K-Challenge update

Surgery carries out on 2000 Cup winner, plus a new recruit

K-Challenge, the French Official Challenger for the 32nd America’s Cup, is back at its training base in Gandia, Spain after the Christmas break.

"We have finished the complete disassembling of the boats. We have checked all the machine elements and tools and prepared the sail loft", says Yannick Le Morvan, K-Challenge's shore boss. "We are now looking forward to receiving the new parts, in order to carry out the Design Team's proposed modifications to the boats. We are working on the old masts to adapt them to the new [Version 5] Rules, and to integrate some new carbon parts according to David Barnaby's plans. We are also preparing all the logistics on the base to welcome all the team that will fully be there soon." (David Barnaby was mast designer for Team New Zealand in 2003).

Work is being carried out on FRA60, the former NZL60 Cup winner in 2000 including the construction of a new keel, that is nearly completed, and a lightening of the boat and an increasing of it draft. The first sea trials will take place at the end of February in Gandia.

Dimitri Nicolopoulos, Design Team Manager, explains : "To complete all of those modifications, we use CFD (Computational Fluid Dynamics), and we've just finished some wind tunnel testing. We will work soon move to the towing tanks to refine the shapes of our new boats. We are also building a new mast to the Version 5 Rules, as well as new sails which are being prepared at the same time. We are modifying the old masts, in order to be able to adapt the new sails on those. Everything will be able to be tested at the same time in the coming weeks. We still have a lot to do, but we are keeping to schedule which is crucial in order to allow the sailing team to start training from the middle of March. There is not a long time left before the next Acts in June, and K-Challenge is really on time in its technical preparation, and to get an advantage over other teams which have not started their design work."



A sailing and two-boat testing program is planned against FRA 57. The goal is to be more powerful in the Louis Vuitton Acts 4 and 5 which will take place in Valencia in June and which will be the opening of the 2005 Season.

Crew-wise Cameron Appleton, who has been with Team New Zealand for the last two America’s Cup has confirmed he is joining the team from the beginning of January: "I am happy to be joining a team with great expectations of what’s to come in the lead to 2007. The team is going to take shape and build on where it was in 2004 and that will be apart of development and team building in the coming months which are important to a new team," he said.

Having a very good understanding of the Rules is also a very important part in the success of an America's Cup syndicate (i.e Protocol, Terms of Challenge, to name a few), and K-Challenge is very pleased to announce that George Clyde has joined the team, as General Legal Counsel. Clyde has left GBR Challenge to join K-Challenge. He was also part of the America True team in 2000.