America's Cup - Italians say monohulls will be used in the next Cup

by Richard Gladwell, Sail-World.com NZ on 11 Sep 2017 Reports emanating from the Italian newspaper La Stampa suggested that the 36th America's Cup, to be sailed in New Zealand, would be held in monohulls.

They were confirmed as being correct at 6.00pm NZT by the America's Cup Defender, Emirates Team New Zealand.

Fabio Pozzo, a sailing correspondent for La Stampa, reported from the Maxi Yacht Rolex Cup at Porto Cervo and apparently managed to get the Patron of Luna Rossa, Patrizio Bertelli and skipper Max Sirena to respond to questions outlining the parameters of the next America's Cup Class.

Using an online translator, the key points of the Italian were that a monohull would be used and that the use of a monohull was a pre-condition of Luna Rossa assisting Emirates Team NZ in the last America's Cup.

They confirmed that the Protocol for the 36th America's Cup would be announced at the end of September.

There was no real detail on type of monohull, except they are reported to have commented: 'They will be very powerful boats, but technical details, for example, with the foils or the canting keel, we'll see them later.'

It was also confirmed that there would be nationality restrictions - but did not elaborate as to whether it would be for sailing crew or permeate further into the team.

The full text of the interview with La Stampa is as follows:

Patrizio Bertelli, CEO of Prada and founder of the Luna Rossa Challenge, an Italian sailboat racing syndicate, is having lunch at the Yacht Club Costa Smeralda in Porto Cervo. An exchange of greetings with the commodore Riccardo Bonadeo is followed by a private meeting with the skipper Max Sirena.

Ahead of his announcement at the end of the month regarding parameters for the 36th America Cup, Bertelli, who helped Team New Zealand win the last America’s Cup in Bermuda, La Stampa sits down with the Luna Rossa boss to discuss the new rules.

So, will we still be seeing flying catamarans?

“No, we’re back to the monohulls.”

Really? Has the deal been made with the New Zealanders?

“It was our condition to help the New Zealanders with their men and means in the last edition.”

When will the announcement of the Protocol (the new rules) take place?

“At the end of the month.”

Returning to monohulls is a turning point for many.

“They will be very powerful boats, but as for technical details such as the foils (which lift the hull up and out of the water) or the canting keel, we’ll look at them later on.”

Will the challenge also be between nations, with passport restrictions for men and women, as they were in the past?

“Yes, there will be limitations of nationality.”

What are you doing in Costa Smeralda? Are you campaigning?

“Well, yes.”

Will there be any events in Italy preceding the America’s Cup?

“There will be racing in Italy as well, yes.”

Besides nationality rules, will the Luna Rossa team be all-Italian?

“Here in Porto Cervo, maxi yachts were racing the last few days (in the Maxi Yacht Rolex Cup). How many Italian sailors are on these boats? Few. And most of all, that today are fifty-year-old grew up with Luna Rossa, which I launched. That’s why my future goal is to grow young Italian talents.”

A nice challenge.

“We’ll have to roll up our sleeves. Also because I think we’re not the only team with the tricolored flag on the stern. “

It would also seem that there will be pre-America's Cup race circuits as existed in the last two editions with the America's Cup World Series, and the Acts held in the years when Swiss based Team Alinghi held the America's Cup for two cycles.

The first monohull of the new America's Cup Class would probably not be launched until 2020 - however that date is expected to be named in the Protocol when it is announced at the end of September.

The move to monohulls has obsoleted the fleet of six AC50 wingsailed catamarans which had had a racing life of just five months. Also jettisoned is a fleet of around 15 AC45S - test platforms - with some teams building up to four of the catamarans said to cost around $5million each.

While foiling monohulls are reasonably well proven in offshore and trans-oceanic racing they are an unknown commodity for inshore round the buoys racing and are unlikely to be as spectacular as the foiling AC50's which were only beginning to realise their potential development.

