Alan Bond remembered... Louis Vuitton returns...Volvo OR latest

by . on 6 Jun 2015 Welcome to Sail-World.com’s New Zealand e-magazine for June 6, 2015

Our apologies for the break in newsletters due to some technical issues that have now been resolved.

Alan Bond, the man that changed the America's Cup like no other, died yesterday of complications following heart valve surgery.

He was a remarkable man, and in this issue we have a compilation of tributes and memories from his crew, Grant Simmer and John Longley along with highlights of the 1983 America's Cup win in 1983.

As well as reminiscing on the 1983 America's Cup, John Longley, a grinder on Australia II shared this story of how he was snared by Bond to take on the Endeavour replica project.

We were in Sardinia for the 1987 12 Metre Worlds. The regatta had just finished, and Alan asked me to come and see him on his big power yacht.

'What you doing now Chink.'
'Don't really know Alan.'
'Do you want to build the Endeavour?'
'What?'
'Endeavour - it's Cook's ship,'
' I know Alan but....'
'Warren Jones reckons we should do it as the Bond Corp Bicentennial project. Do you want to do it?'
' Gee Alan that sounds really interesting. When can we talk about it in detail?'
'Forget that. I'm busy. Do you want to build the ship.'
'Yes Alan'....and that was the next 12 years of my life sorted.

We hope to have a substantial video interview feature with Alan Bond available in the next few days.

The Volvo Ocean Race is about to start Leg 8, with the fleet expanding to seven boats with the re-entry of Team Vestas Wind.

Certainly the Team Vestas Wind comeback is one of the remarkable stories of sailing. The precision of planning the re-build to within a day - six months out, with a wrecked boat stuck on an atoll in the Southern Indian Ocean, is quite remarkable.

For sure it has not been a walk in the park for Nick Cox, Persico and the sponsors - but they can come away from the exercise with heads high and a difficult, nigh impossible job well done.

Oddly enough although Vestas Wind has not been represented on the water since midway through Leg 2, they have secured themselves a very unique place in sailing history as a team that has achieved the impossible. In the general media and public mind-space Vestas Wind has also secured a very unique and favourable profile as a company that can deliver on time against overwhelming odds.

While Vestas Wind's objective might have been to spread the message about alternative energy generation, they have, through the events of November 29, gained a reputation that no marketing plan could have achieved. Their take-out from the race is probably greater than any of the other teams.

A similar recovery from adversity certainly did Sir Peter Blake and Ceramco no harm in the 1981-82 Whitbread Round the World Race.

First work-out for the Danish flagged boat will come in the In-Port Race, to be followed by the Leg start 24 hours later.

You can see both live on Sail-World.com

The Volvo fleet look set to have another day of the light and fluffies for the opening stanzas of Leg 8 to Cape Finisterre, then, according to PredictWind.com the fleet will be hit by strong headwinds of around 30kts for the beat across the Bay of Biscay to Lorient.

Quite how the fleet reacts to these conditions will be very telling.

Thanks to some interesting decisions from the International Jury relating to boats sailing the wrong way up a traffic separation system when exiting Newport RI, at the start of Leg 7, the leader board has been compressed.

There are now two sets of ties on the points table.

While some have race leader Abu Dhabi penciled in for the overall win, there are way too many points on the table to be able to draw that premature conclusion.

On the last leg, Abu Dhabi finished fifth out of the fleet of six - their first time off the podium for seven legs. The damage was reduced with the penalties handed out to Dongfeng and Mapfre. And there are still five boats in with a chance at the champion's spot.

In the last Volvo Ocean Race, Camper with Emirates Team New Zealand started the penultimate leg in fourth place overall, and by race end had snatched second place overall.

This race is sailed in one-designs, and there are not too many passing lanes due to the coastal nature of the two Legs - meaning that normal covering tactics will often be sufficient to protect a position - and the adage of staying between your man and the mark - will come to the forefront in this leg.

Organisers have come in for criticism from competitors with the imposition of various virtual sidelines on the race course, along with other rules complexities that seem fine in the comfort of Race Control but below decks in a Volvo 65 they are often less clear.

Mapfre skipper Iker Martinez, in a video interview with the Sail-World team in Lisbon, questioned how three top navigators could all have got the rules wrong when negotiating the Traffic Separation System in Newport RI. He has a point.

The America's Cup continues to rumble away while largely maintaining media silence.

Since our last edition, Louis Vuitton have come back on board as naming rights sponsor of the Challenger Selection Series, which includes the America's Cup World Series.

In itself that announcement is both significant and welcome.

However when linked with the announcement by Emirates Team New Zealand of their two returning sponsors - Omega and Emirates - then a clear signal is sent to other corporates considering an involvement with the teams in the next America's Cup.

All three corporates are major players on the world sporting landscape and if they have confidence in the Teams and Event - then maybe others can tread in their footsteps with some confidence about the return from their investment.

Artemis Racing have announced they will be moving to Bermuda from their base in San Francisco. As is noted in the story in this edition the move to an island 650nm out in the Atlantic Ocean raises an interesting conundrum for teams. While there is no doubt some advantage in being at the regatta venue for as long as possible, the teams on the island have to replicate the technology base that is readily available in New Zealand or UK/Europe.

In Cup terms that means that making alterations to boats, and bringing on new gear is much simpler with the AC48 and the AC45 test platforms close to a major marine technology centre than on the island.

Time will tell on this point. But for sure Team New Zealand turned up in San Francisco last time with a boat that was fast out of the box - having sailed in the long ocean swell-free stretches of Hauraki Gulf. The others who had gone a lot earlier to San Francisco did not enjoy the same edge - even though they were able to close the gap and catch up in the extended duration of the 34th America's Cup.

Follow all the racing and developments in major and local events on www.sail-world.com, scroll to the bottom of the site, select New Zealand, and get all the latest news and updates from the sailing world.

Good sailing!

Richard Gladwell
NZ Editor

sailworldnzl@gmail.com

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