Editorial- Remarkable 470 result from Hyeres

by nzeditor@sail-world.com on 26 Apr 2008 Welcome to the week end edition of Sail-World.Com/NZ's newsletter

The 40th Semaine Olympique Francaise de Voile, finished overnight with New Zealand sailors taking Silver and Bronze medals in the ISAF Grade 1 regatta.

For the young 470 crew of Peter Burling and Carl Evans the regatta was their first trip onto the podium for an event of this status and is a remarkable feat given that this is an Olympic year; they are only 17 years old; and have only been sailing in the class for just over a year.

The cream on this particular effort was that the young New Zealand crew were lying sixth before the Medal Race and in a remarkable display of sailing under pressure managed to finish in second place, and then had the tie breaker go their way to secure third overall.

Andrew Murdoch was a model of consistency, staying in the top three for much of the regatta, and taking the silver medal in the Laser class from a very strong field.

The other New Zealand Olympic team members had a difficult regatta, Jo Aleh was the only other NZ sailor to make the Medal Race and she finished sixth overall. Dan Slater was 12th in the Finn class, with Aaron McIntosh and Mark Kennedy not helping their Olympic selection chances in the Tornado class with a 16th in a 21 strong fleet.

On the America's Cup scene there has been some 'action' with Alinghi taking several members of the media out racing in the Extreme 40 catamarans, and announcing that the building of their 90ft Defender is 'imminent' - with a view to a 2009 Match. Most observers would be surprised if the New York Supreme Court anoints a 2009 Match date, so it remains quite unclear just where this game is headed

Accompanying this announcement have been various charts and timelines showing a 15 month design/build/launch program and drawing comparisons between other projects.

According to Alinghi 22,500 manhours are required for the construction of a ACC V5 yacht, as used in the 32nd America's Cup. And construction of a 90ft square multihull is estimated at more than three times that amount - with hull construction taking six months. Incredibly spar construction is the longest phase at nine months.

By comparison the construction of the 130ft K-boat used in the Big Boat Challenge in 1988 took six months - from conceptual design to launch - and at a time when there was no previous experience with a boat of this size or type.

Also in this issue we feature reports from BlackMatch Racing as they compete in the Grade 1 Brasil Cup.

Closer to home the YNZ Youthsail regatta has just finished at Algies Bay, north of Auckland. We have featured daily reports from Kirsty Laws of Sandspit YC and great photos from Ben Howson. Our congratulations to the winners, and well done to all those who took part. We hope you learned something!

The video of the 2008 Olympic class World Championships held at Takapuna has been playing on Sky TV this weekend. In this edition we have included a clip from the Tornado Worlds, with some excellent camera work of this exciting class seen at its best.

Good sailing!

Richard Gladwell
NZ Editor

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