america 3 sailboat

AMERICA 3 1992 America's Cup yacht winner America³ (USA–23) was one of four yachts built for the America3 Foundation racing syndicate for the 1992 Citizen Cup. The syndicate was headed by American businessman Bill Koch . Koch's unorthodox scientific approach to boat design was a major contributor to the skepticism in yachting circles that America³ was not a serious contender. Koch said: "To win, you have to combine art and science. We ignored the rules of thumb and looked at what made products better." “When I decided to compete for the America's Cup, everyone thought that what you needed to design a boat was a great naval architect. I said ‘bullshit’. Naval architects are good for ideas but they are not scientists.” “My doctorate degree is in fluid dynamics so I understood science extremely well. I had also discovered what makes a boat go fast and what makes a boat go slow. I’d set up a research program at MIT to do exactly that. We looked at it for five years and we came up with the fastest boat in the world." America³'s innovative design is based on extensive scientific research and testing. She belongs to a class of sailing craft known as "maxis," the largest, fastest, and most expensive sailboats built to race. It was the first edition of the America's Cup that was sailed on  International America's Cup Class  yachts. The yacht was built by Goetz Custom Sailboats Inc. in Rhode Island and the carbon fiber mast package was built by the Offshore Spars Co. in Michigan. She was launched in 1992.   The America3 Foundation racing syndicate won the 1992 Citizen Cup. She then moved on to successfully defend the America's Cup against the challenge of the Italian yacht Il Moro di Venezia V (ITA-25), winner of the 1992 Louis Vuitton Cup. Koch turned down Dennis Conner (the yachtsman who has won the trophy four times ). He skipped America3 to victory! The America3 Foundation racing syndicate entered the 1995 Citizen Cup with an all women's program. The team sailed America³ (USA–23) in the first three stages of the Round Robin, then switched to their newly delivered yacht Mighty Mary (USA–43) for the remainder of the event. America³ is on display at the Wichita Boathouse in Wichita, Kansas.   This wooden model of the America3 is 24" long. It will be completed in one week after your purchase. Learn more about the America 3 here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/America%C2%B3_(1992_yacht)   24" 41" 230 sq in. 5.5" 8" 2.5 lbs This is a 24 inch version of the beautiful racing yacht and 1992 winner of the Americas Cup, The Mini America³. Designed for easy construction and can be sailed in small ponds or even swimming pools. A simple two channel radio is all that is needed to get started with this great boat.  ProductID: VMP-AMER3 AMERICA-3 SAILBOAT Price: 230.00 Quantity: Yachting World Digital Edition America’s Cup boats: 8 facts about the AC75 and why they’re unique Toby Heppell August 20, 2024 The America's Cup boats to be used on the 2024 edition of the event are immensely complicated high tech bits of kit. They might be officially sailing craft but they behave in some remarkable ways The AC75 is the class of boat that takes part in the America’s Cup and are arguably the most radical boats the compeition has ever seen.  This type of America’s Cup boat was first used in the 2021 America’s Cup so this is the second event in which these boats have been used.   The America’s Cup is, fundamentally, a design competition, and successive America’s Cups have featured the most extreme yachts yet – for their time – ever since the first race in 1851. However, the foiling boats we have seen in the last four editions of America’s Cup racing (the AC72 and AC50 catamarans, and now the AC75 monohulls) do represent a new direction for the highest level of sailing. There are plenty who argue that this technology is so far beyond the bounds of what most people consider sailing as to be an entirely different sport. Equally, there are those who believe this is simply a continuation of the development that the America’s Cup has always pushed to the fore, from Bermudan rigs, to composite materials, winged keels, and everything in between. Good arguments can be made either way and foiling in the world’s oldest sporting trophy will always be a subjective and controversial topic. But one thing is certain: the current America’s Cup boats, the AC75s, are unlike anything seen before and are showcasing to the world just what is possible under sail power alone. Photo: Ian Roman / America’s Cup 1 Unimaginable speed Topping the 50-knot barrier used to be the preserve of extreme speed record craft and kiteboarders. A World Speed Sailing Record was set in 2009 of 51.36 knots by Alain Thebault in his early foiling trimaran, Hydroptere , and was bested in 2010 by kite boarder, Alexandre Caizergues who managed 54.10 knots. Only one craft has ever topped 60-knots, the asymmetric Vestas Sail Rocket 2 , which was designed for straight line speed only and could no more get around an