Cup Spy August 4-5: Riding the Summer seabreeze in Barcelona
by Richard Gladwell/Sail-World NZ 6 Aug 2023 07:10 PDT
6 August 2023
NYYC American Magic - LEQ12/AC40s - Day 48 - August 5, 2023 - Barcelona © Paul Todd / AMERICA’S CUP
The five teams based in Barcelona have been enjoying seabreeze sailing, and are learning how to foil with "off-axis" swells. Sailing conditions have followed a pattern, but various issues have stopped some teams from gaining the full benefit.
There are 13 boats of various Cup-legal configuration in play so far in this America's Cup. The teams fall into two broad groups ETNZ, Alinghi RBR and American Magic who are running a 1 x AC75 and 2x AC-40 program. INEOS and Luna Rossa are running a 1 x LEQ12 (custom design test boat under 12 metres overall length) and 1 x AC40 campaign.
What happened in the Cup - August 4 and 5, 2023:
- Emirates Team New Zealand were the only team to sail an AC75, in the last two days and have sailed the most of any of the teams - getting out on four of the six days this week. They missed the fresh breeze of Wednesday, and didn't sail on Saturday. They will switch to their AC40 for next week's sailing block.
- Alinghi Red Bull Racing did not sail on Friday or Saturday - and sailed on three of the six days this week, when they sailed both their AC40's, with Dean Barker co-helming on Monday and Wednesday.
- Luna Rossa - were sailing off Barcelona, on Friday, in the AC40-OD, with Jimmy Spithill and Francesco Bruni co-helming - the same combination used in the last Cup. Spithill said their main objectives were getting to understand the Barcelona course and sea-states.
- American Magic - sailed their two AC40s, on Friday and Saturday - which were the only two of five available days in August on which they sailed. They lost most of the Friday session due to unexplained technical issues on both AC40s, with the Recon team saying American Magic only got 40 minutes of sailing from a five hour session on Friday. They were the only team to sail on Saturday - again with their two AC40s and scored a perfect seabreeze - which they put to good use for two boat training - speed testing and race training.
- INEOS Britannia were down for a serious week of sailing, however the complexities of their technical platform kicked in once again. Setup issues cost them the first two days of the five available in August. They did get onto the water on Thursday, and put in a long day getting a series of issues sorted. Friday was spent tow-testing - presumably to get their F1-style testing comms system synchronised.
- No further news from the Orient Express Team (formerly K-Challenge).
Weather conditions at Barcelona August 4 and 5, 2023:
On the water, on August 4, the AC37 Recon teams reported lighter winds than those recorded at Port Olimpic. The following day American Magic's Recon team reported wind strength 12-17kts from 190°.
Sea states on August 4 were reported at 0.7 - 1.1metres from the East, and with a cross sea (wind chop) of 0.8mtr from 190° and an "off-axis" swell of 1.4mtr from 120° on August 5. Wind direction was 190° on August 5.
At the real-time observation station at Port Olimpic, the real-time wind recordings (see image above) over a 48hour period the period between 1200hrs on August 4 to 0600hrs on Aug 6 showed the breeze following a similar pattern on both days, peaking at an average of 12kts around 1500hrs on August 4, 2023 from 180° (S).
The following day when American Magic was sailing the breeze was stronger at an average of 17kts at 1500hrs, gusting slightly more. The breeze fluctuated slightly in strength for the rest of the day until mid-evening. Direction was similar at around 180° (S).
AC37 Joint Recon Team Reports:
American Magic - LEQ12 x 2 - Day 48 - August 5, 2023 - Barcelona
From Lea Sitjà of the AC37 Joint Recon program assigned to American Magic in Barcelona:
Close pre-start dog fighting session and plenty of nose-dives for NYAM today.
New York Yacht Club's team American Magic' two AC40's named America (AC40-05) and Magic 9AC40-07) came out of the shed at 11:15hrs with the very same modified configuration as for the last two days.
America's starboard silver foil came with white flaps and 3 fences on foil arm, Magic with starboard silver foil came with white tips and one single fence on foil arm, and the One Design set-up on port wing foils and foil arms.
This Recon unit missed the dock out and so we couldn’t identify the crew members on Magic as we were already on the water by then, laying the four marks for the windward and leeward gates used today.
Sailing began 14:07hrs straight away boat-on-boat with a short upwind warm-up and a longer downwind towards the starting area. Both boats sailed with jib#3 for the whole session as the wind was already blowing 12-15kts from 190º when we left the port and increased to 14-17kts by the time we finished, the ever present off-axis residual swell (1.40m, 7.4" from 120°) was still there to make things interesting.
