MAGIC LOOKING IMPERIOUS AND SWISS FINDING NEW GEAR

In the first practice session last weekend against Luna Rossa Prada Pirelli, American Magic impressed in race after race with the established pairing of Tom Slingsby and Paul Goodison underlining not only tactical brilliance but outstanding technique both upwind and downwind, the result of long days on the water and a methodical step-by-step approach. On Wednesday it was another long afternoon on the water with the team running a two boat AC40 programme relatively far south near the airport where the breeze topped out at 7-9 knots and gave plenty of opportunity for aero and hydro testing.

American Magic’s upgrade programme on the foils is impressive with little tweaks being tried on an almost daily basis. The direction of travel is clear with the team preferring the narrow long-form wings that are proving tricky to control but are rapid once in flight. It’s an almost vertical learning curve for the Flight Controllers on each boat who are tasked with adapting fast as the helms put the pressure on. Today it was Tom Slingsby pairing with Harry Melges on ‘America’ and the fast-driving Lucas Calabrese with Paul Goodison in ‘Magic’ who performed several straight-line line-ups at pace with the new ‘Wing 03’ that features upturned tips on the port foil arm, under the spotlight.

A ventilation from ‘America’ brought one stint to a close and a crew member was required to climb out on the foil arm and make some adjustments with what looked like sandpaper – small differences seemingly make big changes. After sailing Michael Menninger said: “We were just kind of making little touch ups, that's the newer foil, Foil 3, and yeah it just got a bit of touch up work that we need to do to it, but nothing major.” Asked whether the team have selected their crew for Vilanova, Michael confirmed that the team will be the same as we saw in the practice racing last weekend saying: “I think it's just the same group that we sailed the last test event that we did last weekend but yeah we're really looking forward to that and pretty soon here we’ll kind of gear back into practising for the one design racing and yeah the whole team is really excited for that and looking forward to it.”

Asked about sailing style and what we will see in Vilanova from all the teams, Michael offered: “I think all the teams will probably converge to very similar hydro and aero setups but for the first event I think there will be some subtle differences, but we'll just have to wait and see what the other teams kind of do. But it seems like we've found some pretty good settings that we're happy with but we're constantly developing and learning so trying to get better.”

American Magic are showing imperious form at the moment. The Preliminary Regatta will reveal plenty about just where they are in this America’s Cup.

Another team clocking up the hours on Wednesday was Alinghi Red Bull Racing who also towed out to the south of Barcelona to find the afternoon breeze by the airport in their tricked-up AC75 ‘BoatZero’ that is now sporting the new Southern Spars rig and a host of new system technology onboard.

The most noticeable change is to the mainsheet clew arrangement and it’s here where they look to have made a breakthrough reducing the natural gap between the mainsail skins, cutting down the aero profile and seemingly delivering much more accurate performance. Mainsail leech control on ‘BoatZero’ is now a thing of wonder with the team able to really power up with ease and control the flight through the tacks and gybes. Trim is precise and much smoother than we saw before with the old arrangement and the depth that the camber depth that team are running in the light is far more easily controlled. Interesting development for the Swiss who looked very efficient out on the water in the lighter airs and flat sea-state over a five hour session that certainly blew the holiday cobwebs away and the team are now ultra-focussed on both their development of the AC75 and building consistency into their AC40 programme ahead of Vilanova.

Over in Cagliari, Luna Rossa Prada Pirelli continued their impressive training week with a slightly less consistent day than they have been showing of late. A modification that saw the removal of the internal wing tip on the port side foil might explain in part their inconsistency when tacking from starboard onto port but by the end of the two-and-a-half-hour session they were back to their best and really flying around the Bay.  Once the Chase Boat had dropped in a leeward gate and set a virtual top mark on the onboard computer, Francesco Bruni and Jimmy Spithill put the hammer down and really pushed the LEQ12 through a series of time-on-distance runs and highly effective two-board down round-ups.

As Luna Rossa has got faster, the demand for low-riding upwind is at a premium and Umberto Molineris and Vittorio Bissaro were working hard to keep the bow desperately low whilst showing some very impressive sail trim. Watching Luna Rossa through the tacks and gybes, the team trim up the mainsail to just above the centreline to promote the turn and then give a very optimal and powerful shape on the new course. Time and again they performed this and the result is fast exit speeds and very controlled turns. Bow-on the leeway profile looked effective and it’s an area the Italian design team and sailors have worked hard on.

Speaking afterwards, Vittorio Bissaro summed up the day saying: “Well, it was an awesome week so far. Today was another very flat and nice sea breeze with sun, flat water, good conditions. It was a long time that I was missing this boat and I cannot ask for a better week to jump back in again...It feels as fast as usual - so very fast!” And Vito also confirmed what the recon team saw as slight inconsistency today saying: “We are trying different things, so yeah as you said it was not as consistent as usual - the boat on the foils - but I mean it’s part of the development phase and we’re just pushing our limits every day.”

Training continues for the Italians in Cagliari this week. (Magnus Wheatley)

On-Water Recon Report – NYYC American Magic: Two boat light wind testing for American Magic with yet another foil wing and foil flap modification.                

Roll out was 11:15h for America; with a black gullwing foil with elevated tips and a spat on starboard side and the new C silver version with elevated tips on port side, and Magic; with the black one design T foil on starboard and the version H of the port wing foil painted in matt silver with full white tips.                                                                                                                

Dock out was 13:26h with Tom Slingsby, Michael Menninger, Andrew Campbell and Harry Melges in ‘America’ and Lucas Calabrese, Paul Goodison, Severin Rowe and Riley Gibbs in ‘Magic.’ By the time they went out of the port the wind was barely reaching 3knts from 115º.

At 13:52h both boats hoisted the main and ‘Magic’ started foiling at 14:04h for 6min with a tow start assistance. By 14:18h they both hoisted the #J1 and did some line-up testing until ‘America’ ventilated at 14:58h and had to stop and check on their new wing on the port foil.

The upwind line-up testing carried on with fully foiling tacks that ended 12nm far from shore. Then they did a long bear away before changing their batteries. At 16:25h the wind increased slightly, and we saw ‘Magic’ doing a pretty good angle leeward and windward. A touch down tack from ‘America’ made them stop and started solo sailing as ‘Magic’ went back to port at 16:54h. ‘America’ kept sailing until 18:44h. It ended being a long and productive day on the water for the NYYC American Magic.  Elia Miquel, Recon Unit NYAM.

On-Water Recon Report – Alinghi Red Bull Racing: The Swiss rolled out their AC75 at 11:00, a late start in anticipation of thermal winds later in the afternoon. It was immediately noted that the old mainsheet system was on deck (commonly used with the M1-1R mainsail) with a shore team member mounting a GoPro at the end of the main hydraulic actuator. A Harken Performa winch was positioned at the rear of the starboard cockpit, though the purpose remains unknown.

The team docked out at 13:00, hoisted the M1-1R mainsail within the port, then towed the yacht southward, to sail in front of the airport and Castelldefels for the day. The J1-1R jib was hoisted and sailing commenced at 14:25. The predominant 'Garbi' thermal wind blew from the southwest, with speeds fluctuating between 5-7 knots, and later settling to 4-5 knots. Sea state was mostly flat.

During the first stint, the team managed to get the yacht foiling in some of the lightest conditions they’ve managed so far, close to the limit in maintaining flight, sailing an upwind-downwind-upwind. The second stint saw another upwind-downwind, as Yves Detrey inspected the sail trim and systems, with Jason Waterhouse presumably in his place on starboard trim.

In the third stint, a pre-start practice was undertaken with chase boats doubling as the starting gate. Post start, the yacht executed a tack and then bore away shortly, returning back to rotate cyclors. Nico Stahlberg remained in position, as Arthur Cevey, Barnabé Delarze, and Florian Trüb made way for Théry Schir, Augustin Maillefer, and Nils Theuninck.

The fourth stint saw a bear away and gybe, and then sailing upwind after rounding a chase boat, before transitioning downwind. The fifth stint involved three attempts at pre-start practices. However, the decreasing wind conditions impeded consistent full foiling manoeuvres. The sixth and final stint of the day necessitated two tow starts due to the average wind of 5 knots: one at the beginning and another after a touch-down gybe.

Sails were dropped at 17:45 and the yacht was towed back to base. The team spent over 5 hours on water, covering a distance of 70NM. Out of this span, 130 minutes were spent sailing, during which 40 manoeuvres were performed, 53% fully foiling. The balance in

performance between tacks and gybes appeared fairly even.

On-Water Recon Report – Luna Rossa Prada Pirelli: The Italian team rolled out their LEQ12 prototype at 12:20, proceeding with the mast stepping procedure and craning the yacht in by 12:35. It was noted that the inboard tip winglet on the portside anhedral wing has been removed. Routine checks followed and dock-out was scheduled for 13:40 after having locked in newer mainsail M1-2 pairing it later with the J1.5 jib. The sea-breeze was building up and the anemometer displayed 9-11kn from 175 TWA with an overall flat sea-state beside some light chop. Six crew boarded the prototype which was then towed up foilborne on port tack at the beginning of the first foiling stint. The usual warm up tacks were executed until the LEQ12 fell hull borne exiting one tack from starboard to port tack, which appeared to happen several times.

After a quick debrief, the second foiling stint began when the LEQ12 performed a self-take-off at approx. 85 TWA and 17kn boat speed and kept on running through tacks upwind before bearing away for some gybes and repeating this routine. In the meantime Chase2 laid out a leeward gate without a physical windward mark, perhaps employing a virtual mark which was marked on the RU chase GPS. After a downwind leg, the LEQ12 trimmed up and stopped for a while. The yacht was then towed up to practice a pre-start with time-on-distance after which it sailed on course for some laps before splashing hull borne on another tack manoeuvre. The J1.5 was lowered as the breeze increased to approximately 12-13kn to hoist the J2.

On the next foiling stint, the LEQ12 was towed up and quickly headed downwind to the leeward gate for another pre-start practice, nailing the clock, starting the first upwind leg but splashing down on the first downwind gybe. Towed up by Chase2, in the last foiling stint, the LEQ12 kept on sailing around the marks for two legs before heading downwind to the harbour and stopping. Today the team had a lower success rate for foil-to-foil manoeuvrers, perhaps running new pre-sets for the transitions.

Sails were lowered by 15:55 and the day was called with approx. 101 minutes of foiling, approx. 32 tacks and 25 gybes. [Michele Melis AC Recon].