Australia dominated on the first day of the third round of the SailGP season on Saturday as skipper Tom Slingsby nailed his starts to give the home team wins in two of the four races in tricky conditions on Sydney harbour.

Australia won two of four races on the first day of its home SailGP event on Sydney Harbour to finish the day atop the points table ahead of Britain and France.

It’s been a long time since the Black Foils have been this uncompetitive. In the past two seasons, the New Zealand SailGP team have been among the two best crews in the global foiling league. In the 24 events across seasons three and four,

Australia’s dominant SailGP team is aiming to win on home waters yet again this weekend, but they’ll have to do it without a key member of their championship three-peat after an off-season shake-up.

The French team will return to action for the first time this year to ensure a full fleet of 12 boats takes part in the Sydney leg of the SailGP series on Saturday and Sunday. France missed the first two legs of the series in Dubai in November and Auckland in January because of equipment problems and will compete in Sydney with a new F50 catamaran.

Australia have capitalised on some sizzling starts on day one of the Sydney SailGP event to lead by five points after winning the last two of the four races.