CHALLENGING DAY ALL ROUND IN BARCELONA

INEOS Britannia were quick to issue a statement about the incident on their website and across social media saying: The two British one-design AC40s (Athena & Sienna) had left the dock early for a two-boat race-training day and towed to the north-east of Barcelona City to find some good breeze. At 10:05 CET whilst sailing off Mataro, the crew onboard Athena were required to react to a very sudden electrical fire highlighted by smoke coming out of the forward hatch. The team chase boat was quickly alongside, fire extinguishers were deployed, but water was required to be pumped into the forward hatch to submerge the lithium battery to contain the fire, no one was injured in the incident. After stabilising the yacht and contacting the emergency services, the team had a long tow back to the INEOS Britannia team base, with constant monitoring of the crew onboard and the lithium battery. 

Speaking to the recon team after coming ashore on ‘Sienna’ the team’s alternative AC40, Sir Ben Ainslie, Skipper and Team Principal of INEOS Britannia gave his assessment saying: “It was clearly quite lumpy and both boats had a few touchdowns. And then Boat A very quickly had quite an extreme battery fire onboard, which there wasn’t any real sign of that coming and it was quite extreme and has caused a lot of damage to the boat and a big effort from the team to salvage the boat, so big thank you to everyone involved in that and also the local safety services here in Barcelona coming down to help both here onshore and on the water as well – big shout out to those folk. Difficult day for the team because we’ve been getting a lot of really useful learnings out of the two boats, we’ve got to see quite how much damage there is to the boat, if we can rectify that or not, but yeah, a real shame.”

Asked if everyone was okay, Ben confirmed as such saying: “Everyone is okay, we had a few individuals we were potentially concerned about with smoke inhalation and things like that but we try and train for these situations and we have all of the safety equipment on the Chase Boats but nevertheless it’s quite a rare occurrence so of course these things happen fast, but I was really impressed listening to the communications onboard between the yacht and the Chase Boat, how everyone responded and from what I could see and hear did a really good job to try and make the best out of a very difficult situation.”

INEOS Britannia is scheduled to have a planned week of maintenance next week and we will await further updates on the team’s plans with ‘Athena’ in the coming days.

Elsewhere, confused conditions and a challenging sea-state in Barcelona made meaningful sail testing a tough ask for NYYC American Magic who persisted for nearly four hours, gamely fighting a relentless swell of up to 0.6 metres and a north-easterly breeze that seemed to build and fade, rarely staying consistent above 10 knots.

Tom Slingsby was joined by Lucas Calabrese on ‘America’ whilst Paul Goodison teamed up with Youth Team ace Harry Melges on 'Magic' for a lively and demanding session pushing through the relentless sail profile programme that the team have been conducting in recent weeks. Clearly sail design direction decisions are being taken and these sessions are notable for the long legs sailed to get the maximum out of the settings.

Anderson Reggio, Testing manager for NYYC American Manager gave a superb appraisal of the day saying: “Yeah it’s been a while since we had a sea-state that here and tricky little north-easterly breeze on the day today that was very up and down, hard to make the right jib call, hard to get the boats into good proper line-ups, but we did the best we could dealing with some pretty tricky conditions out there...when you get the waves like that it makes these boats very, very, difficult to sail and therefore also very difficult to judge when you get a two boat line-up as to what settings are best.”

Asked how the team will scale-up the sail learnings on the water in the AC40 up to the AC75, Anderson commented: “That’s the question that anybody sailing the AC40 right now is trying to reason out. We are not out here to make the AC40 the fastest AC40 in the world, we are trying to do what we can to learn as much as is applicable to the AC75 so those are questions we ask ourselves constantly.”

Drilled about the importance of the sail programme over the racing practice that we’ve seen from other teams, Anderson added: “I imagine that at some point in time, in consultation with our coaching staff we will move into that phase in our plan but for right now where we are, and for internal deadlines that are looming for a few decisions that we want to make, the racing side hasn’t been a priority these last two weeks as much.”

And looking forward to the AC75, he spoke about the boatbuilders up at Portsmouth, Rhode Island where the boat is being built, saying: “They’re looking forward to putting shorts on and coming to Barcelona, I’ll tell you that,  it’s pretty cold at home in Rhode Island right now but they’re finishing up and getting close to the end.” And when asked about the launch date, Anderson simply commented: “Hey we have to at some point, we have a date on the calendar and we’ll be getting closer and closer to that each and every day.”

Good, if challenging, day for NYYC American Magic who are now off for the weekend. For INEOS Britannia, it was a tough day at the office. (Magnus Wheatley)

On-Water Recon Report – NYYC American Magic: NYYC American Magic had a challenging day of two boat tuning due to an incalcitrant easterly breeze and a nasty, confused sea state with a steep chop of up to 0.6 metres. Having rolled out America at 0720 and Magic at 0745 both boats were rigged and launched by 0845 - with Magic being slightly delayed by the discovery of a rudder issue that required remedying and the rudder recalibrating before the boat was cleared for launch. Two new mid-bow cameras (one each side) were observed that appeared to be trained on the foil arms.

After a simultaneous dock out at 0927 the two boats rendezvoused at the harbour entrance where the mainsail on America was hoisted while an issue with the hoist on Magic required lead sailmaker Ben Newton to be brought out to the boat from the base. With the local forecast changing with every update and causing a quandary for the team's selection of headsail, three separate sails were brought onboard and off again before the decision was made to start the day with the J3 C1 on ‘America’ and a one-design J3 on ‘Magic.’

Magic was the first out of the harbour at 1020 and the crew went off for some free sailing before America joined them at 1030. The two boats then set off on a long upwind stint with minimal tacks. The wind was at 11 knots from 090 but with the lumpy sea state causing both crews difficulties maintaining a constant ride height there were several resulting splashdowns from each.

After turning downwind for a long fast two foiling gybe (and one touchdown) run the two boats stopped at 1105 to change headsails to a J2-4 on America and a J2-? on Magic. The wind at this point had dropped to 8 knots. With a new 10-11 knot easterly breeze arriving both boats set off again at 1135 for a windward / leeward lap that ended at 1220 as the breeze dropped away to 6-7 knots. The Magic crew called it a day at this point and opted for a foiling tow with sails up back to the harbour. America stayed out a little longer for a short upwind and then a bear away for a fast downwind to the harbour entrance.

Both boats were in the harbour by 1250 and back on the dock by 1315. No sailing is scheduled for the weekend of February 17/18.