Saild Sailing Blog

The Americas Cup is probably on of the longest running technological fights between man and machine. Pre-dating the first motor car race as announced by Chicago Times-Herald in 1895 the first Cup challenge was in 1851. The Cup has always featured the most cutting edge and expensive boats backed by some of the richest people in the world pitching their crews against each other.

The last race was in 2007 and since then there has been an ongoing legal battle between Pharma Billionaire Ernesto Bertarelli the current holder of the cup and CEO of Oracle Larry Ellison. The ‘Deed of gift’ which was formed in New York hence why the New York Supreme court was involved finally ruled in favour of the challenger for Valencia as the venue for the races two to three races which will dictate a winner. While the centre of the decision has been around where the race would be staged it involves much more and as one would expect leans more towards an issue of control.

With the legal battle out of the way we can now sit back and enjoy what will most likely be one of the most exciting challenges of years past. Both boats are now multihull with Larry Olsen’s challenging tri-mirane representing Golden Gate yacht and Ernesto Bartelli’s defending catamaran representing Société Nautique de Genève, both promise to be packed with lots of computers and early noises are coming out that they will to be able to achieve up to 30kts in only 10kts of wind.

With the fastest recorded speed by a yacht of 51.36kts being recorded this summer by french boat Hydroptere sailing is set to become alot faster, more dangerous. The Americas Cup is truely the F1 of the seas and with rules focussing on making the boats faster rather than slower those who enjoy the sound of cars rocketing around tracks in the summer should book themselves down to Valencia for Februaries billionaire showdown.

Cover image – Flickr/Chantani