Open Day Revelations for Cup Teams in Barcelona

American Magic’s Patriot was plenty quick in its first match against INEOS Britannia. Ricardo Pinto/America’s Cup

As a soft opening of the Louis Vuitton 37th America’s Cup, all teams took to the waters of Barcelona today for the third and final Preliminary Regatta before the Louis Vuitton Cup series gets underway. While the results of this three-day dry run don’t carry forward to the Cup itself, there were plenty of takeaways.

First to engage on the Cup course in 12 knots and moderate sea state were the Swiss of Alinghi Red Bull Racing and the French of Orient Express Racing Team. On the heels of a dismasting on Tuesday, Alinghi didn’t miss a beat using the older spar that they’d been training with all summer long. They were into the start box on time, but the French were late and their match-up was a straight-forward follow-the-leader affair. The Swiss were smooth and mechanical, getting their AC75 around the course and the French were not far off the pace throughout, keeping the gate-rounding deltas to 12 to 13 seconds for most of the race. Alinghi notched its first win with a 36-second lead and was plenty happy with the outcome.

The takeaway: Alinghi Red Bull Racing’s form is strong as a first-time team and its platform is plenty fast and stable. A good start and they will get faster.

The following race, which should have been the pairing of the day between the defender and its former Cup challenger, proved to be a dud. Defender Emirates Team New Zealand had the slightly better and controlling start over Luna Rossa Prada Pirelli, which promptly split away to the right side of the course and came back into the first cross with a slight advantage.

The New Zealanders tacked and bounced the Italian’s back to the right side of the course. Seconds later, Luna Rossa came back at them on starboard for what appeared to be a tight first cross for the Team New Zealand, but the skirmish came to a halt when control systems onboard the silver AC75 shut down. Like an automobile with an alternator failure, they had no control of any of the systems and the boat came to a slow stop. They were able to reboot the system but the team retired soon after, giving the New Zealanders a solo and seemingly flawless lap of the racecourse.

One critical moment of failure: minutes into the defender and challenger re-match, Luna Rossa Prada Pirelli’s control system shut down. Ricardo Pinto/America’s Cup

The takeaway: The insanely high-tech and complex AC75s, with their reliability on software and electronics remains an uncontrollable liability for all the teams. Nothing is bulletproof on these machines and electronic gremlins will continue to run amok.   

American Magic and INEOS Britannia were next to go and there’s plenty of uncertainty going into the match after American Magic had suffered a hard and wet splash down the previous day that gave their systems a healthy Mediterranean hosing (see above takeaway). But, once again saved by the shore crew, New York YC squad’s AC75 squad was just fine for race day. After a textbook push-and-pull prestart, American Magic owned the leeward position as both boats crossed the line on time. INEOS split away after managing to hold its weather position for the first minute of straight-line sailing.

The meteorological trend of the day was more wind on the right side of the racecourse and INEOS owned the first cross. American Magic went for the clean duck, bit into the right-side advantage, got the lead, as was through the first gate with a 6-second advantage. Comfortably in the lead, Patriot’s co-skippers Tom Slingsby and Paul Goodison, piled on the distance on the second upwind leg and looked as though they would run away with it.

As Patriot exited weather gate for the second time and began its bear-away, there was a frightening moment that no doubt gave team principals heart palpitations. With the traveler stuck to leeward, opposing forces were in play and the boat quickly became out of balance, with flashbacks of the great Auckland capsize of AC36. Broadcast commentator Glen Ashby would later describe the resulting imbalance as “going over the handlebars.”

American Magic leads INEOS Britannia through the weather gate in their first meeting. Ian Roman/America’s Cup

With an urgent request of its cyclors hammering away on their recumbent bikes at the back of the boat, the teams saved the maneuver and simply stretched away from the British and from there they were able to sail their race cherry pick their way through the shifts. The post-race interview with Ainslie had hints of the past: American Magic’s Patriot had wheels and the boxy Britannia was off the pace.

The takeaway: Patriot’s weather-gate wobble continues to highlight the crucial on-demand-oil delivery of the cyclors. Low pressure creates high-pressure situations. And here we go again with a British boat searching for speed out of the gates.

One final match of the day had the French back on the racecourse, and once again they were late to the start with a boundary penalty in hand, allowing the rebooted Luna Rossa AC75 to run away with a win. The final delta was 1m:33s, giving the upstart French squad much to fret about going into the real racing at the end of the month.

SW contributor Bernie Wilson got Luna Rossa Prada Pirelli co-skipper Jimmy Spithill on the phone after racing and Spithill shared his thoughts on the boat’s system failure: “In these boats, when that happens, the only thing that really works is the steering because that’s the only mechanical device on the boat. Everything else is electronic and hydraulic. That was a real shame and we’re still getting to the bottom of it of what it was and what happened.

“But the boys were able to sort of reboot the boat for the start of the second one. That race was, let’s say, much easier because the French made a bit of a mistake in the start. It was good to at least execute a clean one for the second one.

Orient Express Racing Team showed signs of pace in both its races, but late starts did them in on the opening day of the America’s Cup Preliminary Regatta in Barcelona. Ricardo Pinto/America’s Cup

“It’s the first time something like this has happened to us. We could see the Kiwis had to stop the other day in a practice race. I don’t know if it was the same issue. I’d much rather have this happen now where it counts for absolutely nothing.”

The takeaway: One team goes home on September 8 and after two races, the French and the Brits have their work cut out.

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