The foiling monohull type is not known for its upwind ability, with the existing boats only coming into their own once sheets are eased in trans-oceanic conditions.

It will be interesting to see the upwind performance of the America's Cup class which will have to break new ground in foiling to be able to match the upwind performance of the AC50.

It is also not clear if the foiling monohull would be open in design compared with the AC50 which was one design in several key aspects. The monohull type doesn't lend itself to the tooling developed for the one-design AC50 construction.

Given Patrizio Bertelli's previously expressed affinity with the basic concepts of the Deed of Gift, the 19th century document which governs the conduct of racing for the 166-year-old trophy, it would seem that the new America's Cup Class will revert to an open design to fit a box-rule (ie restricted to overall length, beam, draft and sail area).

For it to be a foiler, the yacht will need to be relatively light weight and would be expected to be fitted with a long canting keel to provide the righting moment necessary to develop the power for foiling.

Multihulls achieve their righting moment through their wide beam, and not weight in a keel bulb.

The key with any America's Cup boat chosen is its performance in 5-6kts of wind - the bottom end of the wind range for America's Cup sailing - where the AC50's could hit four times the windspeed. Unless the America's Cup Class is a top performer in that condition, then they become less attractive for television and programming schedules are inevitably delayed or cancelled.

If a canting keel is used, then that raises the issue of whether the boats will be fitted with engines to provide the power to swing the canting keel between tacks. No canting keelboats of the size legal in the America's Cup Deed of Gift, use a block and tackle or winch systems to grind the keel from side to side, and in more sophisticated versions the canting process is handled by PLC systems.

There was no comment from Luna Rossa as to whether the monohull would use a full wingsail rig or a hard front element with a soft back element.

Equally, it is not clear if the foils would be of the DSS type used on shorthanded round the world racers, or daggerboard foils used in the America's Cup inshore racers.

Either way foil design is likely to be just as critical a design and structural issue in the next America's Cup as it was in the last two, regardless of whether they are deployed on a monohull or multihull platform.

The nationality rule is expected to hit two of the existing teams hardest - Softbank Team Japan and Swedens, Artemis Racing both of whom only had three nationals in their wider sailing squad - all of whom were grinders. The French, British and New Zealand teams are expected to be largely unaffected. If Oracle Team USA returns as a Challenger, it would be expected that they would be able to covert to US residency given that key crew members have been living in the USA for the past decade.

While it is believed that the new America's Cup teams preferred monohulls, an accommodation needs to be reached with the five existing America's Cup teams bound by the Framework Agreement, all of whom have a reasonable amount of skin in the multihull game.

Strictly speaking under the Deed of Gift the call on the type of yacht used is the call of the Challenger, however, the contemporary approach is that the Challenger and Defender negotiate a Match using a boat with which they are both comfortable, and then invite teams to participate.

The phones were off the hook at Emirates Team New Zealand, and the America's Cup champions only confirmed the reports in the early evening NZT.

Emirates Team New Zealand is expected to be the least affected of the teams, having won two America's Cups in monohulls and another in multihulls and come very close in the 2013 regatta, also in multihulls. They also have a minimum of multihull kit, compared to three of the teams at least.

The two advantages of the monohull would appear to be in that they may be able to be transported in a travel lift (not a certainty if DSS style foils are used), which lowers the footprint required for a team base.

If wingsails are replaced with conventional rigs, then that would ease handling issues in Auckland with its fresh breezes, but the same argument applies to multihulls which can also sail with 'soft' rigs.

The other advantage, if a wingsail is not used, then the new ACC monohull should be able to be towed, rather than having to be side slipped as is the case with the AC50's.

The draft of the high-performance keelboat will be a point of interest in Auckland with the former 75ft long IACC class, which drew 13ft and required a channel to be dredged to give all-tide access to the Viaduct Harbour.

The Protocol governing the 36th America's Cup will be announced by the end of September.