America’s Cup course than cross an ocean. Such records are set by sailing an average speed over the course of 500m, usually over a perfectly straight, flat course in optimum conditions. America’s Cup class yachts, designed to sail windward/leeward courses around marks, are now hitting speeds that just over a decade ago were the preserve of specialist record attempts, while mid-race. American Magic has been recorded doing 53.31 knots on their first version of the AC75 class, Patriot. Perhaps even more impressive, in the right conditions when racing we have seen some boats managing 40 knots of boatspeed upwind in around 17 knots of wind. That is simply unheard of in performance terms and almost unimaginable just three or so years ago. Article continues below… How to watch America’s Cup challenger series, the Louis Vuitton Cup live streams from anywhere The America’s Cup Challenger Selection series, the Louis Vuitton Cup will start on Thursday 29 August 2024 and will run… WATCH: Will the USA’s Radical America’s Cup Design Choices Pay Off? American Magic’s new AC75, Patriot, has garnered significant attention due to its unique approach. While all the teams are bound… 2 A storm onboard the AC75 Related to the speeds the boats are sailing through the water, particularly upwind, is the wind speeds the sailors will feel on deck. When sailing, the forward motion affects the wind we experience onboard, known as apparent wind. The oft’ trotted out explanation of how apparent wind works is to imagine driving your car at 50mph. Roll down the window and stick your hand out of it and there will be 50mph of wind hitting your hand from the direction your car is travelling. So when an AC75 is sailing upwind in 18 knots of breeze at a boatspeed of 40 knots, the crew on deck will be experiencing 40 knots of wind over the decks plus a percentage of the true wind speed – depending on their angle to the wind. The AC75 crews might be sailing in only 18 knots of breeze – what would feel like a decent summer breeze on any other boat – but they experience winds of around 50 knots. To put that into context, that is a storm force 10 on the Beaufort scale! 3 Righting moment changes The single most radical development of the AC75 is to take a 75ft ‘keelboat’, but put no keel on it whatsoever. When the then America’s Cup Defender and the Challenger of Record, Emirates Team New Zealand and Luna Rossa Prada Pirelli respectively, announced that the 36th America’s Cup (to be held in 2021) would be sailed in 75ft monohulls, conventional wisdom had it that the boats would look something like a TP52 or a Maxi72 – both impressively high performance keelboats. By doing away with the keel entirely, the design is now like nothing we have ever seen, particularly when it comes to how dynamic the power transition is between foiling and not foiling. The boats are designed to foil on the leeward foil, with the windward one raised to help increase righting moment: to help balance the boat. This means that when the AC75 is not foiling they are extremely tippy – much more so than most other boats of the same size. Essentially, when the wind catches the sails, the boat wants to fall over as there is too much sail area for the amount of weight underneath the boat – something a lead keel usually counters on a yacht or keelboat. Once the boat is up and on the foils, however, that all changes, as everything to windward of the single foil in the water balances the sails. That means, the hull, the crew weight, the sail and rig weight, and the windward foil, all work to counter the sails. What all this means is that the boats go from being extremely tippy, to hugely powerful in just the few seconds it takes to get up on the foil. “The [AC75s] are really very tippy pre-foiling and then they go through the transition where they will need to build significant power. Then immediately [once they lift off] you have more stability than, well, take your pick, but certainly more righting moment than something like a Volvo 70 with a big canting keel. “That change all happens in a very short space of time,” explained Burns Fallow of North Sails, who was one of the team who developed the soft wing concept back when the concept was revealed. Photo: Ricardo Pinto / America’s Cup 4 ‘Cyclors’ return to power America’s Cup boats Bak in 2017 Emirates Team New Zealand stormed to America’s Cup victory in an AC50 foiling catamaran which was, by some margin, quicker than any of the other teams. The most glaring difference was their use of pedal grinders to produce power rather than traditional pedestal arm grinders. ETNZ’s sci-fi style term for their grinders was ‘cyclors’, cyclist sailors. The idea had actually been tried before in the America’s Cup; Pelle Petterson used pedal grinders on the 12-metre Sverige in 1977. But ETNZ’s set-up now was very different: here it was part of a linked chain of innovations, the most obvious emblem of a radical approach. One obvious benefit was the greater power output from using legs to pedal, but beyond this it left cyclists’ hands free and allowed the team to use a highly sophisticated system of fingertip control systems, and thus to use faster, less stable foils, and then to divide up crew roles so ETNZ could be sailed in a different way. When the AC75 was first introduced in 2021, Cyclors were specifically banned by the class rule. However, with a reduction of crew numbers from 11 to 8 in the second AC75 class rule – in use for the 2024 America’s Cup – cyclors are now allowed once again and all teams look set to be using pedal power onboard. 