A Manchester derby of different sorts is playing itself out on Bermuda’s waters this week.

Cecilia Wollmann, who supports Manchester United, has been training with promising British sailor Jack Cookson, who supports Manchester City, over the past several days in the single-handed Laser Radial.

Cookson has travelled to Bermuda to assist Wollmann in her preparations for this summer’s Olympic Games in Rio.

“Jack works hard and is really good in Lasers, so it’s been good pushing myself against him,” Wollmann said. “We have been working on a lot of boat on boat stuff and it has been great.”

The two sailors first met in Wales, while Cookson also attends Southampton University with Wollmann’s sister Ellie.

“It’s great that she [Wollmann] has qualified for the Olympics,” said Cookson, who hopes to represent Britain at the 2020 Olympics in Tokyo.

“This is my first time in Bermuda and the weather here is a bit nicer than in England.”

Putting the two sailors through their paces this week is Wollmann’s coach Christian Noe of Argentina.

Wollmann qualified for the upcoming Olympics at January’s World Cup in Miami just days after celebrating her eighteenth birthday.

She will be first local athlete to represent Bermuda at both the Youth Olympic Games and the Summer Games.

Wollmann impressed at this month’s Digicel Dinghy Regatta where she was the top female sailor and fifth overall.

“The conditions were challenging, it was very windy,” Wollmann said. “It was a really tough weekend, especially competing against the guys that are so much bigger.”

Wollmann, who sails out of the Royal Hamilton Amateur Dinghy Club, is among the 15 athletes selected to represent Bermuda at next year’s Red Bull Youth America’s Cup.

As a member of that group Wollmann will soon take her first steps towards learning the art of foiling in the NACRA 17 catamaran.

Team members now have access to four of the Olympic class boats, which do not fully foil like the larger NACRA 20, which are based in Dockyard.

The NACRA 17 is equipped with curved foils to enhance performance both upwind and downwind. The foils provide lift which helps keep the bows up and reduces the tendency to pitchpole.

The extra lift generated from the foil helps reduce hull wetted area and markedly reduces hull drag.

The hull shape of the NACRA 17, which meets the specific criteria set out by ISAF for this summer’s Olympic Games in Rio, was designed specifically to work in harmony with the curved foils.

Bermuda’s RBYAC sailors will use the NACRA 17 as an initial test platform before transitioning to a larger catamaran, with the M32 and Extreme 40 believed to be among the classes being considered.

Next year’s Red Bull Youth America’s Cup will be contested in the same AC45F foiling catamarans being used in the ongoing America’s Cup World Series. The AC45 is a test platform for the 50-foot foiling catamarans teams will race in the next instalment of the America’s Cup.

Bermuda’s sailors have already trained in three of the team’s NACRA 17s in the Great Sound, the venue for next year’s Red Bull Youth America’s Cup regatta, to be held just before the America’s Cup.

Land Rover BAR, the British challenger for the America’s Cup, introduced the NACRA catamaran to Bermuda during a winter training camp in January last year.

The team trained in the NACRA F20 which is designed for inshore and coastal racing and is equipped with a flight-controlling system making it capable of reaching speeds approaching 30mph.

“They are ideal for training because they are small, fast, foiling boats,” Jonathan Goring, the Land Rover BAR team member, said. “They are much more twitchy than the bigger boats, so they are more sensitive.

“In terms of balance, you learn a lot on them — basically, the whole team and the designers. The designers sail them as well, so they get the feel for what we are doing. These boats are great.”