CHASING TECHNIQUE
International Moth World Champion, Dylan Fletcher-Scott, got his first taste of the America’s Cup today steering the INEOS Britannia AC40 on its second day of sailing out of Palma and as auditions go, it was pretty impressive.
Very much at the vanguard of the new foiling generation rapidly coming through to the apex of world sailing - the America’s Cup - Dylan had the experience of Giles Scott, Leigh MacMillan and Bleddyn Mon to show him the ropes on a light-weather day that saw the team hold in the dock until the afternoon breeze settled in. When it did, the team were quickly up on the foils and only rarely touched down over a two-hour, early evening session that saw a 93% foil-to-foil tack success rate over 15 tacks and an 81% gybing foil-to-foil success rate on 16 gybes – fantastic numbers on only their second day and at times had the on-water recon unit struggling to keep pace.
Leigh MacMillan put the AC40 into context versus the team’s prototype LEQ12 ‘T6’ saying: “It's different, there's a lot less going on for us on this boat, there’s a lot of things that happen automatically and so it's a different kettle of fish and really kind of geared up just for the racing not for the development. So we were just purely focused on the boat handling whereas in T6, the boat handling is a bit of an afterthought really as we’re into the data collection and getting the testing that we need for the designers… I think they are going to be great racing machines, they're all going to be identical and performing, it’s a really high performance boat, so it's going to be a great racing getting them out there all against each other.”
The sailors certainly looked very comfortable in the light conditions, popping to flight on the auto-pilot and then maintaining foil time with complete ease. The largest J1 jib provided easily enough horsepower to lift out from displacement and the team exercised their customary precision mainsheet trimming through the small gusts and you suspect that they would really like to see some more breeze to push the boat harder.
MacMillan confirmed the goals for the day saying: “Really it was just kind of our final bit of familiarisation with the boat, putting it through its paces and just making sure we're getting really comfortable with how the boat’s performing and finding out how kind of robust it is already… I think we're just going to build up the confidence in it and push it up through the range and kind of know where the limits are with this particular boat. We’re just trying to find the kind of the settings for this boat that feel good for us.”
Those settings are something that all the AC40 teams are now looking at. With the boats designed to be very strict one-design for the Youth & Women’s America’s Cup events, the premium is going to be on small tweaks to technique and then demon racecraft with boat positioning on the racecourse absolutely key.
Familiarisation with the controls to make sailing the boats almost second-nature is the biggest game in town now and INEOS Britannia are well on their own learning curve. Bringing in the likes of Dylan Fletcher-Scott is a shot in the arm for the sailing team – watch this space, the next generation are coming…and fast. (Magnus Wheatley)
On Water Recon Notes: For INEOS Britannia's third day with their AC40 the team timed things perfectly in the afternoon to get the most out of a consistent but light late afternoon breeze of no more than 8 knots.
After rolling out of the shed at midday the shore crew spent some time seemingly testing the foil arm cant systems before the boat was launched ready for a dock out at 1415.
Out on the water, after the mainsail hoist was complete the boat was towed southwest for 3 nautical miles closer to the best of the breeze. With the J1 hoisted, despite the light winds the UK crew – helmsmen Giles Scott and trialist Dylan Fletcher, along with trimmers Leigh McMillan and Bleddyn Mon – were able to coax the boat into the air without needing to be towed.
Once up the sailors stayed airborne for most of the next two hours, stopping briefly only a couple of times. The crew completed a series of 30 manoeuvres – split equally between tacks and gybes – with the vast majority fully foiling. Towards the end of the day they even threw in some unexpected and slick JK and DB (tack bear away) turns. With the breeze fading, time was called shortly before 1700.
Dock out: 1415 Dock-in: 1710
Conditions:
PM: 6.5-8 knots from 180. Warm but overcast with sunny spells 10°c - 13°c
Onboard Today
Helms: Giles Scott / Dylan Fletcher
Crew: Leigh McMillan / Bleddyn Mon
Sails Used:
Mainsail (M1-1): 2 hours 30 minutes
J1 (J1-1): 2 hours
Total Tacks: 15 – 14 foil-to foil, 1 touchdown
Total Gybes: 16 – 13 foil-to-foil, 3 touch & go
Recon Notes: Take offs all self