NAUTICAL
THEY CAN DO TWO TO THREE TIMES THE
WIND SPEED. YOU CAN BE OUT IN 8 KNOTS
OF WIND SPEED AND DO 24 KNOTS!”
This time around, they were even faster.
Prior to competition, the top speed Oracle
has achieved with an earlier development ver-
sion of the new boat is 47 knots, or just over
54 mph.
“Their power to weight ratio is better
than any other boat,” Spithill adds. “They can
do two to three times the wind speed. You
can be out in 8 knots of wind speed and do
24 knots!”
That amazing speed is the result of rapid
development of the foiling catamaran says
Team USA’s general manager, Grant Simmer.
“The technology changed a lot more than
we anticipated,” he says.
Foiling, which involves sailing/fl ying the
80 | INTERNATIONAL WATCH | SUMMER 2017
boat on L-shaped hydrofoils that extend
from beneath the catamaran’s hulls, is one
big area of progress, he explains. In the last
Cup, the AC72s fl ew on geometrically-stable
foils. This time around, Oracle Team USA and
the challenging teams employed unstable
foils of varying designs. The unstable foils
must be balanced much as one balances
the fl ight of an aircraft or helicopter. They’re
harder to control but result in faster sailing.
“You can get stability from the geometry
of your foils or from your control system and
the ability of the sailors,” Simmer notes. “If
you get it from the control system, you can
have a faster shape for your foils.”
Simmer and Spithill say that the boats
now fly over the entire course, foiling down-
wind and upwind, never touching down
even during mark-roundings. Both agree
that development of the new boats will
continue through the last day of the
America’s Cup. Simply put, there is much
more speed to be exploited in the new
boats via aggressive development of sys-
tems and sailing technique.
PANERAI & THE AULD MUG
The exploding development of the multi-
hulls now racing in the America’s Cup
mirrors the manner in which Panerai trans-
formed itself from a largely unknown brand
in the late 1990s to the powerhouse it is
iWMAGAZINE .COM