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  AC35- Same shirt, different day—Sailing news from the U.S. and beyond
 | | 35th America's Cup Match - Day 4 - ORACLE TEAM USA and Emirates Team New Zealand © BMW | Studio Borlenghi |
Skipper Jimmy Spithill has been here before.
Trouble for fans of Oracle Team USA, the Defenders of the 35th America's Cup, is that in 2013, things were entirely different.
A quick rewind: The 35th America's Cup is currently unfurling on the waters of Bermuda's Great Sound, with the Defender attempting to stave-off Emirates Team New Zealand's (ETNZ) efforts to usurp the Auld Mug and bring it back DownUnder and likely away from the foiling multihull catamarans that have defined the last two Cup cycles.
Trouble for Oracle and Spithill, however, is that theirs is the slower boat and the scoreboard now reads 6-1 in favor of the Kiwis.
 | | 35th America's Cup Match - Day 4 - ORACLE TEAM USA and Emirates Team New Zealand © BMW | Studio Borlenghi |
Even worse for the American-flagged efforts (emphasis on the word “flagged”, ahem) is the fact that AC35 is a first-to-seven contest, meaning that the Kiwis are now sitting on a match-point scenario, with the next scheduled day of racing set to take place on this afternoon (Monday, June 26).
As mentioned, Oracle and Spithill have, in fact, been in this hot-seat position before, when, as Defenders of the 34th America's Cup, which took place on the waters of San Francisco Bay in September and October of 2013, they managed to claw their way back from an 8-1 sudden-death scoreboard reality (AC34 was a first-to-nine event), however almost all of the big-picture constructs were different.
For starters, AC34 used box-rule boats, meaning that there was a lot of design variety, whereas AC35 uses boats that are essentially One Design platforms, sans their lift-generating hydrofoils and the control systems that allow the sailors to “fly” these outrageous wind-driven machines at speeds at regularly punch-through three-to-four times the true wind. Moreover, AC35 has a much more organized racing schedule and wider wind ranges, meaning that there's a significantly higher chance of racing taking place on any given day and a significantly lower chance of teams finding huge amounts of development speed in between races.
 | | 35th America's Cup Match - Day 4 - ORACLE TEAM USA © BMW | Studio Borlenghi |
That said, there's no question that Oracle looked faster last weekend than they did in their first official AC35 outing (Saturday, June 18), but-as with many great regattas-AC35 was likely won and lost in the teams' various design offices before the racing even started.
But wait a second-bespoke design in a contest that's largely a One Design affair?
The fine-print keys to success here, of course, are the hydrofoil shapes (and their target wind ranges) and the systems that control the boats, from setting the wing's shape to dictating the boat's foil positions. On the surface these might sound like trivial details, but when the boats are being sailed by some of the world's best practitioners, and funded by teams with war chests that resemble the GDP of some small nations, you can bet your last shackle that design innovation will quickly bubble to the fore.
Case-in-point: Just look at the Kiwi's boat.
 | | 35th America's Cup Match - Day 4 - Emirates Team New Zealand © BMW | Studio Borlenghi |
In 2013, ETNZ stunned the world by adding hydrofoils to their AC72-class catamaran, which they used to narrowly miss winning AC34, and this year their design team dropped another gob smacker, namely seated, bicycle-like grinding stations that allow ETNZ's muscle men to rapidly power the boat's hydraulic accumulator using their bigger leg muscles, rather than their significantly weaker upper body.
Moreover, this bold move also frees up their hands to help run the boat's various control systems, while the Defender's grinders must instead encumber their upper bodies with old-school handles.
 | | Oracle Team USA with Tom Slingsby in the cycling position behind Jimmy Spithill - Round Robin 2, Day 6 - 35th America's Cup - Bermuda June 1, 2017 Richard Gladwell |
Oracle added a stationary bicycle system for tactician Tom Slingsby, allowing him to contribute his grunt while also scoping the course ahead for tactical opportunities, but-at least from my vastly removed vantage point here in Seattle-it looks to be a move that falls into the too-little-too-late category.
So, while Jimmy Spithill taught the sailing world a master class in never writing off the Defender until the final finishing guns have sounded, one does not need an oracle to know that Defender is in trouble deep, with precious little time for juggernaut recovery moves.
 | Larry Ellison
Oracle Team USA
Day 4
2017 35th America's Cup Bermuda Daniel Forster © |
Racing continues this afternoon, so stay tuned to the website for the latest AC news, as it unfurls.
May the four winds blow you safely home,
David Schmidt, Sail-World USA Editor
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