MAGIC AND AMERICA SLUG IT OUT IN BARCELONA

NYYC American Magic’s favourite racetrack area down by the Port Olímpic was once again the arena for some superb pre-starting training where all the action appears to be in the final lead-back into the line. Just how aggressive the manoeuvres were are testament to how far this team has come over this intense period of two-boat race training and it was interesting to watch just how much both teams on the ‘A’ and ‘B’ boat throw the AC40s around – almost as if they were dinghies.

Some of the manoeuvres were absolutely top drawer, most notably the first tacks off the line, the super-aggressive leeward luffs to get the windward boat off the foils and, in the late afternoon breeze, the double-board (safety-first) round-ups at the leeward gate. This is a team high on performance at the moment and with a growing confidence that if the Louis Vuitton 37^th America’s Cup comes down to a straight fist-fight on the water, they will be in the ring slugging.

On balance, Tom Slingsby and Paul Goodison had the better of the day on ‘America’ but Lucas Calabrese and Harry Melges kept them honest, taking a few scalps and pushing hard all over. Where the Slingsby/Goodison combo has it is in the subtle positioning around the racetrack, always aware of how to damage the other boat with back-wind and dynamite covering. When it comes to racing the AC75, these days in the AC40 will be so valuable to the team.

Speaking afterwards, Performance Analyst Anderson Reggio spoke to the recon team about the day, buoyed by what he saw on the water, saying: “It was very productive session. We had a little bit of a forecast for some of these storms that are brewing behind me so we wanted to go out and get as much as we could in what turned out to be a fairly short window on the day today. But the breeze came up pretty quickly so anywhere up to 22-23 knots at times and we got both boats out there racing against one another, so another productive two boat day for us.”

Asked what the biggest gains have been in this intense period, Anderson countered: “For us just the team, the guys working together as a team especially these last few weeks that we've had here where we've been racing two boats hard against one another to see both the ‘A’ boat and the ‘B’ boat sort of gelling together as their own teams and pushing each other harder and harder. It's actually been really beneficial huge, huge, gains for the sailing team, no question.”

Looking forward to the AC75 launch which is any day now, and when the programme switches into a whole other world of performance, Anderson was asked how his job will change to which he replied: “In some ways it gets easier because you're down to only one boat, so in some ways you're looking at half the amount of data as we currently are trying to do between two boats, so same number of people will be looking at half the data every night that we currently are trying to deal with but it's going to be a lot of testing and a lot of regimented routine sailing for us as soon as the new boat launches.”

NYYC American Magic were on the water for just under four hours with dock-out at midday and dock-in at 3.50pm. A total of 140 quality minutes was spent foiling and the strong impression that this American team mean business. Fascinating to watch. (Magnus Wheatley)

On-Water Recon Report – NYYC American Magic: AC40-8 ‘Magic’ was craned in at 10:30 and AC40-5 'America' craned in at 11:00 with dock-out at 12:00. Ten minutes later they started hoisting their mainsails: MC-4 for America and MC-2 for Magic,  paired with J2 custom jibs.

A wind of about 9-11 knots TWD 240º was blowing at 12:20 after hoisting the sails. Waves were coming from 138 º direction, asymmetrical to the wind. From here the sailing session progressed in the following stints:

Stint 1 (12:20 to 13:00): 9-11 knots TWD 240º@12:20. Both boats started sailing together into a downwind and 5 gybes were performed. After the 5th gybe, they luffed into a portside upwind course and they both started speed testing. They did 3 long tacks and after the last one they bore-away into a downwind and sailed to a starting line set by the team in front of the Port Olímpic. Each of them rounded the marks from the starting line as it they were a bottom gate. One took the one to portside and the other one to starboard side and then they began an upwind/downwind race. The top mark was virtual and was set by one of the chase boats. The race was won by ‘America’ who was taking distance upwind, but ‘Magic’ managed to make a great comeback on the downwind and got to the finish line quite close to ‘America’.

Stint 2 (13:00 to 13:45): 12-16 knots TWD 240º@13:25. Two pre-starts were completed in this stint. In the first one ‘Magic’ was getting into the box before ‘America’ at the pre-start and managed to win the pin position having then a bit of advantage there over ‘America’ for the two laps upwind/downwind race (axis set to TWD 240) that continued. A great and very close fight was seen in those two laps that finished with the lead of ‘Magic’ but only a few meters in front of ‘America’. In the second pre-start ‘America’ was getting into the box first. In the last minute a super-tough battle was seen between them, and on the way to the line, America (leeward to Magic) managed to push upwind to Magic until the point that she lost the foiling. America managed to bear-away just before losing foiling and successfully crossed the line on time. Magic got back on the foils quickly but lost some distance against America. They performed a couple of upwind tacks and after sailing back to the line, stopped to get the jibs replaced by J3 jibs as the wind kept increasing.

Stint 3 (13:45 to 14:40): 12-18 knots TWD 220º@14:00. Two pre-starts were completed in this stint. In the first one Magic entered the line before America and, after a tough battle, managed to win the pin spot at the start. America got into Magic’s wind shadow with low speed in the same moment of the start and tried to tack quickly but lost the foiling after the tack. In the second start, America came into the box first. At the start they both crossed the line on port tack, America close to the pin mark and Magic in the middle of the line. They raced (7 tacks) until a bit after the entrance of the harbour where they stopped 20 minutes for a debriefing and battery replacement.

Stint 4 (14:40 to 15:30): 18-22 knots TWD 220º@14:40. The boats returned to the starting line. America started sailing a bit before than Magic and performed several gybes and tacks on the way back to the line with the two foiling arms down. Magic sailed straight to the line. As the wind shift to TWD 220° the axis course was also moved to the wind direction. Two pre-starts were completed in this stint. Magic came first into the box at the first pre-start but it was America who managed to win the pin and got a bit of advantage in front of Magic. One upwind/downwind race was sailed after the start which was won by America. They finished the race after rounding the bottom mark. America did a very efficient rounding sailing with both arms down and managed to minimize the time where both arms were down. Magic forced sailing very low with both arms down to be able to round the mark off the lay line, but before rounding lost quite a lot of speed and when round the mark almost capsized as they lost the apparent wind in the manoeuvre. In the next and last pre-start of the day, America got into the line first. With the wind up at the upper limit, both boats lost foiling on purpose (before the last minute) and waited for the right timing until getting onto the foils, accelerating and crossing the line. America started leeward to Magic and won this race. Magic lost control at the end of the downwind, luffed and lost the foiling. After this last race both boats sailed together back to port in 6 tacks approximately.

Dock in was completed at 15:50.

As a summary ‘Magic’ and ‘America’ foiled for approximately 140 minutes. They performed speed tests, around 56 tacks and 46 gybes for each boat and completed 6 prestart, 1 x 2 lap upwind-downwind course races, 3 x 1 lap upwind-downwind course race and 1 x upwind course race. Jose Piñana AC Recon