CRISS-CROSSING AND ZIG-ZAGGING IN PERFECT BARCELONA

The wise words of NYYC American Magic trimmer, Riley Gibbs, who summed up the most pitch-perfect day in Barcelona, in the most eloquent fashion. And he wasn’t wrong, this was perfection for the AC75s (and two AC40s out on the water), with slightly less choppy conditions than we’ve seen of late in the venue for the Louis Vuitton 37^thAmerica’s Cup and a glorious building breeze that allowed plenty of jib cross-over ranges to be evaluated as the wind increased.

With the designated racecourse area tight along the beachfront, it was a busy runway with team support boats churning up the waters as NYYC American Magic, Alinghi Red Bull Racing, Luna Rossa Prada Pirelli and INEOS Britannia all fought for the same stretch of water to train on. At times, the inevitable happened and suddenly the boats were into crossing situations but the pros know the strict rules about no formal line-ups and kept it onside – just. But you can feel the tension and the heart rates rising as the boats get close and start to semi-engage. Thrilling to watch.

Umberto Molineris summed the situation up well saying: “Actually it's very hard because we're super strict on the rules, we cannot line up with other guys, but it happens and sometimes we cross, and we try obviously as all the other teams to bring everything we can, but yeah it's hard because you’re never on the same leg and we just do some cross and as today the right is really favourite so it's actually hard to make a conclusion.”

Riley Gibbs echoed the sentiment although NYYC American Magic had sighters as recorded in the recon report with Luna Rossa Prada Pirelli and Alinghi Red Bull Racing at times. Talking about the Swiss sighter, Riley said: “I think we linked up at the right time and we were both going up the track at the same time and I think we decided to duck them, obviously with the rules that we’re mandated by we can't be too close to our friends out there but no it's good to line up with another boat so to speak...for me I'm really focused on what goes on in the boat and focus on our own programme and yeah just trying to keep the boat going fast and stable flight and so on.”

INEOS Britannia meanwhile were concentrating on long straight-lines today, feeling the boat through the modes and with a slightly longer set-up on the rudder today as noted by the recon team. An interesting observation by the recon team stated that: “After sailing some days now in wavy conditions, it seems that INEOS Britannia has got more feeling and confidence on sailing Britannia with a greater ride height (both upwind and downwind) when compared to the last days sailed with SW winds.” The longer rudder will certainly aid that mode. 

Neil Hunter, the cyclor who came up through the ranks after being part of the winning British team at the 2017 Youth America’s Cup in Bermuda, spoke about the day and the roles of the cyclors onboard Britannia, saying: “It was a much flatter day out there today than the days we've seen last week and the last sailing day so it was good just to push the boat hard and get the race laps in at the end there...half our cyclor squad is sailors so they have a more sailing specific role and some of them have non-sailing specific roles but yeah everybody does something else on the boat.”

Asked about the mood in the team after some stellar on-water performances of late, Neil added: “Yeah I mean great, to be honest it's great to get back out in RB3 this week and we're excited for the next few days, the forecast looks really good and it's great to be here in Barcelona.”

Umberto Molineris meanwhile spoke about the upgrade to his cockpit shield – the famous ‘Spitfire’ screen as they’re calling it and said (with a smile): “That was something that we talked about months ago and I think obviously it's very good for the aero point of view and also actually sailing the boat that's really pretty nice because everything is becoming super-quiet and it's easy to talk, you can sail without the mask (goggles) and that’s obviously good.”

Alinghi Red Bull Racing meanwhile, having been shoreside over the long weekend, rolled out today with new wing tips on the port side and ran less noticeable cameras than before. Jack Taylor, the Boat Captain of the Swiss team’s stunning AC75 commented: “So you would have seen we've just taken off a few of our cameras and we’re just testing different tips that we might want to bring forward into our race package.”

Talking about reliability that is clearly in Jack’s wheelhouse and something that the Swiss have really nailed under his leadership, he contextualised it with reference to BoatZero saying: “BoatZero was a great starting platform for us, that meant that we got an AC75 out on the waters of the racecourse early, coming forward into BoatOne you know we could transfer a lot of that IP and testing structure so reliability wise we're happy with how it’s all going and as you saw today we had a full fleet out there with six AC boats - four AC75s and two of the AC40s -  there was ‘traffic’ on the racecourse and it looked like everyone had fairly good reliable boats.”

