raw-pace hull whose corrected-time result erased its polars. The next Rolex Swan Cup runs in Porto Cervo on the ORC biennial schedule; the Swan-invitational cohort will again concentrate around AEROMAX and BALANCECORE's Swan hull lineage.

Will the next Swan Cup edition see another balance-family double-dimension sweep, or will a different pressure regime reward the KEELFLEX Swan 45/47/48 sub-families that did not lead the 2024 edition's dimensional boards?

Read the ORC World Fleet hub (Copa del Rey context) →
Performance Verdict · Multi-Dimension Presence

SOLANO leads Comparative Time and Crew together by wide margins.

FRA-99 A SOLANO (SWAN 44, BALANCECORE) swept both allowance-facing dimensions at the 2024 Rolex Swan Cup: Comparative Time at −286.62 sec/nm vs ORC and Crew Effectiveness at −238.54 sec/nm residual. Wide margins across both: 55.45 sec/nm clear of Isabella in Comp Time and 4.78 sec/nm clear in Crew. When one boat leads both the allowance-adjusted result and the crew-only residual by clear margins, the double is crew-compounded, not a rating gift — SOLANO's crew held the SWAN 44 BALANCECORE platform inside its balance window across 24 races. BALANCECORE is the heel-sensitive hull with a wider, more forgiving performance envelope — exactly the archetype that rewards sustained execution when the Porto Cervo Maestrale sets up across a championship week. BALANCECORE was 36% of the race cohort; SOLANO led the family that measures execution.

  • SOLANO Comp Time: −286.62 sec/nm · 1st of 24
  • SOLANO Crew Eff: −238.54 sec/nm · 1st of 24
  • Comp Time margin over 2nd: 55.45 sec/nm (Isabella)
High confidence RR Rolex Swan Cup 2024
Championship Citation · Class Winner

FROM NOW ON takes the Swan 45 class at the Swan Cup.

FROM NOW ON (ARG-5835, SWAN 45, AEROMAX) took the 7-boat Swan 45 class at the 2024 Rolex Swan Cup with 3 points, clear of Dutch sister-ship TENGHER (5 points) and Spanish CLEM PRIMERO (10 points) on the podium. AEROMAX platforms accounted for four of the seven boats in this class, and the top two ran the canonical Swan 45 spec — an Argentinian owner/professional programme converting Swan hull pedigree into a decisive class win at the regatta ORC built ORCsy around. AEROMAX is the rig-power upwind specialist; the class that hosted the deepest AEROMAX cluster delivered the AEROMAX class champion on the class's home turf. The Swan 45 is the platform that defines the mid-tier ORCsy racing fleet — and the 2024 Swan Cup surfaced a clean championship result inside that sub-population.

  • FROM NOW ON Swan 45 Class: 1st of 7 · 3 points
  • Podium: FROM NOW ON / TENGHER (NED, 5 pts) / CLEM PRIMERO (ESP, 10 pts)
  • AEROMAX in Swan 45 class: 4 of 7 boats
High confidence RR Rolex Swan Cup 2024
Tradeoff Escape · Raw Pace vs Corrected Time

DEFIANCE: VMG 2nd, Comparative Time dead last.

USA-52575 DEFIANCE (JV 66, KEELFLEX) took second in the Upwind VMG board at 6.99 kn in the 25-boat Swan Cup fleet, yet finished dead last in Crew residual at +174.20 sec/nm and bottom of Comparative Time at +174.79 sec/nm — the widest under-conversion in the regatta. A 66-foot Judel/Vrolijk hull carries the raw pace of a maxi but the ORC time allowance is unforgiving when execution does not keep pace with the polars. The straight-line VMG and the corrected-time numbers point in opposite directions: DEFIANCE is inside the top three on the physics lens and dead last on the scoring lens, the textbook tradeoff-escape pattern where pace alone does not close the rating gap. Large-hull KEELFLEX programmes live on this knife edge: if the crew cannot hold the platform inside its narrow balance window across 24 races, the corrected-time result erases whatever the polars are capable of.

  • DEFIANCE Upwind VMG: 6.99 kn · 2nd of 25
  • DEFIANCE Comp Time: +174.79 sec/nm · 24th of 24
  • DEFIANCE Crew Eff: +174.20 sec/nm · 24th of 24
High confidence RR Rolex Swan Cup 2024
Archetype Self-Selection · Invitational Concentration

AEROMAX + BALANCECORE = 76% of the Swan Cup cohort.

The 2024 Rolex Swan Cup cohort is a classic invitational concentration. AEROMAX ballooned from 22.6% of the ORCsy fleet to 40.0% of the race cohort (10 boats of 25); BALANCECORE ballooned from 13.8% to 36.0% (9 boats). Together the two families carried 76% of the 25-boat field, up from 36.4% at the fleet level. The Swan 36/44/45/47/48/53/62/65/80 hulls share design lineage across Gerän Frers and Nautor's Swan design boards, and the two dominant archetype families reflect that hull-form ancestry rather than a course-specific selection. A Swan-invitational field does not sample the full ORCsy fleet — it samples the Swan racer-cruiser lineage specifically, and the race cohort's archetype profile is a structural read on which hull families Nautor's Swan produces, not on which archetypes Porto Cervo conditions favour. The 2024 result is the Swan lineage's own archetype ordering.

  • AEROMAX in fleet -> race: 22.6% -> 40.0% (72 -> 10 boats)
  • BALANCECORE in fleet -> race: 13.8% -> 36.0% (44 -> 9 boats)
  • Top-two race share: 76.0% (19 of 25)
High confidence FE Structural Analytics
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