Brazil has never been as successful at the Olympic Games as in sailing. The South American sailors contributed eight gold, three silver and eight bronze medals to their country's Olympic tally. Of these 19 medals, almost 50 per cent were won by the Grael family alone with nine medals!
SailGP helmswoman Martine Grael: Heroine in her home country
Torben Grael, now 65 years old and also Ocean Race winner in 2008/2009 and winner of the America's Cup challenger round with the Italian team Luna Rossa at the turn of the millennium, won silver in the Soling in 1984. After switching to the Star boat, he won bronze in 1988 and then his first Olympic victory in 1996. In Sydney 2000, Torben Grael was again on the podium as Olympic bronze medallist before winning his second Star boat gold in Athens 2004. Brother Lars Grael won bronze medals in the Tornado in 1988 and 1996.
For daughter and niece Martine Soffiatti Grael, the family's flood of medals was both an incentive and an inspiration. She added two 49erFX gold medals to the family's brilliant Olympic record. You need to know all this to understand why the Grael family enjoys legendary status in Brazil. Even more so because Martine won her first gold medal in the skiff with Kahena Kunze in the very place where she trained as a child and where the Graels' sailing roots lie: in Rio de Janeiro's Guanabara Bay. Between the Sugarloaf Mountain and the statue of Christ, she became a national heroine.
It was the most iconic day of my life." Martine Grael
"I will always remember that. Basically everyone I knew back then was on that beach at that moment. It was just incredible," says Martine Soffiatti Grael, who just turned 35 on 12 February and defended her 2021 Olympic title in Enoshima with Kahena Kunze, who is also active in the SailGP. Like her father, Martine Soffiatti Grael has also competed in an ocean race around the world and was part of Team AkzoNobel in 2017/2018. Now the attacker from Niterói in the state of Rio de Janeiro is the front woman in the SailGP.
Influenced by his Rio childhood, steeled at the Olympics
It was her mum who took her on the Europe dinghy when she was a little girl. Martine remembers that she often tried to touch the water with her hands. Or with her hair. She remembers the fun she had. "You grew up where you became who you are," she says today. She believes that "it's the little things that make the difference".
Her parents asked her at the time whether she would prefer to do fun sailing with friends or racing. She loved and still loves racing and competing. Her successful father didn't pay much attention to the results. His motto to her: "If you do your best, I'm happy." Her brother Marco Grael, himself an Olympian in the 49er and crew member of Martine's SailGP team Mubadala Brasil, says of his sister: "She has developed step by step. Each step has given her the further very good experience that has made her what she is today: an outstanding sailor."
My father was always my idol, my source of inspiration and information." Martine Grael
The Olympic Games taught me that - no matter how well prepared you are - it's also about performing at the right moment. Having the right attitude at the right moment," says Martine Grael, looking back on her two Olympic victories, but also on the Olympic regatta in Marseille, where things didn't go according to plan for her and Kahena Kunze. Marla Bergmann and Hanna Wille were also among the conquerors of the legendary sailors. The young German sailors finished sixth in their Olympic debut, the Brazilians "only" eighth.
With plenty of talent and willpower in the SailGP
It was early 2024 when Martine Grael became increasingly involved with the SailGP. For the fifth season, she was then the first female rider in history to enter the World League on foils with Team Mubadala Brazila real milestone for women in high performance sailing. SailGP founder and conductor Russell Coutts said at the time: "Martine has incredible talent and has shown that she can handle the sport at the highest level."
Like other newcomers, the Brazilian and her team Mubadala Brazil had a tough first season (SailGP season five 2025) suffered some serious setbacks. These included mast breakage shocks during initial training off Bermuda and at the SailGP German premiere in Sassnitz in the summer of 2025. the cancellation of last year's planned Rio premiere due to wing defects in the F50 foils hit Martine Grael's team hard.
Now she is heading back to her home country. Next month, things will get down to business in Rio de Janeiro on 11 and 12 April. "It's always exciting to start at home. It's the race course where I learnt to sail," she says a month before the fourth SailGP event of the sixth season. She knows: "It could also be complicated, as we experienced recently in Sydney. But fair winds could blow just as well."
Top sailors at the top of the SailGP
Martine Grael's team is in 11th place out of 13 teams after the first three events of what is only the second SailGP season for the Brazilians. She won't be leaving it at that, having already shown where she wants to go as soon as possible with four top-five finishes in Sydney. The Brazilians had already claimed and celebrated their first victory in an individual race at the Mubadala New York Sail Grand Prix 2025 in New York.
The next big goals for the team, for which Laser Olympic champion Paul Goodison is responsible for strategy, are race wins this season and an event victory. Click here for the SailGP ranking after three of 13 events in the sixth season.
The story of Martine Soffiatti Grael in her own words:
Sneak preview of the SailGP Rio premiere:
Tatjana Pokorny
Sports reporter