Jack also gave a nod to the shore team who are working hard across all the teams with a sentence that will resonate: “The shed lights are always on, we’ll let you figure out what we've done each day and will keep that under wraps.”

Busy day on the water and the forecast just keeps getting better for Barcelona for the rest of the week. Full recon reports below. (Magnus Wheatley)

On-Water Recon Report – INEOS Britannia: The British rolled out their AC75 at 10:00 today and craned in at 10:30. The same cameras than last sailing session were installed on both port and starboard foils.  LiDAR cameras were also onboard.

Dock-out was at 12:00, when Britannia was towed to the entrance of the harbour where sails were hoisted. Mainsail MN2 was paired to a J3 jib. A wind of about 9-11 knots TWD 175 º @12:30 was blowing when they finished hoisting the sails.

Today’s sailing session can be summarized in a total of 10 upwinds and 10 downwinds sailed with 23 tacks and 26 gybes drilled. The first 5 downwinds and 4 first upwinds were done sailing in long straight lines with the goal of what we think was testing different settings from the aero and foiling systems.

The following laps were done through 3 races of 2 laps each, one except for the last one where just one lap was done before getting back to port. Straight lines were also predominant even in the training races.

Mark roundings were practiced at almost every upwind and downwind leg (sometimes with virtual marks, sometimes with physical marks), alternating the side of the roundings between starboard and port as much as possible, but with a higher percentage of roundings on the starboard side.

About the swaps done today:

One swap of batteries was done at 14:50, almost 2 hours and 10 minutes after they started to sail (1 hour and 40 minutes of effective sailing)

Two cyclor swaps were done: first after 60 minutes of effective foiling, the second one after 80 minutes of effective foiling. One jib swap was done: from J3 to J4 (wind increased from 9-11 to 11-16 knots).

Highlight on the following observations:

• Some tacks were seen completed with the following technique: they give a bit of height to the boat while they heel it slightly to leeward, then drop the windward arm and tack with good turning speed.
• After sailing some days now in wavy conditions, it seems that INEOS Britannia has got more feeling and confidence on sailing Britannia with a greater ride height (both upwind and downwind) when compared to the last days sailed with SW winds. 
• The rudder was observed with more height than compared to yesterday.

INEOS Britannia dropped the sails at 16:45 and docked in at 17:10 after approximately 200 minutes of sailing. Jose Luis Piñana – INEOS Britannia AC Recon

On-Water Recon Report – NYYC American Magic: American Magic rolled out Patriot at 10:50, again with a new spray rail arrangement on the foil arms. Standard checks were carried out ahead of 12:55 dock-out. The MN2-1 mainsail (updated to Version B) and the J3-1 jib hoisted, as 8-12 knots from the south were measured outside the port entrance.

The team began with a long downwind to Badalona, often sailing with two boards down. This was then followed by a long stretch upwind on each tack, with the team drone filming the leeward foil. This was repeated downwind. A long upwind drilling manoeuvres came next, before a brief line up with Luna Rossa Prada Pirelli, as the yacht then came to a stop, with technicians heading below deck.

With the thermal wind slowly increasing, sail settings were adjusted at the clews of both sails, before sailing a long upwind, drilling tacks, and another short period crossing with the Italians, before bearing-away to focus on gybes. Cyclors were rotated at 15:30, ahead of two long upwind downwind laps, crossing with Alinghi Red Bull Racing. The distance between both yachts at each cross remained small, with Alinghi Red Bull Racing slightly less consistent through manoeuvres. The wind increased, with gusts measured at 17 knots, as both yachts exchanged their J3 jibs for their J4 jibs ahead of another long upwind downwind lap, repeating the exercise.

American Magic ended the day by dropping sails outside the port entrance at 17:35, docking in at 17:50 after five hours on the water, of which 170 minutes was active sailing. 81 manoeuvres were observed, at a 91% fully foiling rate. The manoeuvres in the final stint were not counted in order to focus on safety while chasing the two teams with many of their respective chase boats following behind, all in close proximity.

On-Water Recon Report – Alinghi Red Bull Racing: The Swiss rolled out their AC75 at 10:45. The boat was craned to the water at 11:12 and the team docked out at 13:00 as planned, after usual routine activities. Different wing tips to the ones seen last week were identified on the port side foil wing.