They stopped at 14:18hrs after Magic ventilated heavily to a complete stop which required some technicians with computers to come onboard. They started the first race (1 lap) @14:37h with a textbook prestart procedure displaying some tight powered-up bear-aways and heavy round-up maneuvers with both boats very close together that set the tone for the rest of the day.
Magic clearly won that start from the lee and forced America into an early tack-away. Magic was comfortably leading at the windward gate but went into a sudden stop after a nose-dive crash early in the run. America, in front, did the very same nose-dive crash-stop shortly after, allowing Magic to retake the lead and win this first race.
Both boats rounded up the leeward gate with two boards down neatly under control followed by a clean tack. They stopped for 6mins and started a second dog-fight prestart procedure 15:00hr won by Magic again because America on the lee ventilated right when crossing the starting line.
They relined-up immediately after for a third intense prestart procedure which was won by Magic again as she buried America deep into the pin end and into a late start. With Magic leading at the windward gate, we saw a repetition of the nose-dive crashes at the downwind leg for both boats so nothing changed really and Magic was first rounding the leeward gate. They sailed on for a second upwind leg on this race and America stopped at 15:27hrs at the windward gate to have a battery replacement.
Meanwhile Magic sailed into port on her own to finish her session 15:34hrs. America resumed her sailing 15:55hrs with three prestart procedures back-to-back and very short upwind legs in between during which we saw America nose-diving hard at every downwind leg, bringing up the final number of nose-dive crashes to 18 between both boats, evenly shared more or less. America sailed into port at 16:25hrs and the Recon unit stayed a bit longer to pick up the marks missing her docking in.
Session Statistics: American Magic - LEQ12 x 2 - Day 48 - August 5, 2023 - Barcelona
- Weather: Sunny
- Wind Strength: 12-17kts
- Wind Direction: 190° - 200°
- Sea State: 4. 0.8mtr at 4sec periods from 190° (wind chop); 1.4mtr at 7sec from 120° (cross swell)
- Crane In: 1115hrs Dock Out: 1330hrs
- Dock In: 1645hrs Crane out: 1715hrs
- Total Tacks: 23 - Fully foiling: 23; Touch & Go: 0; Touch Down: 0
- Total Gybes: 16 - Fully foiling: 13; Touch & Go: 0; Touch Down: 3
Crew: America (AC40-5): Paul Goodison, Lucas Calabrese, Michael Menninger, Andrew Campbell; Magic (AC40-8): Tom Slingsby, Harry Melges, Riley Gibbs, Severin Gramm [Both AC40's fitted with development wingfoils on starboard wing, and OD wingfoil on the port foil arm.]
Emirates Team NZ - AC75 - Day 31 - August 4, 2023 - Barcelona
From the AC37 Joint Recon Team:
ETNZ rolled out their B2 AC75 from the shed at 11.33hrs. The boat was craned to the water at 12:05hrs and the team docked out at 13.30hrs, after a thirty-minute delay. No specific reasons or related actions could be identified. The M2 and the J2 were hoisted inside the port at 13:36hrs and 13:40hrs, respectively.
Today´s training consisted of a short warm up doing some maneuvers very close to the beach, for not more than ten minutes; before running short races all day long. Complete starting sequences, followed by a short two-lap upwind-downwind course was the proposal for the day, starting in between their two chase boats and rounding a virtual top mark. On the downwind legs, the chase boats were used as gate marks.
On each of the upwind legs they complemented with two to four tacks, and with two to three gybes on the downwinds.
During the pre-starts, different maneuvers were executed in the pre-start box. Also, there was an interesting variation of final approaches towards the line. Sometimes starting on starboard tack, and on other opportunities on port. They also varied their positioning and actions, sometimes burning time close to the line and in other starts approaching the line faster from further away on closed-hauled course.
Please, refer to the videos for further details.
During the final approach, ETNZ seemed to be playing a lot with the windward arm. Bringing it down when they were too early to the line, to slow down and burn time; and then lifting it up when ready to accelerate and do the final approach to start.
At 14:20hrs the J2 was replaced by the J3. Immediately after, the training continued with the same format.
ETNZ did in total 26 tacks and 21 gybes, standing on their foils on all of them, except for one tack and two gybes. Their boat handling and maneuvering in these conditions seems to be very comfortable and completely under control.
