America’s Cup World Series 2020

Italian Luna Rossa HQ Cagliari Sardinia

America’s cupThis year the new World Series for the latest designed America’s cups A75 monohull foils begins in Sardinia close to the capital of Cagliari starting in April.

The Italian team Luna Rossa will be hosting the series. The other contests of the World Series are scheduled in Portsmouth in the United Kingdom in the summer and Auckland New Zealand in the Autumn.

Teams have been practicing in Sardinia for first event starting April 23-26. Each sailing foil is meeting an overall design criteria but each team will have some secretly guarded technical advantages and won’t be apparent until racing starts proper in April Sardinian racing series.

The AC75 monohulls have unique carbon fibre foils and in fact during sailing they’re actually levitating above the water more like aircraft flying. The racing should be extremely competitive and the Kiwis I’m sure will have something up their sleeves. 

I intend to watch the 4 day series and will sail Black Swan around to Cagliari. I will try and get to one of the marinas close by such as marina Piccola. There are spectator craft that will be watching the race I have to check if private sail boats can or will be allowed to watch the event offshore?

Black Swan is in Carloforte on the island Pietro which is SW Sardinia. I will be looking for crew to join me for sailing around initially to Cagliari and for watching race days. 

History of the Americas Cup; The cup was originally awarded in 1851 by the Royal Yacht Squadron for a race around the Isle of Wight in the United Kingdom, which was won by the schooner America. 

Originally known as the ‘R.Y.S. £100 Cup’, the trophy was renamed the ‘America’s Cup’ after the yacht and was donated to the New York Yacht Club (NYYC) under the terms of the Deed of Gift, which made the cup available for perpetual international competition.

Any yacht club that meets the requirements specified in the deed of gift has the right to challenge the yacht club that holds the cup. If the challenging club wins the match, it gains stewardship of the cup.

The history and prestige associated with the America’s Cup attracts not only the world’s top sailors and yacht designers but also the involvement of wealthy entrepreneurs and sponsors. 

It is a test not only of sailing skill and boat and sail design, but also of fundraising and management skills. Competing for the cup is expensive, with modern teams spending more than $US100 million each;[5] the 2013 winner was estimated to have spent $US300 million on the competition.[6]

The trophy was held by the NYYC from 1857 (when the syndicate that won the cup donated the trophy to the club) until 1983. The NYYC successfully defended the trophy twenty-four times in a row before being defeated by the Royal Perth Yacht Club, represented by the yacht Australia II. 

The NYYC’s reign was the longest winning streak (in terms of date) in the history of all sports.[7]

From the first defence of the cup in 1870 through the twentieth defence in 1967, there was always only one challenger. 

In 1970, for the first time, there were multiple challengers, so the NYYC agreed that the challengers could run a selection series with the winner becoming the official challenger and competing against the defender in the America’s Cup match. 

Since 1983, Louis Vuitton has sponsored the Louis Vuitton Cup as a prize for the winner of the challenger selection series.

The latest design of America’s Cup sail boats are the equivalent of formula one racing cars in their technical development.

https://www.americascup.com/en/ac75

The carbon fibre cantilevering foiling design is an absolute master piece of technical engineering these boats aren’t actually sailing per se but really flying.

As the boat speed increases the boat levitates out of the water as the foil acts underwater as a plane wing giving lift. 

This reduces the drag of the water across the main sailing boat hull which instantly increases speed the boat overall speed through the water. Sailing boat foiling has taken the sport of sailing into an other dimension.

The 2020 America’s World Series will be exciting to watch really because of the unbelievable technological development in foil sailing boats and the sheer size and speed of the competing boats. I have feeling that foiling will be the future of water transport it’s a technology rejuvenated through high speed performance sailing, that’s why I find it so interesting as it’s harnessing natured forces through human technical ingenuity!

https://youtu.be/_bNO0t2s02Ihttps://youtu.be/utalFfmIYWU