90 x 90 Race Multi

Back at ya....

 

The chance of this DOG race being a close one is about as probable as AL and BOR reaching mutual consent on specifics of date,venue and comprehensive boat details.......therefore........about ..ZIP.
One will have a clear advantage over the other from the outset...not as clear
as the other fiasco, but clear enough to make it a yawn fest.

Pretty much like a foiling surfboard for the average surfer.

 

There is too much cheque book racing, look at your local mixed fleet club. Who wins? The guy with the most $$$. Where does the talent develop and test itself? One design racing... i.e. Not in the $$$$ race but rather on the level playing field.

This move will not result in highly talented sailors testing their skill, this will result in an expensive technology race at the expense of the skills that where once the cornerstone of the event. It might be a designers "wet dream" but without the tactical duel the high tech spectacle will rapidly lose its appeal. You need to level the boats within reason to make it a human contest worth watching. If you want a technology race go race a clock not a person. You will never find the best sailors sailing these things by choice, they have to be paid to do so. Why, because its not a challenge or a fair fight at their level. Most of it was decided on the designers desk, in a court, by a budget set by corporate sponsors. The massive budget for a start precludes challenges from smaller talented sailing nations. Its not a contest you can be proud of winning... there is no honour in spending your opponent into the ground.

Also why make it a one on one race if you are not going to have a close match in terms of the boats. Why not make it a high tech fleet event ? At least then it will be a spectacle. Make it fast, tight short course events design for T.V and the ADD generations.

Again I repeat don't mess the AC up anymore than it has been. Create a new event to showcase the tech and if it has merit let it build its own following. Whatever you do don't fein a match race between a mismatch, thats just dull and what ever you like to think any two boats racing is a match race or a slaughter... at least make some attempt to create the match otherwise you MISS THE POINT.

If its a spectacle you want, watch speed trials.

Heck I don't even know why I am arguing anyway, the AC is a farce already.

 

The default match under the Deed of Gift is 3 races under a box rule.

Like ANY rule, the first few matches will see mismatched boats. The J's, the 12's, and the IACC boats all showed this trend.

Close "match racing" only happened with the 12's AFTER the gains from technology were small enough to be overcome by good sailing.

When the "new, bigger, faster, more spectacular" IACC boats came on the scene we saw more 5-0 'matches' as the designers found the fast corner of the box. After almost 100 hulls, we saw semi-close racing again in AC32.

The DoG 'box' is a great rule:
44-90ft LWL for single masts
115ft max LWL for multiple masts
22 ft max draught
sliding keels and centre boards allowed
powered only by sails

Will we see a mismatch? Yes, just as we saw mismatches in the early days of the 12M rule and the IACC rule. Will the optimum design emerge after a few cycles? Yes, just as it does with ANY rule.

Traditional "Match Racing" requires heavy boats, about 300 D/L or so. Boats that are NOT what most of us sail. Close "Match Racing" requires boats that tack through 90deg (not 75-80) and do not sail high angles on the downwind leg ... they must be stuck in the water and unable to grab 2-3 boat lengths on a puff of by luffing up 5 deg. If you think sailors have to paid to race multi's, how much more would you have to pay them to race 10-12 knot shitboxes?

I'm all for bringing back good match racers like the 12's were, but ALL new rules will have big deltas until the 'right' corner of the box is found.

We might as well go for the ultimate and use the DoG limits. After 2-3 Cup cycles the boats will be evenly matched again and the sailors and tactics will rule. The AC has gone through this more than once.

I'd like to see more nails in the 'racing mono-hull' coffin. Leaners and lead are SLOW (even with power assist). Why not let the AC show the world what the limits of design are in this century? After all, in 1851, America was a radical new design for the times and the AC was deeded to the NYYC to keep it a cutting edge match between clubs.

If the new face of the AC does not find a market, fine. The Cup will sit on a shelf until someone wants to challenge for it again ... hell the Cup just might find new supporters from the ranks of sailors that don't want to play after multis are allowed into races like the S-H. Like other vintage events, the Cup could be a nostalgia match for expensive gutted leadmines ... racing for a prize at less than school zone (caution: children at play) speeds ...

