Cup Spy July 13: Swiss impressive as breeze returns to Barcelona
by Richard Gladwell/Sail-World NZ 14 Jul 2023 19:55 PDT
15 July 2023
Alinghi Red Bull Racing - AC75 - Day 75 - July 13, 2023 - Barcelona © Alex Carabi / America's Cup
What happened in the Cup - July 13, 2023:
The breeze came back at Barcelona, building rapidly to 16kts gusting 20kts and three teams sailed out of Barcelona. Three teams sailed. Alinghi Red Bull Racing dusted off their AC75 and had a very impressive day's sailing. Not so for USA which still experienced their LEQ12 gremlins.
- Alinghi Red Bull Racing sailed their AC75, and from reports by the AC37 Recon Team and what we've seen on video, Alinghi Red Bull Racing had their best day yet on the AC75, and for the first time looked to be up to the standard of the other teams who competed in the 2021 America's Cup.
- Luna Rossa - we have no report from AC37 Joint Recon Team - but from images the Italians sailed their AC40 One Design alone.
- American Magic - sailed their AC40 One Design and their AC40/LEQ12 test boat. Unfortunately the the USA team continued to have technical issues with their LEQ12, but stayed on the water debugging the boat. Co-helm Tom Slingsby elaborates in their post session interview. However at the end of the day, the LEQ12 appeared to be functioning normally, and the US team should be into their test program on Friday.
- Emirates Team New Zealand is in Barcelona and is believed to be assembling their AC75 with a target sailing date of mid-July.
- INEOS Britannia will not be sailing until August 1, and are transiting to Barcelona from their pre-Cup base in Mallorca.
- No further news from the Orient Express Team (formerly K-Challenge), save for the announcement of their sailing team, last week.
Commentary:
After the aborted session, the previous day, NYYC American Magic would have been hoping for a day when things didn't go wrong. Unfortunately that didn't happen.
The gremlins continued to occur sporadically with the US team, disrupting the session, but not to the extent of Thursday.
After the session co-helmsman, and Olympic Gold medalist told AC37 Joint Recon Program's Lea Sitjà that they had a very long day, with perfect sailing conditions.
"Unfortunately for us, we didn't do a heap of sailing, we had a few technical issues on the boat, a few things not working. And so we spent pretty much all the day problem solving those issues. But towards the end of the day, everything got a bit better. So it puts us in good stead for tomorrow," he said.
It didn't take long for the gremlins to re-emerge. "We sheeted on and then I think within a minute or so we had to stop the boat and, and get support team alongside to get the boat working again. They would fix an issue - and then we would have another issue and it was one of those days. But that's what you have in the America's Cup sometimes," he said ruefully.
Slingsby said it wasn't a single issue but "different things. Sometimes we didn't fix the issues straightaway, it took us a couple of little sails and then our, our technical guys could identify an issue from off the boat, before coming back and fixing it. We had a lot of little gremlins today. But it was overall it was really successful, and it feels like we fixed them all by the end of the day."
The US team stayed on a #3 jib all day, which looked a little small at the bottom end of the wind range, however they were sailing in foiling conditions.
"I think pretty much as soon as you're foiling you want the smallest jib you can get away with. "Anything 12 knots and above is pretty much a J 3 in this in this class of boat. I guess you could be J#2 to maybe 14 knots, but then you'd definitely be in the #3.
Yesterday's issues with the "combo" sea-state were still present off Barcelona, but not quite as significant as Wednesday.
"On starboard tack, we're into the waves a bit more. There was a little bit more of a swell rolling into the shore, and on port tack, you're going across the waves a little bit more, but it wasn't too bad out there."
"I would have that there was maybe half a metre of waves. There were some nice troughs there and if you go through a set of bigger waves, the boat would jump around a bit but it wasn't really causing us to crash out of the sky at all!"
The issues they had on board looked like they could have been related to a malfunction on a piece of gear on the starboard side, and it seemed to the AC37 Recon team following American Magic that it was related to the head-on starboard tack swell.
"It wasn't wasn't a performance reason why we were dropping off on starboard. We were having a few issues with that side of the boat with a few different things, and one time the boat just turned off on us, [dropped all power] and that was on starboard as well. But fortunately we were able to get the head to wind and and then the boat fired up again. And we got going again. But yes there were a range of issues, today, Slingsby confirmed.
Alinghi Red Bull Racing looked to be having a much better day in the AC75, in Thursday's seastate, than had been the case the day before. That view was confirmed by the AC37 Joint Recon team following the Swiss.