The M2-1 was selected for the session, combined with the J3-1. Both sails were hoisted just before heading out of the port at 13:25, with Arnaud Psarofaghis (stb helm), Maxime Bachelin (port helm), Bryan Mettraux (stb flight controller), and Nicolas Rolaz in replacement of Nicolas Charbonnier, for the second sailing session in a row on the port side trimmer position.

Southerly medium winds prevailed during the session, increasing in intensity towards the afternoon and slightly shifting right during the day. The training started with some straight-lines performing a downwind, an upwind and an extra downwind. Immediately after, there was a first break in which the technicians got onboard to execute their respective routine checks. However, in this opportunity it took longer than usual, spending thirty-five minutes.

At 14:20 the session was resumed with three long upwind-downwinds, executing just one tack and gybe per leg, focusing mostly on sailing on target numbers maximizing VMG on a mostly straight-line testing day. This was complemented with virtual top mark roundings with immediate gybes, and leeward bottom gates roundings with early tacks.

At 14:55 there was a twenty-minute break in which the second shift of cyclors came onboard in replacement of their colleagues.

The training resumed with an additional long upwind-downwind, executing three tacks and four gybes, respectively. Then after a virtual gate bottom rounding, BoatOne stopped at 15:30 and the technicians came onboard once more for five minutes.

Two long upwind-downwinds followed performing on average eight tacks and gybes per leg, with American Magic sailing on the same waters, crossing each-other in multiple occasions.

At 16:15 a new pause occurred in which the J4-1 came up in replacement of the J3-1, in a building breeze. Then two more long upwind-downwinds were carried out repeating the previous description.

The Swiss ended the day at 17:30 just outside the harbour and proceeded to lower both sails. The team docked at 17:55 and the AC75 was craned out of the water half an hour later, indicating the end of the day. Sebastian Peri Brusa – Recon on Alinghi Red Bull Racing

On-Water Recon Report – Luna Rossa Prada Pirelli: The Italian team rolled out the B3 mast at 11:00 and the hull at 11:15, and craned in at 11:55. Matching jet windows were noticed now on both sides and the anti-vibration aero fittings on the shrouds were repositioned compared to previous days, lower on starboard compared to port. On both wings, the cameras were still mounted with perhaps some mods on tips, to be confirmed, while the previously noticed differences on the upper arm stock bulbs were confirmed by further shots.

Before running the usual controls checks, boat builders were observed fixing a fairing on the mast base. Dock-out was scheduled for 13:10 and the team hoisted mainsail M1-7 + jib J2-7 in the harbour before being towed out. Once up and foilborne by self-take-off with 14-16 knots of boat speed, the team headed downwind for some straight-lines paired to occasional gybes before trimming up and headed upwind for more straight-line and some tacks, before repeating this routine. Occasionally the yacht seemed to be heeling leeward more than usually when dropping the board entering the tack manoeuvre.

At 14:20 the breeze shifted right to 200°, increased to 12-13 knots and the J2-7 was lowered to hoist the J3-7. By self-take-off on starboard tack, the yacht sailed once again mostly straight-line with occasional manoeuvres, more touch & go’s were observed on the gybes.

At 15:15 the team decelerated the yacht and batteries were swapped after approx. 80 minutes sailing. At 15:32, the AC75 was back foilborne to practice two pre-start drills with starboard entry, spending two minutes in the virtual box before heading for an upwind and a downwind leg on the 1.72nm long course. The yacht came hullborne at 16:10 and one helm, one trimmer and two aft pods cyclors were swapped after almost two sailing hours.

The third stint included straight-line with smaller number of manoeuvres. While sailing downwind, the yacht was observed flying quite high having to recover stability coming up before heading back to VMG. Once decelerated, checks were done by the sailors and technicians aroundthe  jib track. After a quick break, the team proceeded with additional two starting practices using their chase boat as pin and committee followed by two legs. The last was abandoned as the team pointed towards the harbour where sails were lowered at 17:30.

The team docked in at 17:45 with 173 minutes foilborne, 51 tacks and 42 gybes resulting in a total of 93 manoeuvres with approximately 80% foil-to foil rate. Michele Melis AC Recon.