 

Drag racing cat's, that will be a heap of fun Yep let the techo multis completely avoid a format that really tests them and watch two boats in a parade.... heck that's pretty well the go now anyway.

CYA

 

What makes the AC special is the history, grandeur, and the elitism. If the boats are made smaller and the design and development race is too controlled the racing will probably be better but it will attract fewer billionaires and the event will deteriorate into something like the World Match Racing Tour. No offence intended to the WMRT, it has much better racing but the spectacle is just not the same as the AC.

I am excited about the multi race because it is a once off thing, and I am interested to see what will be developed. I hope it will be more radicle than a scaled up orma60. I am a big fan of the AC90 monos and I will be disappointed if the cup does not follow that route after this brief pause for the multis.

If you are interested in seeing big cats racing, Coutts and Cayard's World Sailing League should kick off next year. If the AC were to go the multihull route, two events would be competing and both will not survive.

 

The 12's attracted plenty of attention until the K1's shattered that tradition.

 

The WSL boats are supposed to be in the water this spring ... so far no new news on the WSL site for about 12 months. IMO the WSL will not happen. No professional sailing series that I know of has ever been a success. The WSL will be no different.

The AC will survive. The Deed of Gift allows it to be whatever the defender and challenger want it to be ... unless they cannot or will not play nice and then it defaults to a 'king of the hill' grudge match. Since the logical end point point of the DoG limits is large multi's, why not just make them the standard AC boat?

Once you have won the Cup in a DoG maxi boat, as defender why would you choose to race in anything else? One of the ideas behind the GGYC challenge was to use the possibility of big multi's to get EB and Alinghi to talk and compromise on the protocol so AC33 would give the challenger(s) a fair chance. EB refused to talk and rather than get most of what he wanted and see the AC90's race, he has allowed AC33 to go to the DoG defaults.

If you think that you will see good "Match Racing" in AC90's, you are mistaken. The AC90 is an ultralight sports boat. 23 tons on a 90 ft WL is a D/L of 31.5! The boats will accelerate too quickly to be good match racing platforms. Low D/L mono's have the wrong dynamics for good match racing, their performance is much like a multi-hull (only slower). If the AC is to be sailed in boats that keep the apparent wind forward all the time, what purpose does choosing a slower mono-hull over a multi-hull serve?

All this is part of what the AC has always been. The idea of evenly matched boats (12's) and 'match racing' is new. The LV Cup and the challenger selection series leading up to the AC match has only a 20 year history. The 12 Metre era shows what sportsmen can do within the DoG, but that format is not defined by the deed.

Racing for the Cup in big Multi's might well be the end of the AC as "Match Racing" and begin a new era of high tech races that will advance the state of the multi-hull art at a pace that only the large scale investment of the AC can provide. Just how good would multi's be if they were part of mainstream sailing? This impasse in AC33 might well drive development with big budgets. Seeing multi's in the AC will make it hard to justify keeping them out of other sailing events. Once corporate sponsors have seen the speed and spectacle of 90ft multi's, how hard will it be to get backing for a new lead sled? The line honours guys might have to dump their turbo'd canters and powered systems and go back to real sailing machines. Why would anyone spend the money to build a new maxi leaner after the AC goes to multi-hulls?

Yes, the AC33 match will probably be a boring drag race. Any two boats on a 40 mile W/L or a 39 mile triangle will be a speed contest more than "Match Racing". They might as well be fast.

 

Those will be benefit the most and must be as excited as hell must be the regular Grand Prix multihull racers imagining the design leaps that will come out of the exercise! And good on them too.

 

These are just my thoughts, I might be way off the mark

 

Great input!

I don't agree that the sponsors should dictate the AC. I also don't think that the sponsors are marketing to sailors. I don't see the average sailor showing up with LV, or Prada gear. Ask anyone in the business of serving the 'average' sailor and they will tell you that sailors are tightwads and don't spend a dime more than they have to. The average sailor is not the customer of BMW, Prada, LV, or any of the other upscale AC sponsors. AC sponsors cater to the rich, the elite and those that want to become such.

