ITALIANS AT CAPOTERRA’S MERCY
An encouraging day for Luna Rossa Prada Pirelli with the technicians doing a stellar job in ironing out the gremlins from the team’s new AC40 and delivering a fully functional platform on Saturday for the sailors to begin commissioning.
The weather though in Cagliari was up and down with a dense rain-laden weather system filtering off the Capoterra mountains early in the session, shutting out the sunlight, and delivering gusts up to 20 knots before clearing and leaving very marginal foiling conditions of just 7-8 knots. Once up and flying, Francesco Bruni, Marco Gradoni, Umberto Molineris and Andrea Tesei brought all the foiling tricks into play, flying low with windward heel and bow down whilst oversheeting the traveller to windward in the patches.
Francesco Bruni gave a super-positive interview afterwards, delighted that the early technical issues that the team faced with the AC40 have been sorted and is looking forward to the week ahead where the team will be running a two-boat programme with the AC40 and the LEQ12 that will be coming back out with upgrades. Francesco, one of the undoubted superstars of this America’s Cup cycle, runs through his initial observations of the AC40 in comparison with the LEQ12 and breaks down the day for us.
Much more to come next week from Luna Rossa Prada Pirelli and with a decent forecast for the week ahead we will see the Italians really pushing both boats. It will be fascinating to watch.
On Water Recon Unit Notes: The Luna Rossa Prada Pirelli AC40-6 hull rolled out from the shed at 07:50 along with the mast which was stepped for 30 minutes. A repair on the aft port side was noticed, perhaps resulting from an impact with Chase2 in wavy conditions on the previous attempted sailing day.
Once craned in, the team conducted the usual routine checks as dock-out was scheduled for 10:00. The forecast models showed pretty patchy and unstable conditions with several fronts passing above the Gulf. With Chase2 flanking the AC40 on its port side, the team left the dock and quickly started hoisting the mainsail before even exiting the harbour. At first the team found light WNW breeze of approx. 8-10 knots with some early sights of incoming SE swell with 0.9m and 7s.
Just when the mainsail was fully hoisted, a system coming down from the mountains of Capoterra extended over Cagliari’s harbour with increasing rainfall and gusts up to 20kn.
The AC40 was then back on tow line behind Chase1 and the main was lowered waiting for the front to pass behind the pier. As the sky cleared and the wind dropped, the AC40 was towed for 10 minutes towards Capoterra for some more pressure and rehoisted the sails. Considering the NW light air not exceeding 7-8kn, the mainsail was paired to the biggest jib J1. The first attempted self-take off was observed at 11:40 resulting not feasible due to the light breeze and sea state. Instead, the AC40 was towed up on its foils and, after some minutes of stable foiling, a first touch & go tack was recorded before splashing down afterwards. Another 4 tow ups followed with approximately a minute foiling time each. As the breeze seemed to drop completely the team called it a day and more commissioning will follow up in the upcoming week [Michele Melis AC Recon].
Dock out: 1000 Dock-in: 1310
Wind Conditions: 10:15 8-10kn NW, 10:30 18-20kn W, 12:05 7-8kn NW
Weather AM: Cloudy/ Rainy 19°C (11:00)
Sea State: Swell 0.8/1m @ 7s period
Onboard Today:
Helms: Marco Gradoni / Francesco Bruni
Crew: Andrea Tesei / Umberto Molineris
Sails Used:
Mainsail M1 OD: 2 hours 10 minutes
JIB J1 OD: 1 hour 25 minutes
Total Tacks: 1: 0 foil-to-foil, 1 touch & go, 0 touchdowns.
Total Gybes: 0