The Recon team posted a couple of good videos of about 10 minutes duration each, and from these the improvement the performance we have usually seen from the Swiss team when sailing the AC75 in an awkward sea-state.
The boat appeared to be much better trimmed, and was not diving through the occasional wave, but on the other hand it was not flying too high - which can lead to the AC75 making more leeway.
The was no indication from the team in the post-session Recon team interview, as to what changes had been made.
Steven Robert, structural lead at Alinghi Red Bull Racing, was put up by the team for the post race session interview, which initially centred around some wingtip trailing edge changes in the starboard development foil.
"It's a general test design," Robert explained. "We are exploring the design envelope for all the aspects of the yacht so every small item makes a difference."
He said that he wasn't in a position to answer a question about "how the undulated edge affects the structural integrity and load distribution of the foil, particularly during high speed and high speed manoeuvres?" But he did respond by saying: "I know that we are exploring every every aspects and and making sure that really that we get to gain sets that we see from from others to go into into the reality and that's really what we're trying to get every incremental gains."
Later in the interview, when it did get onto Robert's area of expertise he stressed the need to make incremental gains.
"A lot of this development on this on this boat really is about trying to refine every detail. So, we need to explore the things up to the limit and since that is often linked to the some mass restriction, as well as a shape restriction - we want to get that as small as possible. So, everything needs to be finely tuned. So that way even if we are breaking some some stuff, this is good because we are learning a lot."
"All the development aspects we are modelling is exploring small mockups and tests of various materials, and various types of laminates. And all of this helps us really to explore these the full design space available."
Alinghi Red Bull racing did have some lengthy issues with the mainsail as outlines in the AC37 Joint Recon report and the images in this story.
Robert's response was "we are always trying to tune the system. Sometimes we want to tune it on the boat, while we're sailing, and sometimes we get back control and we need to tune it to get it everything stripped out."
With the rest of the sailing gear out of the way it is often a lot easier to see and address the specific issues rather than having to observe and resolve specific issues with the boat not sailing - which is probably a fair comment about most aspects of AC75 sailing, particularly with the double skinned mainsail, with its top battening and clew sheeting, which in our observation, in the last Cup. has taken all teams several days/weeks to settle down.
Weather conditions at Barcelona July 13, 2023:
- According to the Predictwind readings taken at the entrance to Olimpic Port the Southerly breeze did a raid build throughout the morning before spiked to a peak average of 17kts at 1200hrs and gusting just over 20kts at mid day.
The breeze faded a little but stayed in once it had settled down and didn't move too much in direction either.
On the water the AC37 Recon teams reported a SSW breeze of 14-17kts. They both docked out just before noon, and would have caught the breeze at its peak.
- Sea state: Beaufort 4 (approx 0.6 to 1.0metre seas) at a 5 sec period between centres.
- Conditions: 28° C Partly cloudy.
- Alinghi Red Bull Racing (AC75): Dock-out: 11300hrs Dock-in: 17300hrs
- American Magic (both AC40-OD and LEQ12): Dock-out: 1156hrs Dock-in: 18300hrs
AC37 Joint Recon Team Reports:
Alinghi Red Bull Racing LEQ12 - Day 40 - July 13, 2023 - Barcelona
Alinghi Red Bull Racing rolled out their AC75 at 08:55, with a morning focus on systems. An electronics technician worked at the trimmer seat, while other technicians worked at the driver's controls.
A likely battery was also seen being moved into the aft hatch, adjacent to the main sheet system. The M2-2L mainsail and the J4-1R jib prepared on deck before the 11:30 dockout. While in port, hydraulic system checks were performed with the mainsail up and cyclors actively pedalling. Shortly afterwards, the J4-1R jib was hoisted in port, as sailing commenced at 12:30.
The 'Garbi' afternoon thermal wind was moderate, ranging between 13 to 17 knots from the South Southwest. There was a residual East swell combined with the wind waves, between 0.6m to 1m, with a 3-4s period according to local weather buoy readings.
Steven Robert, the Structural Lead, was onboard for the testing in the morning, before training laps of the course. He was spotted speaking to
Yves Detrey on the transom, who subsequently was harnessed up and rode on the transom, observing the controls and clew of the main for a while in the morning.
The first stint of sailing included a lengthy downwind leg, followed by upwind, and another slightly shorter downwind. 18 of the 21 maneuvers were fully foiling. This was followed by a short lunch break and briefing.
