ACM's vision for the 33rd America's Cup

We look at the format and new rules proposed for the 2009 event

The political machinations of Alinghi and America's Cup Management continued yesterday with an interesting press conference in Barcelona hosted by ACM's new boss Michel Hodara, some of the top team's designers and the legend himself, Tom Schnackenberg who has been overseeing the development of the new generation AC 90 boat - as we are told it is to be called - as well as the Competition Regulations, ie the race format, etc.

As one colleague put it, throughout the press conference he was expecting the phone to ring bringing news that Justice Kahn had reached his verdict...For if Alinghi win in New York, then all that was discussed today will come to pass. If Alinghi lose then the 33rd America's Cup could descend into turmoil as Alinghi and BMW Oracle Racing (SNG and the GGYC), not the best of friends at present and with evidently conflicting visions of the AC's future, struggle to find common ground in a new protocol. Should they fail to do this we end up with a lowest common denominator Deed of Gift America's Cup in multihulls. Russell Coutts is obviously behind the World Sailing League, the international catamaran grand prix fleet racing competition he is masterminding with Paul Cayard and it doesn't take too much to join the dots...a BMW Oracle WSL cat, etc etc. Alinghi's saving grace if it comes to this is that BMW Oracle seem to be keen on cats while trimarans have repeatedly proved themselves to be the faster around the race course. Might this become the ultimate catamaran v trimaran showdown?

As ACM's new boss Michel Hodara put it: "Everything we have presented here and are publishing is linked to a competition in 2009. If the result of the judge of the court in New York should affect the 2009, everything you have heard today might be put in question. At present we have no news. The 22 October was the hearing. The judge said ‘I am going to make a decision. I am going to make it quickly’. There has been a lot of speculation about what ‘quickly’ means. All the experts thing that means 2-4 weeks. We are at 2.5 now so we are at the beginning of the window, so it could come any time. So I don’t know. I have nothing else to say about New York."

Despite the America's Cup ball being mid-spin on the roulette wheel at present the press conference was surprisingly interesting. The big news was the format of racing being proposed by ACM for the 33rd America's Cup.

The controversial aspect of this is of course Alinghi taking part in the challenger selection series. Now we have a supposed 'challenger selection series' that is both organised by the defender through its subsiduary ACM AND has the defender sailing in it! Freaked out by failing to go 5-0 up against Emirates Team New Zealand earlier this year, Alinghi maintain that the modern day America's Cup increasingly favours the challenger, who goes into 'the match' against the defender fresh from the challenger selection series. This is probably true with a Swiss team defending, but isn't this the way it has always worked for the last 156 years? Would this still be the case if the defender was American and had to sail a defender series?

Whether it is right or wrong, Alinghi are adamant that they, the defender, will sail in the challenger selection series in the 33rd America's Cup.

This year readers will remember there were two sets of round robins the top four going through to semi-finals and the top two through to the finals of the Louis Vuitton Cup, challenger selection series. For the 33rd America's Cup, ACM are proposing a format that is a lot more complex, as the table above shows and one wonders how on earth the general public will ever understand this.

It could be argued that the complexity of this format is to allow the defender to take part in the series, but in fact there are some more wide-reaching positive aspects to it.

"The competition format is the result of the thought of offering more sailing to more teams, for the public and keep more activity in the Port America’s Cup," commented Michel Hodara. "It has been a request of all the teams who were very sad to be kicked out of the competition and now this program allows teams to stay longer in action in the AC."

There was certainly an almighty punctuation mark in the Louis Vuitton Cup this year when seven of the 11 challengers were ejected in one go at the end of the round robins. More racing for all concerned - as was being suggested at one point early on in the discussions for the 32nd America's Cup - can only be good for the event .

Hodara also maintains that the new format will also minimise the impact of the defender competing in the challenger selection series.

Format

The new format has been divided into three phases - the trials, the challenger selection and the America's Cup match itself. The event starts with two sets of round robins including the defender, culminating in a ranking based on one point per race. Assuming 10 boats are taking part including the defender, at the end of the round robins four teams are ejected who go off and subsequently sail their own 'Challenger Sail-Off' as the semi-finals are taking part.

According to Hodara this sail-off will be "a fleet race with four boats that will last approximately one hour, that will be on a race course adjacent to the semi-final race course which will allow spectators to see more, to have boat closer, through that fleet race."

The six teams in the semi-finals sail three round robins (again one point for each win) and from the overall results of this the leading boat is assured of a place in the challenger selection finals, while boats two and three sail their own repechage round, the winner being the second boat to end up in the finals. The defender (assuming they have made it this far - ha!) drops out of the challenger selection series at the end of semis, but goes on to race in what is known as 'the secondary series' including the bottom three boats from the semis (or bottom two, if one is not the defender).

