America's Cup - Artemis Racing trounces Defender in Practice Series

by Richard Gladwell, Sail-World on 14 Apr 2017 America's Cup Challenger, Artemis Racing has beaten the America's Cup Defender 4-0 in the just concluded three day Practice Session in Bermuda.

On the face of it, USA emerged with a five win/four loss score card from the nine races they sailed. That is quite a turnaround from the nine win/two loss outcome from the first five day long Practice racing Session stage on March 22-26.

Results weren't reported from the second two day session on April 6-7.

Oracle Team USA's four losses all came from Swedish Challenger Artemis Racing - who dished out the same treatment to the other teams in the nine races they sailed.

An analysis of the results table shows that USA and Sweden faced each other four times - the most of any other Challenger pairing. Oracle Team USA'a wins came from their matches against Softbank Team Japan - where they beat their development partner three times. And then took a win a piece of Groupama Team France and Land Rover BAR.

Artemis Racing beat Land Rover BAR twice, and returned the same scorecard from Softbank Team Japan.

Winds were at the top end of the scale for racing in the America's Cup Regatta and if a boat had a speed edge then it should have been repeatable.

Given the issues that most teams have had with their foils it is simplistic to draw conclusions at this stage, six weeks out from the beginning of the Qualifiers.

In the 16-25kts winds, there seemed to be less emphasis on match racing - albeit with some impressive and spectacular manoeuvres in the pre-start. However the the point of difference was always the same with Artemis Racing being able to drive straight hard and fast and if she was not in the lead from the get-go, then she pounced the first time her opponent came off her foils.

Maybe Nathan Outteridge, the Olympic Gold and Silver medalist and multiple world champion in the Olympic skiff class had more nerve than the other helmsmen in the conditions.

Of course a switch to lighter winds could have produced a different result.

The other surprising aspect of the series was that six weeks out from the start of the Qualifiers, only two of the five teams were able to sail a full series of nine races. For sure others might have suffered breakdown, doing development or have a myriad of other excuses. But there is just six weeks left to run before they sail in a series after which one of the five Challengers will be going home.

Softbank Team Japan was able to complete seven races for a two win, five loss record. Land Rover BAR sailed a disappointing four races, scoring one win. Groupama Team France sailed the same number of races and was winless.

Three more days of unofficial practice racing for the 35th America’s Cup concluded on Wednesday afternoon (12 April 2017) on Bermuda’s Great Sound with the Swedish team Artemis Racing dominating proceedings, winning all nine of the races they took part in.

Oracle Team USA finished second in the results table, winning five of their nine races, followed by SoftBank Team Japan who won two out of seven races they took part in, then Land Rover BAR who competed in five, winning one, and finally Groupama Team France who took part in four races without registering a victory.

After the racing, the team skippers and helmsmen gave their own take on the outcome of the Series:

Jimmy Spithill, Skipper Oracle Team USA: “It was another great race period. You can definitely see that all of the teams have improved since the last one. I think Artemis Racing came out on top and they really just made fewer mistakes than other teams. People were definitely trying a few things out on the water in terms of technique and also their general setups but it was fantastic – we got more top-end conditions in this race period.

“We’ve got a lot of work to do still. Clearly Artemis Racing are looking very strong, SoftBank Team Japan too were going really well but we learned a heap out of this as I’m sure everyone did who was out there. The French were spending more hours out there and getting sharper as well with their AC boards but overall it was a great period and we’ve got to build on this. The clock is ticking so every day counts.

“The priorities now are making sure we do a good debrief from this period, making sure we take the time to study all the racing and what we’ve learnt from it, and then we need to implement some of the development options. We need to make sure we keep developing this boat, keep making it faster, and every other team will do the same.”

Nathan Outteridge, Skipper, Artemis Racing: “We’ve had a really good race period here in Bermuda, all five teams on the island have been racing hard. We’ve had some really close battles, really close starting. Tacking duels around the course forcing umpires to make decisions, it’s everything we expect it’s going to be come May and June. It’s going to be close and we’re just working on getting better and better each day.”

Iain Percy, Team Manager, Artemis Racing: “Six weeks to go now until the beginning of the competition, and we’re now at the business end of our campaign. These race weeks continue to prove very useful. We’ve come away again with lots of lessons, lots of things we need to improve.”

Dean Barker, Skipper, SoftBank Team Japan: 'This last practice racing period was the most beneficial yet for the team. The results obviously don't show just how close the racing was but we're really happy with how the boat is going and the improvements we're seeing out on the water. It just shows how close the racing will be - we'll keep developing and improving straight to the end.'

Nicholas Heintz, Grinder, Groupama Team France: “In terms of physical stress, a training day on the water is much more demanding as we do three races and a lot of runs, a rhythm that we won’t be doing during the cup. The learning curve is exponential for Groupama Team France and we are learning from every session on the water.”

Adam Minoprio, Wing Trimmer, Groupama Team France: “The boat is getting more and more stable and faster on the race course. We reach 40 knots downwind and we are happy with our new foils designs. We’re still in the process of optimization in terms of control systems. Competition is very sharp indeed.”

The next Practice Race session is a five day one starting on April 24th with two further Practice Sessions scheduled before the start of the America's Cup Qualifiers on May 26. In just under two months four of the five Challengers will have been eliminated completely from the 35th America's Cup.

Overall Results - Practice Session 3

 

			WINNER
Race 1	FRA	USA	USA
Race 2	SWE	USA	SWE
Race 3	JPN	USA	USA
Race 4	SWE	GBR	SWE
Race 5	USA	SWE	SWE
Race 6	USA	JPN	USA
Race 7	JPN	SWE	SWE
Race 8	SWE	USA	SWE
Race 9	GBR	JPN	JPN
Race 10	SWE	FRA	SWE
Race 11	USA	GBR	USA
Race 12	GBR	FRA	GBR
Race 13	SWE	USA	SWE
Race 14	FRA	JPN	JPN
Race 15	SWE	GBR	SWE
Race 16	JPN	USA	USA
Race 17	SWE	JPN	SWE