Sails were lowered at 16:10hrs once inside the port, the boat was back in the dock at 16:20hrs, craned out at 17:08hrs and back in the shed at 17:35hrs.
The team plans to continue their sailing sessions next Monday on their AC40.
Sebastian Peri Brusa – Recon on ETNZ
Session Statistics - Emirates Team NZ - AC75 - Day 30 - August 3, 2023 - Barcelona
- Weather: 27°C Sunny
- Wind Strength: 9-13kts
- Wind Direction: 195° - 225° degrees
- Sea State: 0.5metres, from 110°
- Crane In: 1205hrs Dock Out: 1330hrs
- Dock In: 1670hrs Crane out: 1708hrs
- Total Tacks: 26 - Fully foiling: 25; Touch & Go: 1; Touch Down: 0
- Total Gybes: 21 - Fully foiling: 19; Touch & Go: 1; Touch Down: 1
Crew: Nathan Outteridge, Peter Burling, Andy Maloney, Blair Tuke
Luna Rossa Prada Pirelli - AC40 - Day 11 - August 4, 2023 - Barcelona
From the AC37 Joint Recon Team - Michele Melis:
Luna Rossa Prada Pirelli rolled out their One Design AC40-6 at 11:30hrs after delaying from 10:30hrs in anticipation of better wind later in the day. The yacht was craned in 30 minutes later using a tower crane controlled remotely from the ground. Following standard pre-sailing procedures, technicians added lubrication to the mast base and the forestay base, while additional adjustments were made to the mainsheet system.
Dockout was at 13:30hrs, with the M1 mainsail and J3 jib being hoisted under the breakwater. Sailing commenced shortly before 14:00hrs with a 'Garbi' afternoon thermal South wind blowing at 7-10 kts.
The ground swell from the Mistral further offshore ranged from 0.7 to 1.1mtrs from the East with a 6s period.
The first stint was brief, with a short five-minute downwind run on starboard before stopping for quick checks and to take on water bottles. This was followed by the second stint, featuring two upwind/downwind laps as the course was set.
Stint 3 saw six pre-starts, as the yacht hit the start line in a variety of ways, challenged by the Chase boat as a reference opponent. This was followed by two laps of the 1 Nautical Mile long course, which used physical marks for the start/leeward gate and a virtual windward gate. The chase boat was used as a simulated opponent, forcing plenty of manoeuvres from the AC40.
Stint 4 was cut short due to an unexpected issue: the yacht ran out of battery. The boat had completed one more two-lap race against the chase boat, before sailing into the port entrance and stopping under the Europa bridge where the sails were dropped and the yacht was docked in at 16:10.
No specific details were provided as to why the yacht ran out of battery, but it was a notable factor in the early end to the session. Despite this, the team managed a high rate of manoeuvres (46 per hour), performing 73 in total, 99% of which were fully foiling. In total, the team covered 32 Nautical Miles over three and a half hours on the water, with 95 minutes of active sailing.
Session Statistics: Luna Rossa Prada Pirelli - AC40 - Day 11 - August 4, 2023 - Barcelona
- Weather: Sunny 26°C
- Wind Strength 7-12kts
- Wind Direction: 180°-190°
- Sea State: 0.7 - 1.1mtrs at 6sec
- Roll out: 1200hrs Dock Out:1330hrs
- Dock In: 1610hrs Crane out: 1650hrs
- Total Tacks: 46 - Fully foiling: 45; Touch & Go: 0; Touch Down: 1
- Total Gybes: 27 - Fully foiling: 27; Touch & Go: 0; Touch Down: 0
Crew: Francesco Bruni, Jimmy Spithill, Andrea Tesei, Umberto Molineris
INEOS Britannia - LEQ12 - Day 65 - August 4, 2023 - Barcelona
From the AC37 Joint Recon Team (Justin Chisholm)
Ineos Britannia went tow testing today aboard their LEQ12 in 10-11kts southerly breezes and a 0.5 metre choppy sea state.
After a delay to the scheduled rollout time of 0930hrs the boat was rolled out at 1130hrs sporting a modification to the t-foil rudder in the form of an aft pointing bulb.
The boat was craned into the water at 1145hrs and following some pre-sail checks the team left the dock at 1230hrs.
On board were helmsmen Leigh McMillan (port) and Dylan Fletcher (starboard) and flight controllers Luke Parkinson (starboard) and Iain Jennsen (port). having transferred from a side tow to a bow tow, before reaching the end of the breakwater the boats stopped for a little over 50 minutes – presumably waiting for the green light from the team's design group in the UK.