5 America’s Cup boats may not be heading where they point With the AC75 sailing on its foil, drag is dramatically reduced, vast amounts of power can be generated and so speeds rapidly increase. But the foils can serve another purpose too. In order to be able to lift each foil out of the water, the foil arms must be able to be raised and lowered. Hence the foil wings, which sit at the bottom of the foil arms (and are usually a T or Y shape), do not always sit perpendicular to the water surface and the AC75s often sail with them canted over to something nearer 45º to the surface. The further out the leeward foil arm is canted – essentially more raised – the closer the AC75 flies to surface and, crucially, the more righting moment is generated as the hull and rest of the boat gets further from the lifting surface of the foil. There is another positive to this: as the lifting foil is angled, it produces lift to windward, which can force the boat more towards the wind than the angle it is sailing. Due to this negative leeway (as it is known when a foil creates lift to windward) the boat can be pointing at a compass heading of say 180º but in fact will be sailing at eg 177º as the foil pushes the boat sideways and to weather, essentially sailing to windward somewhat diagonally. 6 The foils are heavy. Very heavy. As the foils work to provide stability to the boat (when it is stationary both foils are dropped all the way down to stop it tipping over) and to provide massive amounts of righting moment, they are incredibly heavy. A pair of foil wings and flaps (excluding the one-design foil arm which attaches them to the boat and lifts them up and down) weigh 1842kg. To put that into perspective, the entire boat itself with all equipment (but without the crew) weighs between 6200kg and 6160kg. So the foil wings at the base of the foil arms are nearly ⅓ of the total weight of the boat. It is partly due to this that you will see some teams with bulbs on their foils. If you decide to go for a skinny foil wing (which would be low drag and so faster) then there will not be enough volume to cram sufficient material in to make the foil weigh enough. So some teams have decided to add a bulb in order to make it weigh enough but to also keep a less draggy, slimmer foil shape. 7 Sails can invert at the head As with everything on the AC75, the mainsail was a relatively new concept when the boat was first announced. It consists of two mainsails which are attached to both corners of a D-shaped mast tube. This has the effect of creating a profile similar to a wing. It is well established that solid wing sails are more efficient at generating power than a soft sail and for this reason solid wings were used in both the America’s Cup in 2013 and 2017. But there are drawbacks with a wing: they cannot be lowered if something goes wrong and require a significant amount of manpower and a crane to put it on or take it off a boat. One reason a wing makes for such a powerful sail is that the shape can be manipulated from top to bottom fairly easily with the right controls. With the AC75 the designers wanted a sail that could have some of this manipulation, produce similar power but could also be dropped while out on the water. The twin skin, ‘soft wing’ is what they came up with for this class of America’s Cup boat. In addition to the usual sail controls, within the rules, the teams are allowed to develop systems for controlling the top few metres of the mainsail and the bottom few metres. What this means is that the teams are able to manipulate their mainsail in a number of different ways to develop power and control where that power is produced in the sail. But it also means that they have the ability to invert the head of the sail. Doing this effectively means ‘tacking’ the top of the sail while the rest of the sail is in its usual shape. The advantage here is that instead of trying to tip the boat to leeward, the very top of the sail will be trying to push the boat upright and so creating even more righting moment. The disadvantage is that it would come at the cost of increased aerodynamic drag. We know that a number of America’s Cup teams are able to do this, though whether it is effective is another question and it is very hard to spot this technique being used while the boats are racing at lightning speeds. 8 America’s Cup meets F1 A new America’s Cup boat is a vastly complex bit of kit. Each team has incredibly powerful Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) software packages and simulators in order to try to understand the various gains and losses. To make these simulators and computer projections as accurate as possible each team has been getting as much data as they can over their three year development cycle. In the case of this America’s Cup it does seem the development process is genuinely getting closer to Formula 1 (albeit with smaller budgets than a modern F1 team has behind them). INEOS Britannia have been work alongside the all powerful Mercedes F1 team (both of who are backed by INEOS) and have been open about how much this has helped their development process and after a relatively small amount of collaboration in 2021 the British team and Mercedes have created a much tighter relationship for the 2024 America’s Cup . But the British team is not alone. When two-time America’s Cup winner, Alinghi announced they would be coming back to the event after some years on the sidelines, they also announced their own tie-in with current F1 World Champions, Red Bull Racing, to for Alinghi Red Bull Racing . “It’s really similar to F1,” explains Mercedes Applied Science Principal Engineer Thomas Batch who has 11 F1 titles to his name and is was with INEOS in Auckland 2021. “Certainly in this campaign the technology is close to what we have in F1. “In terms of raw sensors on the boat you are probably talking in the 100s but then we take that and we make that into mass channels and additional analysis with computational versions of those channels that we then analyse and get into in more detail. So you are looking at 1000s of plots that we can delve into [per race or training session]. “That level of data analysis and then feedback with the sailors is very similar to working with an [F1] driver.” If you enjoyed this…. Yachting World is the world’s leading magazine for bluewater cruisers and offshore sailors. Every month we have inspirational adventures and practical features to help you realise your sailing dreams. Build your knowledge with a subscription delivered to your door. See our latest offers and save at least 30% off the cover price. Give the Gift of an Experience - Purchase Your Gift Card Today! The Yacht America A replica of the 139-foot yacht that won the historic Royal Yacht Squadron’s 100 Guinea Cup race in 1851. The History Without exaggerating, America is the world’s most famous racing yacht. It is also one of the most beautiful yachts in the world. The reason is simple: The original America put yachting on the map. It is why the most famous trophy in sailing is called The America’s Cup. In 1851, a boat named ‘AMERICA’ won the ‘Royal Yacht Squadrons’ 100 Guinea Cup given to the winner of a race around the Isle of Wight. It is said that the margin was so great that watching America sail past the royal yacht, Queen Victoria famously asked “Who came second?” “Your majesty… there is no second,” was the reply. The winners, members of the New York Yacht Club, donated the trophy to the Club, to be held as a ‘challenge’ trophy. Thus was born the America’s Cup, named after the boat not the country. There aren’t many yachting stories as exciting as the 95-year history of ‘AMERICA.’ The Low Black Schooner from New York that won the most famous race of them all. Designed by a young genius who combined the best of Old World theory and New World practicality, and owned by a syndicate of powerful men out to prove American maritime prowess, she did what almost everybody thought was impossible. Her later career was equally as colorful – conveyor of secret agents, Confederate blockade runner, Union warship, Naval Academy training vessel, and the pride and joy of a famous Civil War general and politician. By her end in 1945, she was one of the most honored vessels in the United States. The original was destroyed during World War II but ours is a near-perfect replica built in 1995 at a cost of more than $6 million. Replica or not, in 2007 the America’s Cup Management (ACM) offered $500,000 for the America to be brought to Spain where the race was being held. ACM, the city of Valencia, and the government of Spain were reported to have spent over $2.65 billion on the build-up, marketing, and conduct of the 2007 America’s Cup event. The America was invited to San Francisco in the summer of 2013 to represent the history of this great race for Oracle Team USA’s defense of the 34th America Cup. Then, The America was selected as the ambassador for the America’s Cup Tour, visiting sites along the West Coast in July and August 2015, and Mexico, the U.S. Gulf and East Coasts, and the Caribbean in 2016. Length:               139 feet Weight:               226,000 pounds Mast Height:     105 feet (main mast) Sail:                     5,900 square feet Capacity:            77 Contact Us to Book a Private Charter Name * First Last Phone This field is for validation purposes and should be left unchanged. Photos of The Yacht America Classifieds Remember Me Forgot Password?   Classifieds RC Boats (FS/W) Sold Victor Model Products America 3 Sailboat

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The America's Cup: Everything you need to know about the sailing competition

Ahead of the 2021 America's Cup in New Zealand , Elaine Bunting explains everything you need to know about the sailing competition in our handy guide - from America's Cup racing rules and history, to detailing just how fast those hydrofoil boats can go...

The America’s Cup is considered the pinnacle of yacht racing. Every four years, teams compete for the oldest trophy in international sport in yachts that represent the cutting edge of yacht design and technology.

This is a magnet for the world’s most talented sailors. It is notoriously difficult to win, and the opportunity comes only once every four years. Yet the storied history of the Cup has always attracted brilliant minds and been backed by some of the world’s most ambitious and successful businessmen.

The America’s Cup match is held between only two teams, the defender and one challenger. The series that establishes the right to be that challenging team was held through January and February, and provided some genuinely shocking moments.

WHAT HAS HAPPENED SO FAR?

Two of the four challengers were eliminated in the Prada Cup challenger series in January and February. The US team American Magic spectacularly spun out of control and capsized in a high-wind, high-speed mark rounding. Despite rapidly being rebuilt, the team was unable to get the boat fully functional again and was ousted from the Prada Cup without a single win.

The British team INEOS Team UK, led by Sir Ben Ainslie, won the opening round robin series handsomely and were regarded as favourites only to shock fans when they were thrashed 7-1 in the Prada Cup final by the clearly faster Italian team Luna Rossa Prada Pirelli.

So after several brutal gladiatorial rounds, the match is on between old rivals Emirates Team New Zealand and Luna Rossa Prada Pirelli. The stakes are sky-high: whoever wins the America’s Cup not only earns the historic America’s Cup ‘Auld Mug’ trophy, but they get to write the rule for 37th America’s Cup in four years, defining the yacht design, how it is sailed – and to choose the venue where it will all take place.

It is a winner-takes-all format. The America’s Cup is famously a race in which, as Queen Victoria was informed during the first contest in 1851, “there is no second.”

HOW IS THE AMERICA’S CUP WINNER DECIDED?

The challenger, Luna Rossa Prada Pirelli, will race against the defender, Emirates Team New Zealand in the 36th America’s Cup match series starting on 10 March.

There are two races each day on 12, 13 and 14 March with additional days on 15, 16 and 17 March if needed to conclude the first-to-seven wins series.

A choice of race course is decided each day depending on wind conditions, but the courses are all windward-leewards with around 3km between each end and around 1.5km from side to side.

WHAT ARE THE DIFFERENCES BETWEEN THE TEAMS RACING FOR THE AMERICA’S CUP?

Emirates Team New Zealand, yacht Te Rehutai – The home team is the defender, having won the Cup in Bermuda in 2017. Heading it up is the steely Grant Dalton, with eight times America’s Cup campaigner Kevin Shoebridge capably in charge of the sailing side. The design team is also second to none – and between them they all set the rules this time.

The Kiwis boast some of the youngest sailors, who grew up in the era of foiling, notably the wildly gifted Pete Burling as helmsman and his Olympic champion crewmate Blair Tuke, who share a Gold and Silver Medal and six World Championship wins in the high performance 49er class.

The pair works in partnership with the team’s resident Australian Olympian, Glenn Ashby. This successful triumvirate was a crucial ingredient in Emirates Team New Zealand’s last Cup win. Ashby is key to tactical decisions, Blair Tuke is the so-called flight controller in charge of flaps on the foils and rudder, with Peter Burling is steering and coolly making those split-second decisions on the race course.

Their yacht Te Rehutai has many visible differences compared with Luna Rossa. It is a more brutal looking design beside the smooth shaped, elegant Italian boat, and has quite different shaped foils (see ‘How do the America’s Cup yacht work?’): New Zealand’s are almost flat across the wing base, while Luna Rossa’s foils are in a dihedral shape, sloping downwards from a central wing bulb.

These are just the most obvious differences, and there will be many more variations beneath the surface, especially in the complex control systems. Yet despite dissimilarities, the speed differential between teams in the Prada Cup varied only by fractions of a knot, putting the emphasis on dominating pre-start manoeuvres, reading the wind shifts and match racing the opponent. These will all play a part in the Cup match too.

Luna Rossa Prada Pirelli, yacht Luna Rossa - The Italian team, backed by Patrizio Bertelli, is bristling with experience. Italian team boss Max Sirena has been involved in six America’s Cups.

At the wheel, the Italians have a set-up never seen before, with straight-talking Australian Jimmy Spithill helming on starboard and Italian Olympic sailor Francesco Bruni helming on port. When one is steering, the other acts as flight controller and trims the foils.

It is a formidable partnership. Spithill is the most successful Cup sailor in the line-up, having been part of seven campaigns and winning it twice in 2010 and 2013 for Larry Ellison’s US team Oracle. Bruni, meanwhile, has three Olympics behind him and several Cup campaigns himself.

While this unconventional division of control between the two helmsmen prompted observers to shake their heads at first, it has proved highly successful. Spithill has suggested that the arrangement allowed them both to accelerate their skills, while at a very practical level it means no one has to jump out of the cockpit and cross the boat during high-speed G-force tacks and gybes before settling back into continuity in a new position.

Indeed, it has been so successful that Emirates Team New Zealand have been experimenting with changing to the one-helmsman-per-side arrangement, split between Peter Burling and Glenn Ashby. Watch out, this may come into play at some point.

Meanwhile, they have increasingly brought into play the tactical skills of Pietro Sibello, an Olympic 49er sailor, who is to be seen popping up to read the wind and the race course and feed back into the strategy.

HOW TO WATCH THE AMERICA’S CUP

America’s Cup racing is split into two parts throughout February and March and you can watch them all free. All the racing will be streamed live on the official America’s Cup YouTube Channel , Facebook and on americascup.com .

It will also be on free-to-air and pay-to-view networks in 120 territories around the world, including TVNZ in New Zealand, RAI and Sky Italia in Italy, the BBC and Sky UK & Ireland in the UK, and NBC Sports in the USA and Caribbean.

FIVE THINGS TO WATCH OUT FOR IN THE AMERICA’S CUP RACES

1. The pre-starts. This America’s Cup has traditional upwind starts. Each team must enter the start box from opposite ends at the two minute mark. They jostle for the best position with the aim of hitting the line powered up exactly as the clock counts down to 0:00 – and in front of their opponent.

To get an advantage, each team will look to dodge, weave, box out their opponent, put a penalty put on them, or execute some other perfectly legitimate but edge-of-the-seat manoeuvre. These minutes can be among the most exciting of a whole race, and may set the tactics and playbook for all that follows so are not to be missed.

2. Mark roundings. Teams can round either one of two marks at the top or bottom of the course, so watch for splits here, close overlaps and other tactical manoeuvres. As the boats bear away at the upwind mark rounding they head into a power zone, speeding up rapidly. This is where we have seen the AC75s exceed 50 knots of speed and get unstable and into trouble with flight control.

3. Light winds. The AC75s have sometimes struggled to foil in winds of under 8 knots. When they come off their foils they suddenly go from supersonic to super-slow. Comparatively huge distances can open up or disappear in a flash if one team finds a puff and gets flying while the other is floundering. On light days, everything can turn inside out in seconds.

4. Strong winds. The same is true in big winds. Mistakes in crewing and sailhandling can be punishing when these massively loaded boats are fully powered up. When the winds are up, the pre-starts and mark roundings are likely war zones.

5. Match race tactics. Some thought the equivalent of hand-to-hand combat could never happen in the AC75s, but they have turned out to be agile and the crews surprisingly willing to throw them into some very close quarter spots. They are also able to mark opponents tack for tack and gybe for gybe round the course to defend a lead and deny their opponent a passing lane. Watch for these clever displays of aggression and stealth. And do listen in the live audio feed from each of the boats that gives big clues as to what each skipper and tactician is doing, thinking and planning.

WHAT ARE THE AMERICA’S CUP YACHTS?

Teams are racing in the AC75 design, a radical 75ft long monohull with no keel that flies on foils at speeds of up to 50 knots.

Deciding the boat to be raced is one of the spoils of victory, and when Emirates Team New Zealand won the last America’s Cup in Bermuda in 2017 they decided to create something never seen before, and where their knowledge of foiling could be a winning advantage.

The AC75 design rule is a so-called ‘box’ rule, which sets some key parameters such as hull length and overall length with bowsprit (75ft, hence the name AC75). The 62-page rule specification defines draught, minimum hull volume, number of sails, number of foils, even the number of boats – the teams have been allowed to build two and will all be racing with iteration No. 2 – but leaves other areas such as hull shape and foil flaps open for teams to develop.

As these yachts do not have keels, they rely for stability on a mere three tonnes of total ballast, plus 960-990kg allowed for 11 crew. The ballast is spread across two swivelling foils that look like arms (some say insect legs) on each side.

