America's Cup

[RHough]

Originally Posted by Lorsail

"no need to change the rules or make a mockery of sport"-Wow! Maybe you should tell that to the disabled people who sail the Martin 16 using servo controlled rudder and sheets ?!
Randy, you should really stop using the "rules" to justify your anti-power assist crusade. The RRS provide for the use of power assist by any one design class including new wild ,exciting IACC boats. The use of that kind of technology has produced the most astounding monohull ocean racing performance ever seen and would do the same in the America's Cup. It's really simple in my mind: 1) the Racing Rules of Sailing allow it, 2) it allows big boats to use the same basic physics as small trapeze boats to go real fast. 3) these boats would be extraordinary crowd pleasers both within and without the existing sailing fraternity-they would grow the sport! 4) they would represent the pinacle of this era in technological monohull sailboat design.

Doug, there is a HUGE difference between creating a boat or class of boats to allow those otherwise unable to sail and allowing the same devices to be used by able sailors.

Rube Goldberg Yacht Design has come up with an astounding ocean racing monohull ... so what? The boats are SLOW and require altered rules. They are great fun to watch, they are stupid expensive, they prove what? If the goal was to create fast ocean racers the current power assisted boats are an expensive failure. While marginally faster than the sailboats they have replaced, they are far from being fast ocean boats.

I pity the fine sailors on Morning Glory ... they sailed hard, they read the weather, they finished a race. They will never know if they are better than the sailors that came before them, they used an engine and the sailors they beat did not.

If your sense of fair play can make that right, fine. Mine is outraged.

The America's Cup is all about match racing. It is not about speed. The last thing you want in a match race is one boat measurably faster than another. The racing would be better if it were done in One-Designs, the IACC rule was intended to create boats with similar performance that match race well, not to create fast boats.

In match racing, the folly of power assist would be highlighted. The boat that could tack and gybe the quickest would be faster. In a RGYD boat that means fitting bigger rams, larger pumps and a more powerful engine. You would have exactly what I am campaigning against ... a sailing race outcome determined by the biggest engine ... that is not what the sport of sailing is about.

Simple solution: make the power systems one design-every boat has a maximum hp power assist that is exactly identical to every other system.
But WHAT moves, how it moves whether canting or on deck or a combination is up to the designers.

[RHough]

Originally Posted by Lorsail

Simple solution: make the power systems one design-every boat has a maximum hp power assist that is exactly identical to every other system.
But WHAT moves, how it moves whether canting or on deck or a combination is up to the designers.

That would work, as long as the power units are supplied by the class and sealed. The last thing you want is an old racer like me with a power unit that I can "maintain"

One problem I see with the current IACC boats is that they can point too high. They can only cover on one tack. This makes choosing the right side of the course at the start much too important. If the rule could be changed to create boats that tack through 90 degrees rather than 75-80 it would make for better racing.

Another problem that I see in AC boats is trying to make displacement speed sailing exciting. Planing hulls are terrible for match racing.

[usa2]

RHough is right. Match racing is about tactics and boat design within a very narrow range of parameters. If one boat is measurably faster than another, its an anti-climatic event. Take the last America's Cup. SUI-64 won rather easily in 5 races, and nobody seemed to care the least.

I think they should just modify the current AC class to have much deeper fins and lighter bulbs, as that would speed them up a bit by reducing their displacement. They should also incorporate sprits and huge oversized asymmetrical spinnakers.

Ultra light displacement, round the windward mark and pop the spinnaker AND retractable main hydrofoil--planing is yesterdays news....

[usa2]

big monohull sailboats will probably never hydrofoil unless a computer is controlling where the weight is. The reason a Moth is easy (relatively) to foil is because its being controlled by single person who is in tune with the boats forces, and moves accordingly to whatever the pilot/sailor senses. Now what happens if you get 17 guys on an 85 footer that is supposed to foil, and they all sense something different and move different ways? Big wipeout, and the thing will probably submarine. Super fast boats are a bad idea for the AC. They need a compromise, with a boat capable of 20+ knots yet no moving ballast and/or internal combustion engines on board.

I think you're missing the biggest point of the America's CUP: TECHNOLGY-maximum, edgy, leading edge technology. The new rule has to ANTICIPATE what MAY be possible so that the rule is not old technology before any new boats are built. That means things MUST be legal that we're not necessarily sure will work. Numerous MAJOR designers are looking at the use of foils on monohull keelboats from 30' on up-it has huge potential-probably.
Even if one boat zoomed another it still has to finish and in these hi-tec exciting boats that could be a real question not a mostly forgone conclusion like it is now. We need drama-the kind of drama that sends chills up and down your back; the kind of drama where the chance is taken and the result not guaranteed.
We need the TEAM USA Foiler IACC
Maxi Skiff out there ready to kick ass or die trying!

[usa2]

diesel engines powering hydraulic systems is not much in terms of maximum, leading edge technology.

[RHough]

LMAO ...

Boat A rounds the weather mark, sets the kite and pops up on foil at 20+ knots.

