34th America's Cup: multihulls!

Among AC fans it would seem that most of them think AC34 is better than AC32

Poll

Not saying you are wrong about the racing being dull. But I take issue with the idea that this AC is anywhere near as dull as past events. In sailing less dull = exciting.

 

Grinders are movable ballast. The grinders moving from side to side doubles their righting moment contribution compared to having them stay in the center.

 

Catsketcher Phil, we've now seen a reversal; in race 2, Oracle astonishingly fast upwind but ETNZ (formerly untouchable on this point of sail) now quicker down. When the book/books come out, the secret information of the changes and drama will be fascinating. Race 2 today was the best ever. You could hear people shouting up and down our street.

 

The 72s are so fast that when running downwind the apparent wind is not directly behind the boat, but sufficiently off to one side that it is running more like a close reach.
Dead downwind with the sail let full out no boat can do much better than 1/2 true wind speed.
In a lot of cases it is faster to tack downwind.

 

It is getting so tense, I have to question if I continue to enjoy it.

PS: The best way treat a loud mouth Aussie is ignore him, The above insult is the worst I have ever seen on an internet forum. I will not respond to any of his posts - or read them.

Oracles foils are running vey clean.

M

 

Some individual races have been interesting and many others have been dull.

Once the lead blows out to a few hundred metres there's little tension
except the fear of equipment failure or a disaster.

 

Good idea. You obvioulsy lead a very sheltered internet life

Some people have been treating the cheating as some form of in-game
breach, like giving away a free kick in football. IMO there is an
ethical gulf between those sorts of split-second infringements and
conspiracies to manipulate the game over weeks if not months.

It wouldn't surprise me if the FBI has a look to see if there were any
"betting irregularities". Maybe some bookmakers and punters will move
to get their money back. If it was a foul committed in a game they would
have no chance: when there is collusion, akin to match-fixing, it's a
whole different ball game. Maybe the IJ will have to make public the names
of SailorX and others who gave evidence. That would be amusing, especially
if it gets to a point where perjury penalties apply in the proceedings.

 

apparent wind sailing

Hi RAC _ light multihulls travel so fast that they never travel downwind as you would descfribe by putting the wing out at 90degs. You will have to read up on apparent wind and fast sailing. Cheers Peter s

 

The CG is 16.35m from the mast bottom not 23.7m This is speced in the rules. Cheers Peter s

 

It might be beneficial to choose some types based purely on their power
output, and others for their weight and ability to bound quickly from one side of the boat to the other, as well as their capabilities as sailors. Remember that
whole AC's have been decided on a margin of 1 second.

 

Leg Pedalling vs Arm pedalling Summary - Two decades ago I used to make bike frames /bikes for the Australian Olympic teams (abled and para olympians). Power output measured can get up to 1kW+ with elite athletes. Hand pedalling same power but less duration. This is because the heart as a pump is not capable of moving enough blood around the body at peak loads to carry enough oxygen/lactate. The legs are a second pump so as they work they squeeze large blood vessels in the legs and return blood to the heart. If you are standing and hand pedalling the legs do not do this so you tend to go into oxygen debt pretty fast. Artemis first boat had a central cockpit so some of the grinders did not have to move around. Great idea but the AC72 needs as much righting moment as possible so grinders are used as intelligent moving ballast. But I think the central position is a great idea if you are clever and give away some Rm eg the AC72 is depowering alot once going so can't take advantage of full Rm anyway so the central powerhouse may work out. The reason they use arm grinders is that it takes years to develop peak capacity as a cyclist or a hand grinder. Sailing tends to be slow on some things so having stationary leg grinders is a bit left feild. They would have to go out and get a couple of cyclists just like they second rowers. The idea of using arms and legs has been tried on several devices but the exertion and the unsteady/unco condition just overloads the body and it does not work. Better to use the arms to stabilise the legs or vis versa. Cheers Peter S

 

Thank you, PeterS,

I was thinking that the problem of unsteady and uncomfortable conditions was an issue for the cyclists, but not for the sailboat grinders...
Anyway, I believe that (nec plus quam minimum) human power should only be used in control devices - with hydraulics and grinders, one can say that we can have a situation similar to pumping, is nt it that so ?

 

I must say I really am astounded that there are some stubborn folks who still believe that the racing is boring. I don't know what would be required for them to become excited about the sailing, my belief is that they will only start enjoying the sailing when it returns to very slow monohulls, regardless how interesting the multihull racing is.
They just don't understand multi racing, and must have been on the toilet when NZ and OR did 14 tacks up the one beat, crossing within metres of eachother several times.
They must have had their heads firmly in the toilet when OR sailed the right shifts to pass NZ upwind,from 180m behind, when we all thought the race was over.
They don't understand the start, because the multi's aren't circling eachother continuously.
They don't understand the apparent wind aspect, and how a 300m lead can dissolve in two manouvres. The boats are doing 20m/second, or 65ft/sec if you like, a small error can change the whole race.
They just can't get excited about two boats doing 31knots UPWIND!! and having to dip or lee-bow at the last second, several times up the beat.
This, my friends, is the height of boredom.
Let's bring back the mono's, it will be far more environmentally sustainable, as the chase boats and umpires can use electric trolling motors to keep up with the action.

 

Some good sites to help understand the action

The stats here show that ETNZ extra speed after race 1 and 2 may have been a myth a. Probably just good calling of shifts. (Why didn't Ray get stuck into Oracle in race 2 today at the bottom mark and start pinning them against the boundary?). I know he's smarter than me but it seems they have to start defending a lead soon.

http://www.cupinfo.com/cupstats/

and for watching the race again with a virtual eye type view.

http://www.cupexperience.com/americas-cup-liveline-race-viewer/

I hope the Kiwis win it soon so I don't do a gasket.

cheers

Phil

 

@petereng:
Good points again. I didn't know that fact about legs helping the heart pump the blood more efficiently. Good info.

This idea, however, makes me smile a bit. Hope sailing will not be reduced to that in the future. Reminds me of that old idea of PAR about hamster-generated on-board power.