To keep some design costs down, the teams have one-design elements, such as the components and arms that move the foils up and down. However, the shape of the foils, the flaps and the control systems that operate them are absolutely key, and unique to each team.

The rule has also kept hull shape relatively open so we see quite striking differences in shapes. This reflects different teams’ thinking about the best way to promote foiling as early as possible in the wind range and slip as smoothly as possible between displacement and flying modes.

The sails are unique, too. The mainsails are twin-skinned soft wings, a new hybrid between a conventional sail and hard wing.

HOW DO THE AMERICA’S CUP YACHTS WORK?

The AC75s are designed to be able to fly in as little wind as possible, and as consistently as possible across the wind range up to the maximum of 23 knots allowable for the America’s Cup match.

To do that, the yachts have a canting T-foil on each side that provides the lift to take the hull out of the water and fly.

The foils are ballasted to provide stability, and are set across a large beam, so the AC75s have a huge amount of righting moment. That means they can carry a very large and efficient sail area to drive the boat.

Once the leeward foil lifts the hull clear of the water, there is very little drag, with only one slender foil and the T-foil rudder in the water. That, in a nutshell, is how it is possible for these yachts to reach 50 knots of boat speed, and potentially more.

In the real world, there are lots of variables that will affect foiling. New Zealand’s Hauraki Gulf sees a large wind range, often blustery conditions, and there are also waves to contend with. Keeping a large boat foiling efficiently and consistently on just two slender points is like juggling on a slackline, and the control systems for rapid adjustments will be a critical but largely invisible factor.

WHAT’S THE HISTORY OF THE AMERICA’S CUP?

Books could, and have, been written about the contentious history of the America’s Cup. It all began in 1851, when a syndicate of businessmen from New York sailed the schooner America across the Atlantic and beat a fleet of British yachts in a race around the Isle of Wight, winning the 100 Guinea Cup.

Famously, Queen Victoria, who had watching the race, asked who was second and the reply came: “Your Majesty, there is no second.”

The 100 Guinea Cup was donated to the New York Yacht Club, renamed in honour of the schooner and a Deed of Gift drawn up for ‘a perpetual challenge cup for friendly competition between nations’. The America’s Cup is the oldest trophy in international sport and arguably the most difficult (and expensive) to win.

For 160 years, Britain has been trying to win it back. Challengers have included the tea magnate Sir Thomas Lipton, who challenged five times between 1899 and 1930.

After a golden era of racing in the J Class yachts, the Cup was raced for in the 12-metre design, then an evolving International America’s Cup Class. More recently it has been contested in much faster multihull designs.

The America’s Cup has always been defined by, and contested with, the backing of some of the world’s wealthiest businessmen. Winners have included Harold Vanderbilt (1930, 1934 and 1937) and Henry Sears (1958).

In the modern era, Ernesto Bertarelli’s team Alinghi won in 2003 and 2007 before losing to Larry Ellison’s Oracle Racing in 2010. Ellison’s US team successfully defended in 2013 before losing to New Zealand in 2017.

Both men retreated from the America’s Cup following their defeats, but Patrizio Bertelli, CEO of the Prada Group, is still trying to win it for Italy after five Cup campaigns with the Luna Rossa Challenge.

Since 1851, the US has defended or won the America’s Cup 30 times, New Zealand three times, Switzerland (Alinghi) twice, and Australia once (Alan Bond’s Australia II in 1983). Despite 16 challenges in a Cup match since 1870, Britain has never yet won back the trophy that left its shores in 1851.

WHAT IS THE AMERICA’S CUP TROPHY?

The America’s Cup , affectionately known as the ‘Auld Mug’  is an impressive piece of silverware. Including its pedestal, it stands 1.1m high and weighs over 14kg. It was made by London-based silver maker Robert Garrard & Co, the royal jeweller since 1735, and was originally a claret jug.

It was given an extra pedestal in 1958 to make room for more engraving, and when that ran out of space, another was added in 1992.

A little known fact (which says so much about America’s Cup rivalry) is that when Oracle won the trophy in 2010 the engraving marking rivals Alinghi’s victory was rotated round to the rear. A new base in carbon fibre was also made to replace the mahogany one.

When Louis Vuitton sponsored the challenger series, the America’s Cup was given its own large Vuitton trunk on its 150th birthday in 1998. With Oracle as the holder it was accompanied everywhere and closely guarded by white-gloved bodyguards.

