Alinghi designer talks

James Boyd gets down to the nuts and bolts of America's Cup design with Rolf Vrolijk

For a Swiss America's Cup team it was fitting that Alinghi should recruit leading German architect, Rolf Vrolijk of the Judel-Vrolijk design house to be their principle designer under the co-ordinator of Grant Simmer and alongside the likes of Dirk Kramers.

Rof Vrolijk was clearly fired up by the unveiling ceremony when we caught up with him earlier in the week and he more than most is waiting with baited breath to see whether their design teams ideas match those of Team New Zealand.

"I think it will be probably very difficult to predict," says Vrolijk. "We were with Andy Claughton and Clay Oliver [two of TNZ's design team] and they said that they are getting to the end of their prediction possibilities now. The two concepts are clearly two different concepts. You might say it is going to be a one to one tank test race basically because it is too difficult to tell where you think the other one will be faster and there are too many things which are not comparable."

With NZL82, Vrolijk believes their priority has been for out and out speed. "They try to get advantages upwind because of the lower centre of gravity of the bulb. They compensate with the smaller foils so they still have the speed and don’t get too much wetted surface. They try to get more advantage out of effective length through the hula taking into account that they have added gap resistance and added drag – there are all those factors - and on the other hand they have more sail area."

Following their design process and the advantage of having raced SUI64 in anger through the Louis Vuitton challenger series, Vrolijk feels the performance of the Swiss boat should be considerably more rounded, although this was not always the case. "Our concept has always been from the beginning that we wanted to optimise the boat for upwind performance. We originally had a boat that was very strong in windy conditions, even if nobody saw it but we were by far the strongest team always compared to Oracle."

Since then they have been concentrating on improvements primarily in sails and mast design. "I think we have done a very very big improvement in that area to boost performance to make it more all round and more in the light weather than anyone would expect from our concept. So our basic concept is that now we are very all round: we are comfortable in windy conditions, we are comfortable upwind and even in the lighter stuff. Maybe we are not the fastest boat, but we are close to being one of the fastest boats in the light stuff. So I think we are better prepared in our concept. They will have to prove their. So I think the pressure is on them."

Compared to Alinghi they have approached the way to make an ACC boat fast from a completely different angle. "Their basic hull concept is very conservative. That is astonishing because our hull shape is a lot more progressive, a lot more aggressive in shape, a lot more effective in length and that is the route we have chosen from the beginning. We are not pushing on the appendages – that is the big difference. So we looked for a hull shape that we know will perform well and will be fast and can be moded in different conditions and they are looking for speed advantages in areas outside of the hull by adding volume through the hula and the different appendages. They really looked for speed advantages in other areas from where we were looking. We were looking at mast and sail development, basic hull shape and not playing around too much with foils."

They like Team New Zealand has gone for the Prada double rigging option, although Team New Zealand have had to make a small compromise with their spreader set-up. "It is a measurement problem. They have a five spreader now! It is a lot of added windage but it is a mistake they made. They adopted the dual rigging system that Prada used at the beginning of the round robins and they adapted also the dual rigging for the top capshrouds and now that everybody is rotating jumpers a lot, like we originally started, moving jumper aft, like they have also, when you push the jumpers forward you push them against the double rod rigging and you actually disalign them so it is a big disadvantage. So they wanted to have protection on their shrouds to prevent it from rotating or getting touched and bent around the corner and in the rule that is not allowed unless you cover the whole shroud. Now they have to add a spreader, so it is called a fitting at the end of the spreader."


Vrolijk says that like most America's Cup designer he thought the hula was illegal. "The problem is that by signing the protocol you have to accept the interpretation of the measurers and the measurement committee and the measurement committee has allowed Team New Zealand to have it.

"So we have no come back at all. There is no possibility. We cannot even go to an arbitration panel. The strange thing about it was that the interpretation actually was asked by Oracle in November 2001 – more than two years ago. Oracle started with the concept, asked for the confidential interpretation and the New Zealanders never asked for it. So they had the conversation with the measurer, but not officially and pushed it to a point where it was accepted and we and most people felt very surprised that they allowed it."

The team were talking about taking a more hard line approach to resolving the issue. "You can go with lawyers, but we were still discussing with Oracle in the beginning of December to protest it and push it hard. And maybe we would have succeeded. But then you have a real problem with lawyers and the head of our team and Russell and Larry Ellison decided not to do it. We all decided in December that we’d give up on it. We accepted it and we’ll see which concept works better."

This put Alinghi into a situation where they had to find out all they could about the hula and what advantages it gave and when. "We did our homework," says Vrolijk. "We modified 75 – that is one of the reasons why we are using 64 all the time, because we changed the shape of 75 quite extensively. We put hulas – we called it the JoLo (after Jennifer Lopez – (she has a very nice butt)) and the advantage wasn’t big enough to convince us to continue to go on. And the period when we had to make that basic decision to optimise and work on it was when we had to race Oracle and we still had to beat Oracle and we were sure that Oracle was going to protest us if we had showed up with a hula. So we thought 'why put all the effort into it and maybe screw up your basic performance, your whole concept?' So we decided at that point to sail against Oracle with 64 as it is and just do it."

