Artemis Racing and Luna Rossa Set to Meet in Louis Vuitton Cup Semi-Final
Swedish and Italian Teams Talk about their Upcoming Match:
Press Release
San Francisco, USA, August 2, 2013
Wetting down the boat, Artemis trains for the Semi's.
Photo:©2013 Sander van der Borch/Artemis Racing
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| Max Sirena, skipper of Luna
Rossa, at left, and Iain Percy, skipper of Artemis Racing, at
right. Photo:©2013 ACEA/Gilles Martin-Raget |
The Semi-Final round of the Louis Vuitton Cup, the America's Cup Challenger Series, between Artemis Racing of Sweden and Italy's Luna Rossa Challenge begins on Tuesday, August 6.
The Swedish team has been fighting the clock to be ready to race in time. With six days of training on the new boat under his belt, Artemis Racing helmsman Nathan Outteridge says the team is learning how hard they can safely push their boat, noting how difficult it is to sail cautiously: "The only way to sail these boats is hard and fast. The moment you take your foot off the throttle is when it's going to bite."
Both teams are planning to get more training in over the weekend ahead of Tuesday's first race.
On Friday morning key members from both teams met with the media to share their thoughts ahead of the first elimination round of the event. The winner of the semifinals will advance to meet Emirates Team New Zealand in the Louis Vuitton Cup Finals. The loser is eliminated from further competition.
Racing is scheduled to start at 1:15pm PT for the semifinals, which is a best-of-seven series. Tickets are available now for new grandstand seating at the America's Cup Village at Marina Green.
Below are quotes from team representatives who attended today's media briefing at the America's Cup Media Center.
Iain Percy, skipper,
Artemis Racing
On the battle against the clock to get his team ready to race: Personally,
it's been one of my most enjoyable weeks of sailing. We've learned so many
things at such a fast rate. But to say that we're ready to go would
absolutely not be the case. Our competitors launched their boat nine
months ago. We launched our boat nine days ago. Obviously if we had nine
more months we would progress a lot more. That's not an excuse. It's our
fault we are in this position. But those are the facts. We've had our
foiling 72-foot cat for nine days and the event starts on Tuesday.
Max Sirena, skipper,
Luna Rossa Challenge
On final preparations ahead of Tuesdays race: We will make a few changes to
the aero package, put new tips on the daggerboards, and look at new rudder
elevators. After the next couple of sailing days we will decide which
configuration to use for semifinals. Chris [Draper] will choose what
combination feels the best. We will be ready to go. We want to use the
next two days to get around marks and do crew training, and we are looking
forward to starting on Tuesday.
Nathan Outteridge,
helmsman, Artemis Racing
On sailing the AC72 compared to the AC45: Everything that happens on the
AC72 is a scaled-up version of the AC45. Because the AC45 is smaller, it's
more unstable and harder to sail than the AC72. The AC45 is a tiller,
bumpy and jerky on the hand. The AC72, because its heavier and more
powered up it glides along nicely. Above 20 knots of wind the power starts
working against you, but in the 13- to 18-knot wind range, so far
everything we've learned on the AC45 has scaled nicely to the AC72.
The AC72 is an easy boat to sail upwind, but a hard boat to sail fast. Downwind, it's a hard boat to sail, and a harder boat to sail fast. We tried to take on the harder things earlier. You'd be surprised how much analysis we do of other teams. We've done lots of research watching what the other teams do.
Chris Draper,
helmsman, Luna Rossa Challenge
On the damage suffered to the wing sail during practice this week: We had a
bit of damage on Wing 2, the most recent wing we have. We managed to
de-load the rig quickly so it wasn't an issue. It's getting worked on now.
Unfortunately, there's quite a lot of work going on right now so it's going
to take a few more days than we thought.
We have our other wing on standby and ready to go. We'd like to use Wing 2 because it's more refined, but Wing 1 is just as good and we've spent a lot of time working on it, making it good and reliable. We'd like to use Wing 2, but Wing 1 is just as fine.
Adam May, Artemis
Racing, Foiling Adviser, Performance and Analysis team
On the design differences between Artemis Racing and Luna Rossa: I think
Luna Rossa has a slightly higher-volume hull shape with more rocker profile
through the mid-section. We're probably a slightly lower volume, slightly
lower freeboard shape. That's probably the main differences between the
two.
Off the wind you're hopefully foiling, so hull shapes are less relevant for that. I think they may have a shape that benefits maneuvering, as the rocker profile and volume are helpful for maneuvers and tacking well. Our boat is probably happier in a straight line, and for top end speeds. The contribution of the hull shape is quite a small factor now relative to the foils. That's the biggest difference. If you want to change the mode of the boat in any way, the foils are the big-ticket item.
Giorgio Provinciali,
Luna Rossa Challenge, VPP/CFD (Performance analysis)
On Artemis Racing's performance: We're really impressed with the reliability
level they have achieved. These boats are really difficult with a lot of
systems that can fail in some way, but they've appeared to be very
reliable. It's also impressive how stable their foiling is and how in
control the boat seems to be downwind.
Upcoming Louis Vuitton Cup schedule (all starts scheduled
for 1:15 pm PT)
Tuesday, Aug. 6, Semifinal Race 1
Wednesday, Aug. 7, Semifinal Race 2
Friday, Aug. 9, Semifinal Race 3
Saturday, Aug. 10, Semifinal Race 4
---From America's Cup Event Authority/©2013 ACEA
Italy's Luna Rossa closes in.
Photo:©2013 ACEA/Gilles Martin-Raget
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