Another interesting aspect is that aside from pride of a team's final position in the challenger selection series, they will also be racing for money. "It will have a direct impact on the split formula of the net surplus," says Hodara. "It will be important for the teams to get third rather than fourth or fifth because they will get more money." Once the accounts for the 33rd America's Cup are concluded all the teams get a cut of the profits and by the division between the challengers will be determined by their results in the challenger selection series (exact details of the split are still to be announced).

In general we like the new format in terms of it providing more racing for all, but don't like the complexity of it which will be hard to communicate to the public.

In addition to the format of the racing Hodara announced two dates - the challenger selection is to set on 2 May 2009 while the America's Cup match itself will be begin on 18 July. Both dates have been moved on in the year compared to the 32nd America's Cup when much of the round robins were hampered by a lack of breeze.

Acts

As previously mentioned on the site, ACM are currently looking at holding two Acts in existing Version 5 boats next year and one Act in the new AC90 boats in 2009. The first Act in 2008 will be Valencia at the end of June-mid July while the second will be elsewhere in Europe in September - the UK is being strongly mooted at present.

Michel Hodara says that they are also considering a fleet racing event in the AC90s over the Easter Weekend of 2009 in mid-April.

No skirting

For the 33rd America's Cup skirting is to be prohibited, but there will still be an 'unveiling day' as such on 1 May 2009.


Training

In an attempt to reduce costs ACM are attempting to get challengers only to have one sailing team and thus to only sail one boat at a time - this applies to the Version 5 boats as well as the AC90s. This is also designed to prevent interminable two boat testing meaning that teams will have to allocate considerably more resources to improve their boat performance monitoring and data logging systems in the future.

In terms of boat on boating the only way this can happen at present is by teams racing one another and hence at present Desafio Espanol are regularly out on the water off Valencia competing against United Internet Team Germany. At the moment this is unregulated by ACM, but from October 2008 when the new AC90s start to be launched, this practice racing will be run by ACM.

"The frequency will be set by the Competitor Commission and will be based on the demand from the teams," says Michel Hodara. "AC will put out a committee boat and will put out buoys and create a schedule of fleet races and match races, choosing the pairing of the match races. That program will be set approximately 30 days in advance. It will be a fantastic platform for teams to entertain their partners, sponsors and friends and for the media to know exactly what they want to see and to come to Valencia to see the action they want to see."

The practice races will be a mix of fleet races and match races as decided by ACM and the Competitor Commission.

Breaks

Hodara said that there will be a break from practice racing over several periods. This will include a 14 day period around each of the Acts (ie the Acts and a few days before).

There will also be a winter break in the practice racing from 15 December 2008 and 15 January 2009 and another from 3 August until 7 September 2008 over the period of the new Valencia Grand Prix.

"On 24 August there will be a F1 Grand Prix in Port America’s Cup and sometimes in the bases of the teams," explains Hodara. "In order to provide equal opportunities to all the teams, some wouldn’t be ale to launch their boats we decided to have a non-sailing period over that time."

Sail inventory

Another cost containment measure by ACM is over sail allocatios. Basically teams will be able to build 25 sails in 2008 and another 45 in 2009.

Tom Schnackenberg explains: "For any syndicate to get the best benefit out of that and to encourage them to start their building program early and to start their first sails and to methodically work their way through the sail combinations, until by the time they are racing in 2009 they have learned as much as they can. If we didn’t do that some syndicates would build 150 sails and some wouldn’t be able to afford that and there would be some inequality."

However the sail inventory is also the prize for doing well in the Acts. Once again Tom Schnack explains: "If you participate in the two Acts (in 2008), then you are granted five more sails. So instead of it being 25 and 45, it becomes 25 and 50. If you win overall the two Acts you get another two sails, and if you come second you get another one sail. So it is mainly for participation that we are rewarding the Acts and that is mainly because all the teams that come don’t have the same strength in their V5 programs."

One boat or two?

One of the most complicated new rules limits the way teams can build their two new boats. The idea behind this is to prevent teams from simply building two new boats in 2009. As a result ACM have come up with a schedule teams must build their boats to.

Thus teams who have formally entered the competition by 15 December 2007, must launch their first AC 90 boat before 1 November 2008 as only by doing this will they be allowed to build a second boat.

Tom Schnack adds: "And the sail bonus I mentioned before only applies to a boat that is sailing before 1 November 2008. If they miss that date for sailing, they will get a smaller sail allotment for 2008 - down to 10 - and if they miss the launch date then they really become a one boat campaign, unless of course it is for unforeseen reasons in which case they can apply to the Race Director for dispensation."

From 2009 no version 5 boats will be allowed in Port America's Cup.

More on the design of the AC90, the at present 'virtual' boat for the 33rd America's Cup next week.