The second stint comprised of upwind sailing and a few laps around the course. Despite a nosedive during this stint, it did not disrupt the team's performance or schedule. The third stint began with a bear away and a downwind leg towards the leeward gate, continuing with several more laps. Notably, a JK maneuver was executed around the leeward gate, followed by a couple of double tacks upwind.
The stint concluded with a final bear away and round-up in front of the W hotel.
Following the sailing stints, the sails were dropped and the yacht was towed back to the base. A flurry of activity followed, with numerous engineers and designers working on the systems, specifically the main controls. The mainsail was raised again for further inspection, before being dropped after about an hour. Upon dock in, it was noted that the mainsheet hydraulic ram had been removed.
The wingtip claimed in the interview is not in fact new.
The team spent six hours on the water, covering over 60nm. 62 maneuvers were performed, of which 85% were fully foiling. One of the Alinghi Red Bull Racing’s best performance so far.
Session Statistics: Alinghi Red Bull Racing LEQ12 - Day 40 - July 13, 2023 - Barcelona
- Total Tacks: 39 - Fully foiling: 33; Touch & Go: 3; Touch Down: 3
- Total Gybes: 23 - Fully foiling: 20; Touch & Go: 1; Touch Down: 2
Crew: Helms: Arnaud Psarofaghis, Maxime Bachelin. Sail Trimmers: Yves Detrey, Bryan Mettraux, Nico Rolaz
American Magic - AC40 and LEQ12 - Day 38 - July 13, 2023 - Barcelona
From the AC37 Joint Recon Team:
Today we had the complete opposite of yesterday, a very long day on the water.
From the very beginning America was permanently plagued by glitches and system failures killing short every sailing attempt.
But then magic happened. Through shear grit, resilience and effort the AM team, that never gave up, managed to pull a proper training session to finish the day.
Hopefully they managed to get rid of all the gremlins onboard too.
Roll out was at 0845hrs and dock out 1155hrs with Slingsby, Goodison, Menninger and Campbell on-board America (LEQ12) and Severin, Calabrese, Melges and Finn on Magic (AC40-OD).
Wind was 12-16kt from 200º (SSW), sea state 4 Beaufort with a wind chop of 0.6m, 3 secs periods from 200° SSW and again a combined swell from two directions - one swell of 1metre, at 5.5sec from 120° and the other 1m high, at 5sec periods from 000°. Sails used were the Main#2 and Jib#3
America was out of the port and flying upwind by 12:30h but had to stop 1 minute latter. They had a debriefing on the chase boat followed by a battery replacement 1318hrs. Here follows the painful list of sail and stop periods for the day with sailing times in minutes for America:
Sailing upwind 1343hrs for just 5min and stopped.
Sailing upwind again 1418hrs for 6min when they lost control of the boat and stopped.
Sailing upwind 1533hrs for 9min with three tacks and then twice losing control to crash again.
Sailing upwind 1547hrs for 5min with two tacks and stopped. The wind had dropped by then to 6-9kt from 190°. Resumed sailing for 20 minutes 1617hrs with a short upwind with a single tack followed by a run with no jibes.
Then they needed another battery replacement 1641hrs with a debriefing on chase boat. Sailing again upwind at 1705hrs and a run for 15mins. The wind picked up to 10-13kt from 200°.
Sailing 1743hrs until 1755hrs with 4 tacks and 5 jibes and stop. Final 7min upwind sail at 1813hrs towards the port with two tacks and one last crash-stop.
Dock in was at 1835hrs and crane out 1900hrs. Magic spent all day sailing on its own.
- Lea Sitjà (AC37 Joint Recon team)
Session Statistics: American Magic - AC40 and LEQ12 - Day 38 - July 13, 2023 - Barcelona
- Roll out: 0915hrs Dock Out: 1156hrs
- Dock In: 1830hrs
- Total Tacks: 13 - Fully foiling: 10; Touch & Go: 3; Touch Down: 0
- Total Gybes: 5 - Fully foiling: 5; Touch & Go: 0; Touch Down: 0
The Parting Shot:
This commentary was written and compiled from video, still images and statistical content extracted from the AC37 Joint Recon program and other material available to Sail-World NZ including photo files, and other on the water coverage from the 2010, 2013, 2017 and 2021 America's Cups. Its format is intended to give Sail-World readers a snapshot of all teams' progress on a given day or period.
Additional Images: