ACWS and Extreme Sailing Series day 1 for Artemis Racing

by Artemis Racing on 7 Aug 2011 As the fog rolled in and the helicopters roared overhead, racing got underway today on the Bay of Cascais for the inaugural America’s Cup World Series event.

Artemis Racing was the first team to put a point on the scoreboard winning the first race and rounded out the day in second overall, just one point behind Emirates Team New Zealand.

This is the start of a new era in the America’s Cup and it was fitting that the team also had sailing’s most revered historian and journalist, Bob Fisher, as a guest racer onboard. Fisher has been covering the America’s Cup since 1967 and was invigorated after his experience onboard today.

The Race Committee ran three quality fleet races in what were very challenging conditions for the nine teams. The breeze was light and shifty, with a bit of rain passing through mid-afternoon.

Skipper Terry Hutchinson praised his crew onboard the AC45, as well as the team's sail designers (Steve Calder and Martin Oliver) who have been working hard over short period of time to comprehend and develop the sail plan.

'The conditions were very tricky today. Fortunately, we were sailing in multihulls otherwise we wouldn’t have gotten the racing in!' said Terry. 'The guys did a good job working together and picking the right sides of the course. We’ll be working on refining our reaching speed and continue to focus on our crew communications onboard tomorrow. Keeping in mind that our end game is 24 months from now.'

The outlook for tomorrow is for breezier conditions with one fleet race, followed by a speed trial.

Extreme Sailing Series – Cowes

Today was also the first day of racing at the Extreme Sailing Series in Cowes with winds up to 20 knots. After four races, Artemis Racing is in sixth overall among the fleet of 12 Extreme 40s.

'We improved as the day went along and are focused on learning every minute,' said Helmsman Santiago Lange.

Artemis Racing website

Follow the racing live tomorrow from 1500 BST:
America’s Cup World Series – Cascais here
Extreme Sailing Series - Cowes here