America's Cup - Kiwis damage two wingsails but go 3-1 up in Semi-Final

by Richard Gladwell Sail-World.com on 6 Jun 2017 b>Top America's Cup Challenger, Emirates Team New Zealand suffered a very challenging day on the Great Sound, Bermuda, on the second day of Semi-Final racing, suffering damage to two wingsails, and pitch-poling the AC50.

The fortunate aspect of the day is that the team scored a come from behind win in the first race of the day which puts them 3-1 up in the series against Land Rover BAR, and with adverse weather forecast for much of the rest of the week, if there were no more racing, the New Zealand team would progress to the Challenger Finals starting on Saturday.

Winds today were always expected to be close to the upper limit for racing.

All teams were out on the Great Sound for a practice session before racing this afternoon.

Emirates Team New Zealand did some damage to the lower section of their wingsail during training and elected to return to the team base and replace it with their second wingsail.

This was the support crew feat that the British team were unable to achieve on the first day of the Semi-Finals which resulted in them losing two races and going 0-2 in the first to five series.

Emirates Team New Zealand returned to the race course short of time to get to the start area, however fortuitously the wind exceeded the average limit for racing at least twice, resulting in two eight minute delays while the 'rolling boxcar' system of averaging wind speed measurement was restarted.



The Peter Burling skippered crew arrived at the start of their match with Land Rover BAR, a team that performs very well at the top end of the breeze.

By this stage winds were hovering around 22kts - just a couple of knots under the 24kt maximum - and rain was beginning to settle in - the first serious rain in Bermuda for a month. The New Zealand team elected to play it cautiously at the start and trailed the British for the first three legs as the boats hit the top speeds yet seen in the regatta and sailing in very marginal conditions and reduced visibility.

On the second windward beat, Peter Burling and crew put the hammer down and showed blinding speed and superb tacking to go from being 11 seconds behind to 9 seconds ahead of the British in just one 1.2nm leg to windward. There was no lucky shift in it - just sheer boat speed - and maybe the Kiwis hand was forced to reveal a secret they have been rumoured to have all regatta.

The Kiwi margin increased, and eventually, Ainslie decided seamanship was the order of the day and took the pressure off the cruise the rest of the course finishing over 2 minutes behind Burling and his crew.

The third race of the day got underway between Artemis Racing and Softbank Team Japan as conditions deteriorated still further and Dean Barker helmed to Japanese entry to quickly have a comfortable margin over the Swedish team, who were once again not flavour of the day with umpires and were being pinged with multiple penalties, which forced them to physically stop the boat soon after the start of the first beat to resolve the penalties.

Conditions brightened somewhat for the start of the fourth race of the day between Land Rover BAR and Emirates Team New Zealand. Again the Kiwis played it cautiously in the marginal conditions. Both competitors suffered penalties for early entry which were offset.

British skipper Ben Ainslie chased the Kiwis to the southern side of the starting box with both boats holding up until the start signal. Ainslie was the first to break and go, followed by Emirates Team New Zealand.

The Kiwis got foiling and up to speed before the bows dipped and then the AC50 went into a full pitchpole.

The reason for the pitchpole was not clear as the boat was in level flight and appeared to be accelerating properly. However as was seen earlier in the series it is relatively easy for the AC50's to get the bow down, lift a rudder-aileron clear of the water even just for a moment, releasing 700kg of downward pressure from the back of the boat and at best there will be a major splashdown with the boat stopping completely. Or as happened today the boat nosedives and pitchpoles.



Three crew were dropped into the water, but the designed flotation and safety systems came into play, and the AC50 just sat bows down waiting for rescue tenders to move in.

Steering the AC50 into a head to wind situation, and righting the catamaran took about ten minutes, during which time the top back element of the wingsail suffered some shredding damage and probably broken frames. The top front element suffered skin damage.

After righting the AC50 was strapped alongside the team tender and sideslipped back to the team base in the Royal Dockyard - trip that took about forty minutes in heavy rain which killed the wind, and made the end of the trip to the team base slightly easier.

Once at the base, the team put a man up the wing mast and pulled the wingsail. After which the wingsail and AC50 was put into the shed and the doors closed.

No statement has been issued yet from the team as to the damage.

From photos and dockside observation, it would seem that the upper aft element of the wingsail was badly damaged. Mast head and other electronics in the wingsail will have been damaged. It is not possible to tell whether hydraulic systems would have been damaged in the wingsail, but one would suspect that would have been the case,

On the platform a lot of crossbeams and other fairing has been damaged - however, this happened on other competitors as well. Water got into the forward section of the hulls and had to be pumped out - it is not known what electronics if any are affected.

While the cockpits filled they are 'wet areas', and gear in these would be expected to withstand being submerged.

However, it would be expected that they would be ready to race tomorrow. However, the weather forecast is such that Race Director Iain Murray told media this morning that he had a low level of confidence that racing would be held on Wednesday.