Bol d'Or, Upset City ! There is the most wonderful race going on at this very moment.
After nearly 9 hours of racing, Ladycat was first round the mark at Bouveret. Close behind were the M2 'Tilt' and (more dangerously?) Monsieur Bidegorry on Banque Populaire, who along with Foncia/Gauthier&Desj has been the on the hottest streak in this 2010 Decision 35 season so far.
Over two hours later, Ladycat has held her lead as she has gone 'wrong way' through the rest of the fleet at up to 13 knots speed; now they are opposite Rolle on the french side...
Can she stay in the wind and finish first? This must be the all-time best tracking page, so far in sailing!
It's a wonderful achievment as one the rare "canard" sailing hydrofoils, indeed. Cheers. About the technology which is related to this boat, the most of it comes from a Canadian warship FH-400 "BRAS d'OR" which is the only fully-flyng hydrofoil able to reach 65 knots in a 1.5 m high swell WITHOUT ANY ELECTRONICS. FH-400 was a very clever design including a "V" super-ventilated (cavitation forced with atmoispheric air) front foil which acts as the pitch and heave sensor. The patent which covers "C-FLY" is obviously based on the same principle which have been described in several technical papers from the canadian engineers. A spanish engineer named Fulgencio Garcia HERNANDES also rided a small canard called "VOLADOR" using the same innovative canadian works. GIVE BACK TO CAESAR what belongs to him....Sincerely Yours, RLJ
I was on the windward pod during this filming - the acceleration was really impressive, but you didn't feel like you were going get jettisoned off the back as it was so smooth on the foils. Cool looking at the speedo and seeing the numbers jump: 22,27,29,31 without anything in-between! Once up on the foils the headsail is almost continuously trimmed on as the apparent moves forward, with the main being wound up the traveller.
Absolutely brilliant British design. The front foil concept of pitch damping is particularly good and to use them as fwd rudders is genius. Must be some complicated steering linkage! It's always made sense to me to support the bow.
AC34's Boat, All About It! You heard it here first!
Everyone's impatient to know more about this, and scratching their heads wondering what the heck will be chosen.
It has to be super-performing, super-telegenic, and different.
Since I have a few moments this Friday afternoon, I'll try to cut this Gordian Knot so that we're spared more of the rambling, uninformative speculations which have filled the vacuum. I think there's a solution everyone can be delighted with!
Start off with a famous Herreshoff design, and size it up. Build it in space-age materials (OK, skip the honeycomb) which is a long-overdue project anyway. You can tweak the hull-shape, but you have to retain that cool cockpit design because it will look great on 3DTV.
The traditionalists can't complain too much about that. It's a Herreshoff; are they going to dare resume where they left off bitching about it, in1876?
The match-racing issue has (secretively) already been laid to rest. Using a close approximation, the Reynolds 33 catamaran, Oracle is said to have conducted over 20 close and exciting match races last fall. They're said to have then adjusted the match-racing rules a little, to allow for all the additional speed and close action.
So far so good. But now comes the hard part: Herreshoff would have been very happy with this platform, but would he now have chosen the same old rig that he was constrained to have?
Obviously, he would have wanted to build a wing! How can we not upgrade the boat with what we all know Herreshoff would have preferred himself? With the exception of New Zealand perhaps, and Switzerland, every other major country in this game has a long history of producing military and civilian aircraft. New Zealand will just have to catch up for once. The Swiss will be ecstatic, to have a second chance to get it right.
And to avoid a repetition of some of that AC33 trickery, let's get one thing clear: with regard to this boat, the LOA includes the rudders!
The above photo is the 1933 reproduction Amaryllis II, in the Herreshoff Museum. Said to have reached 19.8 knots!
What a disgrace, how can the boat that won the selection trials (A35 Waterjet) not be in one of the top two teams - this reeks of old boys sticking together
Am I alone in thinking that the LVT is totally and completely whack? While no doubt there are little pieces of match racing that are interesting if you are watching it live on TV (there wasn't any), in the main it really is like watching paint dry. We have been going for two weeks thus far.... typically the time it takes to run the Olympic Games.
What is more, the common practice of borrowed boats not being very good or not being treated well has totally taken over this regatta. So many breakages and the Aleph accident took out the whole thing. GBR 75 and GER 93 were in Nice 6 months ago. Why aren't they here as back up? In what serious sporting contest can you honestly say "we had to scrap the quarter finals because we didn't have time". Laughable!
It is a brilliant summer day, but I find myself distraught, more or less...
To divert myself lately, I've been trying to improve my language skills. I surveyed the width and breadth of the internet of sailing one morning, and I asked myself: 'Here is all this endless content being produced, on websites, facebook, etc. etc: but what the blazes do they get in return, all the journalists, commentators, photographers and videographers; all those who are manning the pumps of the broadband?
It can't be much, for the most part. 'Peanuts' would be an overstatement! Suppose that the Pharaohs were equally devious, when they had the urge to build pyramids: "Come out to the desert, and bring a big stone with you! Then everybody involved will all list you as a 'friend' and say that we 'like' that rock!"
So I decided for my own part that I should put this energy to a slightly better purpose, by trying to improve my exécrable French. Thereby setting a good example for everyone...
I found a nice sailing-oriented forum, in French of course, and set about the laborious task of honing and polishing the few short sentences which I would dare to present to the regulars; who needless to say are excellent at slangy, indecipherable French, and moreover with their thousands of posts have all attained eminent forum rankings such as 'Tacticien', 'Barreur', and 'Challenger of Record'. When you start off, then you are just a lowly 'Apprenti', naturellement! But I reckoned that if I applied myself, then I might soon advance to something better!
How do you say 'dishwasher', in French?