At 1400hrs the boat left the harbour and set off on a tow session along the Barcelona coast. Speeds started off slow at around 12-15 kts and the crew kept the boat in displacement mode. After 10 minutes or so the speed increased to 18-20kts with the boat in low foiling mode with the bustle skimming the surface and the bigger waves hitting the hull.
After half an hour of this a 180° turn was made and the boat continued the tow session in the opposite direction.
Speeds varied on this return leg between 18 and 26 kts. The boat returned to harbour at 1450hrs and returned to the dock at 1505hrs.
No sailing is scheduled for the weekend with the next available sailing day being Monday August 7.
Session Statistics: INEOS Britannia - LEQ12 - Day 65 - August 4, 2023 - Barcelona
- Weather: Sunny 27°C
- Wind Strength 10-11kts
- Wind Direction:190°
- Sea State: 0.5mtr - confused moderate chop
- Crane In: 1130hrs Dock Out: 1230hrs
- Dock In: 1505hrs Crane out: 1530hrs
- Total Tacks: 0 - Fully foiling: 0; Touch & Go: 0; Touch Down: 0
- Total Gybes: 0 - Fully foiling: 0; Touch & Go: 0; Touch Down: 0
Crew: Giles Scott, Dylan Fletcher, Luke Parkinson, Iain Jensen
American Magic - AC40/LEQ12 x 2 - Day 47 - August 4, 2023 - Barcelona
From Lea Sitjà of the AC37 Joint Recon program assigned to American Magic in Barcelona:
Very slow day for NYAM today as they’ve just achieved 40 minutes of boat-on-boat proper racing drills out of a 5hour session on the water.
Most of the time we saw one boat stopped on the water with undisclosed issues while the other boat was waiting nearby.
Roll outs for both AC_40_Modified (LEQ12s) were at 09:45hrs with apparently the same foil configurations as lately (America starboard silver foil with white flaps and three fences on foil arm, Magic with starboard silver foil with white tips and one single fence on foil arm. Both boats had the One Design set-up on their port foils).
Dock out was 11:56hrs with Severin, Harry, Paul, Riley on America and Tom, Lucas, Andrew, Michael on Magic. They hoisted mains MN-2 on Magic and MN-3 on America that finally features a window at the foot, a window that might need to be lowered according to Paul Goodison during the interview.
They got out of the port 12:10hrs and hoisted Jib#1 as the wind was blowing at 6-8kt from 190° and a sea state of 3 already (wind chop of 0.6m, 3.3sec periods from 190° and 1m swell, 7sec intervals from 100°).
They initially attempted some warm up drills but never managed to have both boats sailing together simultaneously as there was always one of them stopped with the support boat tied alongside resolving some issues.
By 13:55hrs they switched to Jibs#3 as the wind had increased lightly with gusts of 12kts from the same direction.
They laid a windward and a leeward gate and at 3:57hrs they finally sailed a proper 1one lap race with tight prestart drills that lasted 26 minutes overall. In this race Magic won the start but it was America who crossed first the finish line as Magic ventilated on the run to a complete stop. They started a second one lap race at 14:55hrs that lasted 13minutes and was easily won by America because Magic ventilated again shortly after their good start which allowed America to cover them from then on.
A last one lap 14minute race was sailed 15:25hrs with Magic winning the start again but we saw America first at the weather gate and all the way down to the finish. Magic went back to port 15:46hrs to finish her session while America changed the batteries and sailed on her own until 16:49hrs to dock in @17:05hrs.
Session Statistics: American Magic - LEQ12 x 2 - Day 46 - July 27, 2023 - Barcelona
- Weather: Sunny
- Wind Strength: 6-12kts
- Wind Direction: 190° - 200°
- Sea State: 4
- Crane In: 0925hrs Dock Out: 1156hrs
- Dock In: 1705hrs Crane out: 1735hrs
- Total Tacks: 23 - Fully foiling: 23; Touch & Go: 0; Touch Down: 0
- Total Gybes: 14 - Fully foiling: 10; Touch & Go: 0; Touch Down: 4
Crew: America: Paul Goodison, Harry Melges (co-helms), Riley Gibbs, Severin Gramm; Magic: Tom Slingsby, Lucas Calabrese, Michael Menninger, Andrew Campbell.
Additional Images:
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.