SATURDAY BIG BOAT SESSION

The north westerly breeze filtering off the land and arriving on the America’s Cup racecourse via numerous downtown structures was throwing up some big shifts especially near to the beach as the boats beat up into La Barceloneta, but flat water gave the Flight Controllers and trim teams on both boats plenty of scope to run through modes and gear changes.

Docking-out and setting their M3 mainsail and J3 headsail, the Emirates Team New Zealand Chase Boat team towed ‘Te Rehutai’ out to the east to get well clear of the harbour before the sailors returned on a short beat and then bore away for a long downwind to take them offshore. In recent days, the development of the power delivery and sail control systems has been upgraded on the Kiwi boat and they’ve used their time in Barcelona to keep on pushing through the upgrades and modifications before they return for the New Zealand summer where their development work will continue on the team’s AC40s. Whilst today’s modifications were all hidden and internal, one thing we could see was their Lidar sail measuring and mapping camera being hung out on a pole on the port side. Previously these units have been mounted on the deck just behind the helms on both sides but the desire to try and get more accurate onboard data and a clearer view of what is happening on the double skins of the mainsail was clear.

Speaking afterwards Nathan Outteridge, helmsman onboard Te Rehutai gave a good analysis of the day saying: “We heard it's possible to get an offshore breeze and it's taken us almost four months to find one so yeah it was good to get out today and experience it and a bit of a leftover swell from the last couple of days and trying to work out what the racecourse would look like with this NW shifty offshore breeze. It was fun.”

Talking about the shifting breeze and how they sail the boat in those conditions, Nathan added: “You’ve just got to go through a lot more gear changes, down the bottom of the course that we had high teens often at the top of the course sometimes you had high teens, sometimes you had like 8 or 9 knots, so a lot of what we were trying I guess to work out today was just how quickly we can adjust the sail trim so that we can get through such a large range of conditions and it was shifting 45 degrees out there at times so you’re on like a glamour shift and you’re like ‘okay this is great’ and then you hit a boundary and you're sailing kind of back where you came from sometimes. So yeah it was it was definitely good for us to be able to do that and I think we've all done a lot of sailing in shifty venues and when you're in Barcelona for months on end and biggest shift you see is about 8 degrees it was nice to actually try and pick a couple today.”

Nathan also spoke about the modifications programme and confirmed that most of the changes are internal and unseen, however he did say: “It was pretty hard to validate how good the changes were given how unstable the wind was but you know we’ll have a look overnight and see how it goes and yeah a few more days ahead of us still with the big boat right now to push through some of those mods. We always planned to be here until the end of October so it's nice that we can keep developing right up until the end and yeah that was good.”

Alinghi Red Bull Racing were also out in their AC75 ‘BoatZero’ after a maintenance day on Friday and despite a few gremlins creeping onboard causing some stoppages, once they were sailing again, they looked very good with a slightly higher bow mode and more than capable of going through the required gear changes to keep flying. A highly productive four hours on the water, covering some 50 nautical miles kept the sailing clock ticking over and this hard-driving team are building in added confidence levels with every passing session.

Rodney Ardern, Recon Panel member and a vital link between the sailing team and the design office described the day saying: “The forecast was pretty accurate so we got pretty much what we expected but it was a little unfortunate we had a few little stoppages with a few little problems which we don't really know that complete story behind them but often they happen after a maintenance day and there's a little bit of fine-tuning to get the things running again.”

Rodney, a past America’s Cup winner and Round the World Race veteran summed up the mix of youth and experience in the team saying: “yeah well there definitely is plenty of people in the team with lots of experience but it's also trying to find a way to share that with the younger guys and try and inspire them to do their best and work hard all the way through.”

And talking about the value of sailing the AC75s in this October window, he added: “I think the AC75 in this period has being really good, I think Emirates Team New Zealand touched on it last week, having this size boat in these conditions, wave size, and everything is very critical even though everyone’s probably designed their boats already it's still just getting a good feel for what the conditions actually are in October and yeah I understand American Magic’s probably pulling theirs out next week or the week after so that’s good for them too.”

The Alinghi Red Bull Racing programme continues this week whilst for Emirates Team New Zealand they are planning a short tow-test session on Sunday. (Magnus Wheatley)

On-Water Recon Unit Report – Emirates Team New Zealand: Emirates Team New Zealand scheduled an 1100 Saturday dock-out time to take advantage of a so far rare offshore wind in Barcelona with a just over three hour session sailed in a very shifty north westerly breeze that ranged from 10 knots up to 15 knots in the unpredictable gusts that periodically rolled off the city front. The team's previous-generation AC75 rolled out of the hangar at 0930 and was rigged and launched by 1008 ahead of a slightly delayed 1103 dock-out. We observed that the LIDAR unit on the port side of the boat had been projected outboard on a carbon pole. See photo.

Because of the unusual wind direction and the remarkably smooth sea state, the team opted to tow the boat out of the harbour at 1115 with sails down before a short foiling tow along the coast to a point off the W Hotel where sails – M3-1 mainsail and J3-6 headsail – were hoisted by 1135. The boat was up and foiling by 1140 on a brief upwind sail before a hard bear away to begin a long, fast downwind run heading out to sea. This was followed by a reciprocal upwind leg all the way back to the beach where the breeze was noticeably more shifty making life difficult for the crew to keep the boat tracking smoothly in a straight line.

After another downwind / upwind laps the boat came to a stop at 1208 when at least one VIP guest was brought on board. At this point the average wind was in the 10-12 knot range, but the regular gusts that fanned out from the shore were peaking at around 15 knots. 15 minutes later the boat was up and foiling again for another windward / leeward session lasting 20 minutes before another stop to rotate the cyclors. This break lasted just six minutes before the crew were off again on a 35-minute free sailing windward leeward session during which the wind direction appeared to get increasingly unpredictable with some huge sudden changes in sailing angle observed both upwind and downwind. (In the post-sailing interview Nathan Outteridge mentions 45 degree shifts).

All in all the crew appeared to deal well with these difficult conditions by flying the boat slightly higher than usual – although there were some occasional splashdowns, both upwind and down. After a 10-minute stop at 1330 the team set about one and a half practice laps around a virtual racecourse – with the final upwind leg finishing outside the harbour mouth at 1402. Sails were dropped by 1420 with the boat docking in at 1425. A short towing session is scheduled in the morning tomorrow – Sunday October 22.

On-Water Recon Unit Report: Alinghi Red Bull Racing: Challenging wind conditions for Alinghi Red Bull Racing team, sailing with their first generation AC75. The Swiss rolled out their AC75 at 9:00h. The yacht was craned in, and the usual pre-sailing checks were carried out.

The team docked out at 11:00h and went straight out of the harbour, where they hoisted the M2-2R mainsail and the J3-3 headsail. The wind conditions outside were 9 kn0ts from 280º, flat sea state and clear skies with cumulonimbus all over the horizon.

Alinghi Red Bull Racing started sailing in displacement mode by the port entrance, following with one gybe downwind on their starboard tack. They stopped at 11:43h, and the technicians went onboard apparently working on the jib traveller and the position of the jib sheet. After twenty minutes, they did 3 more manoeuvres and stopped again with technicians onboard.

At 12:35h, the team was clearly trying to sail the boat in a low mode, they touched down several times as the sea state increased and the wind went from 9 to 7knts, making It even more challenging. At 13:20h, they did a long run upwind-downwind making 30 and 42 knots of speed consecutively. Then, they stopped for a hydration break and right after, they did a bear away until reaching the two marks that they placed near Badalona. At 14:16h, with a decreasing breeze of 5knts from 285º they did a pre-start procedure, followed with a headsail change. The sailors dropped the J3-3, and the chase boat towed them right in front the merchant ships anchorage area, near the port entrance, where they hoisted the J1 at 14:47h. They sailed in displacement mode for than 10 minutes, but as the wind conditions were getting worse, the team decided to lower the sails at 15:10h and tow the yacht back to the base, docking in by 15:30h.

The team covered a total of 50 nautical miles over four hours on the water, 160min were spend sailing with 22 manoeuvres performed, 68% fully foiling. Elia Miquel- ARBR Recon Unit.