Boat B rounds 2 seconds later, sets and pops up on foil at 20+ knots.

Boat B covers Boat A and takes their wind. Boat A drops off the foil(s) and goes from 20+ to 8 in a cloud of spray as the crew gets tossed forward and into the water. Boat B continues at 20+ and slices Boat A in half with her foil as she runs her sprit through Boat A's rig. The impact stops Boat B and Boat B's crew joins Boat A's crew in the water ... both boats sink ... the sharks start to circle ...

Boat B looses the protest, racing will resume as soon new boats are built and uneaten crew are located.

I saw that race at the new Sailing Coliseum-you know the floating one built off Newport after we won the last Cup from the Russians.All the crews were picked up by the little Donzi Power Foilers(DPF's).The blood was from a single shark speared by the splintering American boat. According to the America's Cup Committee the TV/internet broadcast ratings were the highest for any sporting event in the history of the US. The Cup was preceded at the Coliseum by the World Two Person Big Moth High School Championship attended by over 400 foilers.
Now do you remember when you said foilers wouldn't make any difference?
--------------------

[Willallison]

Once again I find myself coming to the aid (or am I a hinderance, being a powerboat guy? ) of an embattled Doug Lord.
I sat on the edge of my seat thru the night for every race of the (best ever) AC - when Australia 2 wrestled the cup from the sticky hands of the USA's finest lawyers.
I jumped in my car and drove across Oz for 3 months to watch as we tried in vain to keep it 4 years later.
I haven't watched it since. Boring as bat ****. It barely even rates a mention in the media here anymore.
But the Volvo 70's - how cool are they!! On TV almost every night.

The point is simple. Excitement means people. People mean money. Money ensures the continuation of sport.

Make 'em bigger. Make 'em WAY faster. Make 'em cool.
Then the people will come. Even powerboaters like me

[BOATMIK]

Originally Posted by RHough

Much of the drama in the VO this year was created by forcing the boats to sail short handed. Maybe the only rules needed are manual power and 11 crew. The designers could build anything they want as long as 11 guys have to manhandle it around the course. It would be interesting to see what size would end up as optimum for a 11 person crew, match racing in all weather. 40 -50 feet? What innovations in boat and sail handling would we see?

Great lateral idea.

I'm with you all the way - but keep it as a mono race.

It would force the tempering of speed to gain control and some tactical bias as well.

No point in going a million miles an hour if you can't turn the thing round.

Great concept - there really should be such a class - hasn't been done yet. Think of all the shorthanded methodologies that would be developed! Great thought!

MIK

[BOATMIK]

Originally Posted by usa2

RHough is right. Match racing is about tactics and boat design within a very narrow range of parameters. If one boat is measurably faster than another, its an anti-climatic event. Take the last America's Cup. SUI-64 won rather easily in 5 races, and nobody seemed to care the least.

I think they should just modify the current AC class to have much deeper fins and lighter bulbs, as that would speed them up a bit by reducing their displacement. They should also incorporate sprits and huge oversized asymmetrical spinnakers.

Agreed there would be a period of instability with a new rule, but a type would soon develop with the right mix of speed and control.

The 18/12ft skiff rules have very few restrictions - the boats are similar for some period of time - stable type - then someone like Julian Bethwaite or Bob Miller (aka Ben Lexcen) comes along and heads in a direction that no-one has thought of.

So then a usually short period of instability until it becomes type stable again.

I see this as a good thing. Good for the development of speed producing factors

To say there would be no match racing if the design is derestricted is not necessarily the case because of the filtering process of the selection trials. When the class has become type stable the racing will be close.

Also if there are two boats on the course there will be match racing - We have all seen slower boats come through because they have been sailed better.

And if sometimes a boat has such a speed advantage it is very good for the development of the class in the long run - plus the rest of us who are interested in design. Remember Intrepid or Australia 2 - or Gretal 2 for that matter. All of them upset the "the type stable" scenario.

Of course if a boat does have a huge speed advantage one year it will become the starting point for all the design teams next time round.

The big innovation with the current AC Class has been the minimisation of beam - not much excitement about that! A simple discovery of what corner of the rule pays off the best. Open it up to REAL innovation - not a class for buttoned down incrementally minded low acheivers. They all think it is OK to have spent the last 2 years of their lives working out how to shape the fillet between the keel and hull - one of the few areas where they can see an improvement being made.

All pluses - no downside :-) (nothing like a bit of hubris!)

I am happy to negotiate on the canting keels - or at least power assisted ones. Allow them and all other appendage configurations - but don't allow the engines as that's the sticking point rather than the canting keel concept itself.

Boatmik

[RThompson]

Originally Posted by Lorsail

...that the whole crew be from the country of origin of the challenge.

why? are you sick of seeing the New Zealand "A" team racing the New Zealand "B" team in the final?

Rob

[BOATMIK]

Originally Posted by RThompson

why? are you sick of seeing the New Zealand "A" team racing the New Zealand "B" team in the final?

Rob

Tasmanian A team vs Tasmanian B team?