Following the Louis Vuitton finals they did modify 75 again. "We adapted shapes that are not exactly the same as Team New Zealand, but with similar volume distributions and we sailed every day against it. So for us 75 was the trial horse to trace Team New Zealand later on."

The upshot is that following their research Vrolijk believes that there are conditions when the hula will be an advantage, but he says that their research has not convinced him that it is the best way forwards.

"The tools that we have at the moment are not convincing that it is the best way forward," he says, qualifying this - that they were rushed for time to completely test it. "The tools are not showing the advantage that they are predicting. The normal processes, the tank tests, the modifications, then back to the tank test – we didn’t have the down time to do that. So we had to do it with CFD programs and stuff like that. And we also had a shot at gap resistance – which is not easy, it is a difficult thing. We also did tests on 64 with the basic principle: under 64, we fixed disks just to see structurally how you make solutions, how you control gaps, so we did basic tests of resistance and stuff like that, but you need more time to do it correctly. We were just convinced that we should go on and push more in the direction where we think we are strong, rather than just giving up all the work we have done and suddenly concentrate on an area where we are not 100% convinced."

Vrolijk admits they have altered the bow on SUI64, but this is just to gain slightly more effective length enabling them to increase their sail area.

In terms of which conditions the team want - Vrolijk says he is not particularly bothered. "I don’t think we are really predicting to be stronger in any particular conditions. We would of course like steady wind which is what everyone would like. Yesterday we were out and it is terrible, it is unbelievably complicated. You expect to have at least 8 knots steady as a minimum. We would be happy to sail in that condition, but we would be happy to sail in 20 knots. We think we have no real weakness."

Team New Zealand hold a considerable advantage in being able to dictate when races are sailed and when they are not. It is therefore more probably than not that if conditions are light in conditions which will not suit the hula, then races may be postponed.

"Their strength will be the straight line speed," continues Vrolijk of the pros and cons of the teams. "Our advantage will be that we will have more technical control and our crew has a better tool. The Alinghi boat is more manoeuvrable, will be better to accelerate and has better modes – that is what we have been pushing all the time. That is what you have seen in all the other race series. The crew had chances to change modes and do different things. And together with the sail development programme they do very well and that is why I think they can be very strong in most conditions."

Looking back at the challenger series, Vrolijk says there were some interesting concepts tried by the other challengers. "It was for us a very interesting period, because it is like a one to one tank test. You have ideas and you also see other people doing them or doing them in a different way - different solutions. You get a lot of information from sailing them. The problem is that most of the teams were not optimised well enough to be really competitive – that was a little disappointing, but that was to our advantage."

One choice which was not too successful was Stars & Stripes. "They were pushing the [narrow] beam extremely – much more than we would expect. And it proved not to be the best way to go. The shape was nice, but it was just too extreme. Most of the other boats were too in the middle of the road. Oracle clearly decided for a different concept from the beginning, which was very interesting for us, because you get very nervous when someone does something different. It is the same for them – but they have done their homework of course and they have a lot of possibility and research.

"We were very interested in their concept and we actually sailed against them before the official racing, because we just wanted to reassure ourselves. Okay, we gave a way a lot, but on the other hand it is good to know where you are. They worked hard to get it up to speed, but also they took just corners and they were not a good all-round performer. They took a shot at the light stuff and we were very happy we could match them because we were not pushing the barrier. So they were really set on one condition and if it were another condition they would have had no chance. So it is a gamble that you take."

While Oracle and Stars & Stripes were different concepts they viewed racing against OneWorld as the closest they were likely to get as an indicator of how they might fair against Team New Zealand. "OneWorld was up with us, very fast. They were very strong in the beginning, but they didn’t improve a lot. That was a pity because we expected them to be stronger even than Oracle. But unfortunately they didn’t progress and they never sailed up to their potential. Again OneWorld was not an extreme boat, but a good all round performance. For us they were the best benchmark to compare with the New Zealanders. They came out of the same family, because the influence of Laurie Davidson was quite big."

Of the Alinghi design team, Vrolijk says he has been particularly impressed with the sail designers - Mike Schrieber and Patrick Mazuay. "They are very very dedicated and very very organised which is good for a campaign like this. They did a perfect job, also listening to the sailors and working with the sailors. Our sail development programme I am convinced has been better than anyone else around.

"Then we have Dick Kramers who has been involved with many America’s Cup projects but has never had a chance to get input into it. He is very creative. Most of his ideas are blocked because they are too different, but you control it well and he has a good positive input and he is always looking for a different solution." The secret to a good AC design team is to have a good mix of level headed types and free thinkers like Kramers.
Perhaps one of Alinghi's greatest unsung strengths and one of the main reasons why, despite all the hoohaa about the hula, Alinghi remain such a strong contender is down to the experience of the crew. It should be remembered that Coutts has been sailing with his trimmers at the highest level for 10 years. Not only this but this group including Warwick Fleury and Simon Daubney also have a vital grasp on what makes a boat go fast and slow. "They are very very strong," says Vrolijk. "They know what they want and what is fast. You really tend to rely on those guys. If they something you know there is 10 years worth of experience coming there. There is no separation between the sailing and the design team."

So the bookies may have it going Team New Zealand's way, but it would be a foolish person to dismiss the Swiss.