As far as what people relate to and the relationship between the 6-8 knot tupperware shitboxes that populate every marina goes ... well do I need to say more? The boats people (non-racers) own are so far removed from modern GP boats the only thing they have in common is that they have one hull and tip over and spill the wine when the wind picks up (they also sink when holed).

I can see the marketers of high tech, cutting edge products becoming sponsors of AC multi's. I can also see high end luxury marketers returning to sponsor AC mono-hulls as soon as ACM and SNG are out.

I guess it is a question of a Red Bull screacher on a 30 knot multi or a Chanel #5 Spinnaker on a gutted leadmine.

I'd be happy either way.

Traditional (slow, heavy) sloops are a sailing icon, make good match racers, and the average sailor can relate (his boat is heavy and slow too).

OTOH The same sponsors that back F1 could support the AC in modern boats. A 'Miss Budweiser' Tri? Nike? Almost any sponsor that is targeting the 20-35 x-treme sports market would love to be part of the oldest trophy in sport.

 

The last 6-8 knot tupperware ******* I sailed past was a condo cat. Your bias is sickening.

 

Your marinas must have a different mix of boats than the ones I know. What is not accurate about the 6-8 knot tupperware ******* description? That is not bias, that is fact. Damn near every boat built since 1970 is sitting in a marina somewhere and most of them fit the tupperware ******* description.

I happen to own one of them. What I own, like, and sail does not colour my view of the AC.

As I've said, on a personal level, I would like to see good close racing in 12's rather than sports boats or multi's. However, I'm a realist and understand that what I would like to see has no bearing on what is allowed under the DoG or what we will see in AC33 and in AC matches in the future.

It is a fact that the IACC boats did not provide as many tactical options as the 12's did. It is also a fact that the AC90 will be as bad as a multi in that respect. This is physics, not opinion.

Tell me again about my bias.

 

If you don't consider "*******" a bias and derogatory term then what can I say. Most of these boats serve the purpose for which they where built quite well and there is no need to make reference to them in a derogatory and base way, or in anyway at all really, in arguing a case for the AC.

 

Ok, then I retract the *******. Does "6-8 knot, plastic, little used and poorly maintained yacht" sound better?

The point remains that what fills marinas and what wins on race courses are not very similar.

The performance of modern medium to high tech monos is more similar to multi's than to the condomarans and high berth to length ratio boats that joe average sails. Preferring slow monos because they provide better match racing is not a viewpoint that is shared by anyone that I know of in the AC game.

After the 1988 Cup, the 12M replacement boat was touted as bigger, faster, and more spectacular. Now, 20 years later, the AC90 is being touted as bigger, faster, and more spectacular. IMO the average guy can't tell the difference between a 12 and a IACC and a AC90, they also can't tell these boats from the 6-8 knot, plastic, little used and poorly maintained yachts they see sailing close to home. The boats are not exciting to watch. Racing sailors I know either want good match racing or don't much care (they would rather sail than watch others). The number of people that understand and enjoy match racing is not a large enough market share to support the sport.

If a 90x90 multi goes by at 30knots plus, joe average and the advertisers that want his $$ might just take notice. That might not be good for the AC as old guys like me would like to see it, but it just might be good for sailing in general.

The sailors want boats that are fast and challenging to sail. That is the force driving the AC90 ultralights. The century old anti multi-hull bias is still trying to keep fast boats off the race courses.

I have been an AC fan for as long as I can remember. I don't regret dropping a huge chunk of cash to see AC32 in Valencia. I'd like to see the Cup return to the friendly competition it was before it became a full time, corporate backed, profession.

We agree that the AC either is becoming or has become a farce. If it implodes, sooner or later someone with some sense will want to sit down and agree to terms and we will see the AC reborn in a new form. Until that time, it will be a power trip for the big egos. Might as well be in big fast boats, we aren't going to see good match racing again for a very long time.