Anyhow, my post count reached 50 today, and then 51, but did it make the slightest difference to my échelon (or lack thereof), anymore than did the 10th, 20th, or 30th posts?
So you see, why I might be indifferent to this fine weather.
On top of that I had the misfortune to watch an instance of 'déjà-vu, all over again' ( I feel obliged to include a link, but you'd be better off not examining it) : www.prosail.com/videos.html
All that needs to be said is that it looks back on a substantial moment of hype, featuring professionals sailing on big catamarans, in San Francisco! Years ago...
I found it a little too close for comfort, not just in relation to some suggestions for the America's Cup, but any others who are casting about with ideas for how to land bigger audience ratings and sponsor interest. What can they do differently with a better outcome, these insecure Olympic classes, or the F18's, or the Tornado guys for example? The X40's have done everything short of sailing naked, and I don't know how confident even they are, of future sponsorship.
But the task of coming up with a magic public relations formula so that sailing will attract much more attention, is being closely studied by a committee.
It has its virtues, being in a boat one can afford to keep, in one's spare time!
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Bol d'Or, Upset City ! There is the most wonderful race going on at this very moment.
After nearly 9 hours of racing, Ladycat was first round the mark at Bouveret. Close behind were the M2 'Tilt' and (more dangerously?) Monsieur Bidegorry on Banque Populaire, who along with Foncia/Gauthier&Desj has been the on the hottest streak in this 2010 Decision 35 season so far.
Over two hours later, Ladycat has held her lead as she has gone 'wrong way' through the rest of the fleet at up to 13 knots speed; now they are opposite Rolle on the french side...
Can she stay in the wind and finish first? This must be the all-time best tracking page, so far in sailing!
boldor.inser.ch/
AC34's Boat, All About It! You heard it here first!
Everyone's impatient to know more about this, and scratching their heads wondering what the heck will be chosen.
It has to be super-performing, super-telegenic, and different.
Since I have a few moments this Friday afternoon, I'll try to cut this Gordian Knot so that we're spared more of the rambling, uninformative speculations which have filled the vacuum. I think there's a solution everyone can be delighted with!
Start off with a famous Herreshoff design, and size it up. Build it in space-age materials (OK, skip the honeycomb) which is a long-overdue project anyway. You can tweak the hull-shape, but you have to retain that cool cockpit design because it will look great on 3DTV.
The traditionalists can't complain too much about that. It's a Herreshoff; are they going to dare resume where they left off bitching about it, in 1876?
The match-racing issue has (secretively) already been laid to rest. Using a close approximation, the Reynolds 33 catamaran, Oracle is said to have conducted over 20 close and exciting match races last fall. They're said to have then adjusted the match-racing rules a little, to allow for all the additional speed and close action.
So far so good. But now comes the hard part: Herreshoff would have been very happy with this platform, but would he now have chosen the same old rig that he was constrained to have?
Obviously, he would have wanted to build a wing! How can we not upgrade the boat with what we all know Herreshoff would have preferred himself? With the exception of New Zealand perhaps, and Switzerland, every other major country in this game has a long history of producing military and civilian aircraft. New Zealand will just have to catch up for once. The Swiss will be ecstatic, to have a second chance to get it right.
And to avoid a repetition of some of that AC33 trickery, let's get one thing clear: with regard to this boat, the LOA includes the rudders!
The above photo is the 1933 reproduction Amaryllis II, in the Herreshoff Museum. Said to have reached 19.8 knots!
www.herreshoff.org/news/publications_archives_10_1_8.pdf
It is a brilliant summer day, but I find myself distraught, more or less...
To divert myself lately, I've been trying to improve my language skills. I surveyed the width and breadth of the internet of sailing one morning, and I asked myself: 'Here is all this endless content being produced, on websites, facebook, etc. etc: but what the blazes do they get in return, all the journalists, commentators, photographers and videographers; all those who are manning the pumps of the broadband?
It can't be much, for the most part. 'Peanuts' would be an overstatement! Suppose that the Pharaohs were equally devious, when they had the urge to build pyramids: "Come out to the desert, and bring a big stone with you! Then everybody involved will all list you as a 'friend' and say that we 'like' that rock!"
So I decided for my own part that I should put this energy to a slightly better purpose, by trying to improve my exécrable French. Thereby setting a good example for everyone...
I found a nice sailing-oriented forum, in French of course, and set about the laborious task of honing and polishing the few short sentences which I would dare to present to the regulars; who needless to say are excellent at slangy, indecipherable French, and moreover with their thousands of posts have all attained eminent forum rankings such as 'Tacticien', 'Barreur', and 'Challenger of Record'. When you start off, then you are just a lowly 'Apprenti', naturellement! But I reckoned that if I applied myself, then I might soon advance to something better!
How do you say 'dishwasher', in French?
Anyhow, my post count reached 50 today, and then 51, but did it make the slightest difference to my échelon (or lack thereof), anymore than did the 10th, 20th, or 30th posts?
So you see, why I might be indifferent to this fine weather.
On top of that I had the misfortune to watch an instance of 'déjà-vu, all over again' ( I feel obliged to include a link, but you'd be better off not examining it) : www.prosail.com/videos.html
All that needs to be said is that it looks back on a substantial moment of hype, featuring professionals sailing on big catamarans, in San Francisco! Years ago...
I found it a little too close for comfort, not just in relation to some suggestions for the America's Cup, but any others who are casting about with ideas for how to land bigger audience ratings and sponsor interest. What can they do differently with a better outcome, these insecure Olympic classes, or the F18's, or the Tornado guys for example? The X40's have done everything short of sailing naked, and I don't know how confident even they are, of future sponsorship.
But the task of coming up with a magic public relations formula so that sailing will attract much more attention, is being closely studied by a committee.
It has its virtues, being in a boat one can afford to keep, in one's spare time!
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