Alinghi Redbull, ahead of all expectations in sailing performance

Brad Butterworth and Hans-Peter Steinacher were out on the water today in Barcelona and will have come off it convinced that the programme they initiated with Alinghi Red Bull Racing’s young Swiss sailing team is very much on the right track. In short, the sailors were electrifying today, putting in another world-class performance in tough conditions with a heavy swell running along the beautiful Barcelona beachfront.

The highlights video is one to thoroughly enjoy as Arnaud Psarofaghis and Maxime Bachelin played with what Lucien Cujean later called “extreme set up” going from vicious windward heel cant straight out of the tacks into flat and fast mode where the boat accelerated at a rapid pace whilst flight control was over-ridden with all manner of pitch and ride heights on display. One thing the team noticeably practiced again and again was the sharp bear-away from upwind to a broad reach, keeping the boat flat and powered up throughout – could this be a practice of the emergency duck for a starboard tacker? If so, we’re going to see crosses at unbelievable closing speeds when racing starts in earnest.

The sailors were on it all day. They seem to have come back from the Easter break with renewed vigour and the old sailing mantra of ‘time on the water’ is paying handsome dividends for the Alinghi Red Bull Racing set-up in Barcelona. Their knowledge now of the variety of conditions and sea states that the America’s Cup venue can throw up will be peerless and on days like today, with the swell running, it will catch the unprepared out. The Swiss almost certainly have a sailing edge.

In conditions that built steadily with a Garbi breeze coming in at some 15 knots+ before switching to the west and increasing further, it was a day that rewarded accuracy and communication and the stats simply don’t lie: Across 31 tacks the Swiss recorded 30 perfect foil-to-foil moves whilst on some 21 gybes, 17 were fully foiling. In just under four hours, they covered 50 nautical miles, flying up and down the Barcelona waterfront like they owned it. Fabulous sailing from a team rapidly attaining peak performance.

Speaking afterwards, Lucien Cujean gave a marvellously insightful interview, delving into the DNA of the AC40 as he said: “Today with the gusts and the chop we had out there it was perhaps the limit of the boat, and by managing some windward heel it makes our life easier to trim properly the sails and narrowing the angle upwind. Downwind you just have to tie your seatbelt and cross your fingers!”

Talking about the various modes that were on show today and in particular the aggressive windward heel the sailors were trying, Lucien commented: “We train with extreme set ups on this boat because it's the best way to see how the boat behaves and how it is manageable in this wind condition, and we were trying windward heel quite a lot, or flat and switching to the counter position and at the end we were managing the pitch, extreme pitch bow down and bow up…different setups to make sure we reach the best performance on the AC40.”

Asked specifically about sail trim, Lucien was clear that flat is fast in the windier conditions saying: “You are actually trying to flattening everything you can so basically we were very narrow angle with the mast rotation and trying to flatten the foot…The thing is it's a one design boat so every time you reach the limits of the loads then you have the release valve and so you end up sometime with max load everywhere and just get a little touchdown and have to work up everything again.”

The Swiss are looking mighty at the moment in the breeze and really look to be ahead of all expectations in terms of sailing performance. Shoreside the team are settled and committed. This is a terrific challenge for the America’s Cup and one that everyone will be watching as they continue to progress at pace. Electrifying to watch.