On winning it in 2017, Emirates Team New Zealand took it to yacht clubs round its home country and let members and young sailors handle the famous silver trophy.

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UNDERSTANDING THE ‘RULES OF THE ROAD’ IN THE LOUIS VUITTON 37th AMERICA’S CUP

With the Louis Vuitton Preliminary Regatta and the opening days of the Louis Vuitton Cup revealing some ultra-close boat-on-boat action, from a spectator’s stand-point, understanding the nuances of the rules that govern these races has provided much debate. Foiling boats are fast, and we’ve seen speeds in excess of 50 knots at times whilst the closing speeds of the AC75s when in close contact are astonishing.

Richard Slater is the Chief Umpire for all the racing at the Louis Vuitton 37 th America’s Cup and he is supported by a world-class and highly experienced team of umpires who are using some of the very latest digital technology to ensure that calls are both fair and consistent. Working shoreside, Richard and his team have a huge variety of camera angles and digital overlays to make the calls, and we caught up with him to explain the key rules that you will hear a lot about during the upcoming racing.

As the regatta unfolds and further questions arise, we will keep in touch with Richard and his team and attempt to answer the most burning questions from fans around the world. Today we are looking at the ‘Platform Border’ that surrounds the yachts, the ‘Keep Clear Border’ that keeps the boats apart at a safe distance plus the question of when and how Richard and his team are ‘invited’ in to make a ruling on the racecourse and when they can award an ‘Umpire Initiated Penalty.’

Platform Border The boats have two shapes around them, the first one which is the closest to the boat is the Platform Border which we use that for starts, we use it for finishes, and we use for boats relative to different lines on the course. The Platform Border is a shape that goes from the stern camera frame to the transom corners, the furthest foil position, and the end of the bowsprit.

Keep Clear Border We also have the Keep Clear Border. This is the one the boats use for Racing Rules and boat-on-boat interactions. The intent is to get the boats further apart. With the foils projecting so far outside the hull, any contact between boats would probably be catastrophic.  So, we take the same points used to create the ‘Platform Border’ and extend the lateral boundary out by two metres.

When the boats are racing, if we see the ‘Keep Clear Border’ touch the other boats’ ‘Keep Clear Border,’ in umpire world it's like when we used to see two boats actually touch in traditional match-racing. We treat it like that's contact, so there's definitely a rule being broken at that point and if there’s a protest initiated by a team, we will make a ruling one way or another.

When are the Umpires ‘invited’ in to rule on an incident? We are ‘umpires’ in the same way cricketers have ‘umpires’ as opposed to referees. Normally an umpire gets invited to adjudicate the rules by the boats protesting. There are some situations where umpires can act without a boat protesting. A common example of that is at the boundary where the opposition doesn't know if a boat stepped outside of the boundary - only we know (as the umpires have the telemetry and digital assets to assess) - so there are situations where we will have the right to step in and give a penalty, but as a rule of thumb when you deal with a boat-on-boat incident, we wait for the boats to say there's a problem and then request our intervention.

Occasionally, boats are involved in incidents and due to their uncertainty they are not sure which boat broke a rule, and although the umpires might be  ready to give one of the boats a penalty neither boat protests.’ And they’re right, they are smart enough not to introduce the umpires into their game if they are not certain of the outcome.

An example of this was in the pre-start of the Louis Vuitton Preliminary Regatta Final, Luna Rossa against Emirates Team New Zealand, when the Kiwis protest and the umpires penalised Luna Rossa. If the Kiwis hadn't protested, despite the two boats being visually very close, and certainly on our screen their keep clear boarders intersected, we would not have ruled.

We expect the sailors to ask to protest at the time of the incident, probably up to five seconds, as after that we would treat the incident as closed.

Accuracy of Decisions Speaking with Richard, you come away with an over-riding sense that safety is the number one priority but that also, the umpire team have all the expertise and the resources to make extremely accurate decisions.

The team work analysing racing situations in real-time throughout the course of each individual race, whilst also looking ahead to potential upcoming situations so that rulings can be made accurately and almost immediately is intense. Their processes are continually reviewed and refined, with the intention of making the Louis Vuitton 37 th America’s Cup the fairest and most consistent on-water regatta in the event’s 173-year history.

(Magnus Wheatley)

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