The Americas Cup has always intrigued me on how it works as it always seems a little unfair. The defending champion is always guaranteed a spot in the final and everyone else has to fight it out. This may have been thought up by someone who thought they could never lose and most likely was an American or an Englishman with deep pockets who thought he could control it for years to come.
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The reason behind Auckland being selected was that it would be spectator friendly with many view points along the course.
The race has changed slightly over the years and it is all about cost savings today making an even playing field for the less rich teams. I am not a fan of what and how they are doing it as technology benefits in the long run. Following on from Formula One they want more research and development to happen in simulation so virtual reality sailing as such.
These are the basic rules for the next Americas Cup in 2021. These were submitted by Team New Zealand for all the other participants.
Strict limitations on the number of components that can be built being hulls, rudders,masts, foils, and sails. They are hoping more research and development will happen in these components via simulation or virtual sailing. Everything is about saving costs and not about the boat.
Supplied foil arms to save design time and construction costs. I would have thought this area is where the tweaking could happen and who knows maybe it still will.
Supplied rigging so everyone is standard and on a level playing field.
One design mast tube which shouldn't matter really.
This is what Team New Zealand came up with for the finals. You can see why being a defending champ has it's benefits as you get to choose what boat you are all racing. In the past no one knew what shape the hulls were or what type of boat they were up against. I tend to prefer the old way of having a surprise in store for the competitors. So what if someone has a deeper pocket than you and comes up with something outrageously faster than everyone else.
Now the research and development will happen on the component side of things as the rigging is supplied and hull design has been agreed upon. I am sure there will be some slight modifications, but it won't be on the keels like in the years gone by as this is the boat for the next Americas Cup. A fully foiling mono hull racing yacht. The boat literally sits out of the water so expect high speed racing as there will be little to no drag.
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If the boat capsizes the foils help to re right itself back up.
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The foils are bought in when not racing so this is how it would appear in the dock.
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This boat is seriously fast and going to be areal beat to get right. The Lunna Rossa skipper saw the design and the simulator for this and his words were "we'll s*** ourselves." The problem is you can go from doing 40 knots to zero instantly if you get your timings wrong. The G-forces exerted will throw crewman in the air.
It looks like mastering the boat first before research and development can happen as they will only know how the improvements have worked then.
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Auckland,New Zealand the place where the final will take place. New Zealand won the last Americas Cup so got to choose where the next venue was as defending champions.