AC45s Wrap Up Testing

June 21, 2011

Though the boats are still in town taking media for rides and tuning up against each other, the race testing phase wrapped up on Monday for two Oracle Racing AC45 catamarans, skippered by CEO Russell Coutts and AC33-winning helmsman James Spithill. The home-town visit has been extremely successful in terms of public relations. Last week's capsize made national network television, and even non-sailors were thrilling to the footage on the local evening news. A crew of as many as 80 volunteers and several yacht clubs around the Bay Area got involved to help run the races, thereby gaining the support of the the yachting community that the organizers will need for the Louis Vuitton Cup and America's Cup.

Richard Taylor, manning one of Richmond YC's RIBs, described the racing from his perspective: "From the North Leeward gate, we had the best seats in the house for about thirty seconds two times each race. As we looked upwind at the approaching boats, it looked like they were freight trains on rails heading right for us. At the last second they would alter course a few degrees and miss us by a foot. We learned later there was no penalty for hitting the mark and we were the mark. Their support boats looked like angry mosquitoes chasing them down the course.

Spithill rounds the leeward gate. ©2011 Richard Taylor

"Each day John Craig, the PRO, would start our briefing by saying, 'Well, we are going to change the course,' and then describe how we were going to experiment with the race course that day. It seems the objective of our exercises was to try to find a balance where we got the fairest and best racing combined with the excitement television viewers need to keep their attention."

Principal Race Officer John Craig briefs the race committee. Photo by Lynn Davis ©2011 norcalsailing.com

The racing rules, race committee logistics, courses, umpiring, and other technical details still need some more tweaking before the World Series starts in Cascais, Portugal, August 6-14. One purpose of the sailing here was to work out the kinks in the judging software that was used onshore at Golden Gate YC. Stan Honey and his team tirelessly swatted bugs in the software and made progress. Guest umpire Liz Baylis said, "All you have to do to mark a penalty is click on a box and it's sent to the offending boat. The weird thing was sitting in front of the computer screen concentrating on virtual racing when the boats were right there off the club within view out the window."

Spithill chases Coutts to the windward mark. Photo by Lynn Davis ©2011 norcalsailing.com

To keep track of what's going on in Americascupland, you can follow the official blog at www.americascup.com/blog. Has everyone seen the Mickey Hart video? The erstwhile Grateful Dead drummer was among the local celebrities who got to go for a spin, and he described the experience eloquently. We've added a short video on the remote scoring system to our site.