The dates for the Rolex Commodores’ Cup 2008 have now been announced.  The event will run from Sunday 29 June 2008 to Sunday 6 July 2008.  Class bands have already been announced and details of these together with some advance details of the format are available on the RORC website (www.rorc.org).  It is planned to issue the Notice of Race in September 2007.  Interest in the event is already building and it is intended to cover some of the potential entrants in the next edition of Seahorse.

Admiral’s Cup Reunion – and future

2007 marks the 50^th anniversary of the first Admiral’s Cup Series held in 1957.  To mark the occasion the RORC is organising a reunion party for past Admiral’s Cup owners in Cowes on Thursday 2 August.  Whilst sadly there is no Admiral’s Cup this tear, the Club is still actively discussing options for the future of the event and the reunion should provide more than enough food for thought!

There really are Easter bunnies

The Red Funnel Easter Regatta was held under clear blue skies and light airs at Cowes.   Whilst this may not have been to everyone’s liking, it did give all competitors a slightly smug feeling as they read of rain squalls and chill winds off Valencia!  With over 70 entries, the series continues to provide a testing environment for both boats and crews to work up for the season.  The tradition of Easter eggs as prizes provided an opportunity for 2 Easter bunnies to join the fun!    

America’s Cup

As the 32^nd America’s Cup gets under way off Valencia without a GBR entry, there are plenty of Brits around the dock – some 62 in all and not just as on board the boats but every imaginable role from design to shore crew.  Many of the faces were involved with Peter Harrison’s GBR Challenge in the last Cup Series which sailed under the burgee of the RORC and it is good to see that this involvement has paid off.  With the announcement of a fresh GBR challenge for the next two Cup series, under the name TeamOrigin and headed up by RORC member Sir Keith Mills, it is hoped that this investment will continue to flourish.

James Dadd, Chief Measurer at the RORC Rating Office is also in Valencia.  He was a measurer at the last Cup in Auckland and is now back in the same role.  Keeping the Rating Office involved with a key yachting development area in James’s words “gives him a great insight into what goes on in the minds of the key technical players in the development of our sport, but quite often I am very grateful I cannot hear the voices in their heads though!” 

Another RORC member, designer Rob Humphreys was also present in Valencia for the unveiling or lifting of the skirts, allowing teams and designers to check out rival designs for the first time.  Trends were difficult to judge with little agreement on either hull shape or underwater shape, and this is probably due to team readings of whether winds were likely to be more or less than the average 14 knots.  Rob’s detailed comments were carried by the Daily Sail, but a quick overview of the teams revealed the following design thoughts:

Alinghi – Both boats showed a confident approach aimed at fast light air sailing with SUI 100 the less aggressive of the two boats.

Emirates TNZ – Both NZL 84 and 92 have an overt aggressiveness masking a very sweet fundamental form.  NZL 92 may be narrower than NZL 84, with her construction allowing more bulb weight.  Again a team confident in it is approach to design. 

BMW Oracle – With the largest design team of all the campaigns, both 87 and 98 are more heavily rockered than the Alinghi boats and the sheerline is not as ramped as TNZ and others.

Luna Rossa – Despite second largest design team, neither boat shows flair or great innovation and they still have speed issues.

Mascalzone Latino-Capitalia – Heavily knuckled and very bluff entry on both boats.

Desafio Espanol - With Reichel-Pugh in the design team and Paul Cayard advising, the two Spanish boats are unextreme.

Victory Challenge – Frers design for Sweden is possibly one of the most innovative boats after TNZ. 

Areva – The French boat looks almost old fashioned and unremarkable.

Team Shosholoza – Ker’s South African boat was first version 5 boat and is almost knuckle free.  She and CHN 95 are only boats with bowsprits.

+39 Challenge – Development hampered by lack of money, this is probably narrowest boat.

China Team – CHN 95 Andrieu’s design is very aggressive with square sectioned hull and knuckled bow.

Underwater shapes.  All the bulbs (weighing 19-20 tonnes) have winglets in a variety of shapes and sizes.  Trim tabs may be twisted by cranking the bottom round by a few degrees.  The richer teams have between a 5 and 10 keels each. ACT 13

RORC member Eddie Warden-Owen viewed the racing and said that watching 12 Americas Cup boats hit the starting line at full speed in any wind strength was a sight to behold. The unsettled spring weather brought unusual and very tricky sailing conditions which made it very difficult for the afterguard of each boat but added to the excitement as place changes were a regular occurrence. Add to this close quarter mark roundings, the odd crash (+39 mast break) and a leeward gate (which helps to keep the racing close) and you have format that with good TV coverage might just start to attract the interest of non sailors.

Despite all the boats being of very similar speed Alinghi, however made winning look very easy. Even with poor starts in a number of the races they posted a score of: 4,1,1,1,3,2,1 for a total of 78 points, 14 points clear of Emirates Team New Zealand. To put this domination into perspective, the next 5 places were only 9 points apart and the ease with which Alinghi was able to get to the front was, I am sure, a surprise to all the challenging teams. For Alinghi it must be comforting to know that they have good speed relative to all their rivals in all conditions with 3 months of in-house speed development still to come.

Leading the fleet of Americas Cup challengers was Emirates Team New Zealand steered for the whole regatta by Britain’s Ben Ainslie. The Kiwi were not quite as polished as Alinghi in all departments but had sufficient speed advantage to extricate themselves from poor positions in a number of races to get a mid fleet result or to come from behind and win, as they did in race 5.

However the model of consistency goes to Mascalzone Latino – Capitalia who never won a race but was always threatening the leading boats. With their new boat (ITA 99) this team has jumped up the speed ladder and are now commanding respect from the “top 3” big budget teams (Oracle, TNZ and Luna Rossa). Their skipper Vasco Vascotto did an excellent job of positioning the boat relative to the fleet and keeping out of trouble to minimize extra tacks and gybes which are very costly in a fleet of this quality.

Luna Rossa had a 7 & 8 as well as 2’s and 3’s and could not convert good positions into winning races. Oracle used their much altered USA 87 and had big up’s and downs. She came from a long way back to win the first race when the wind was at its most flukey but also had to count a 10^th when unable to hoist her jib up a broken headfoil. She never looked short of speed and I am sure they have more performance hidden away.

Desafio Espanol improved as the week went on. They won the first race on the last day (Race 6) and should have posted another top 3 result in Race 7 but for two penalties at the top mark. They too had difficulty in capitalizing on potentially good positions and turning them into winning ones but they were clearly learning fast.  The bottom half of the fleet was led by Shosholoza who after an excellent 2nd in race 1 and generally good starts could not get up amongst the leaders and stay there. Victory Challenge from Sweden, the French Areva and United Internet Team Germany (UITG) all seemed to struggle with a lack of pace in the generally breezy conditions. +39 lost her mast in a collision with the Germans and as these rigs weigh 1000kg it is a miracle that no one was hurt on either boat. This was a major blow to the +39 campaign. The boat had shown good speed despite having only stepped the mast the day before the regatta. They led race 1 until the wind turned the fleet upside down. They won their protest, given re-dress and awarded 5^th place for that race and despite not sailing for the rest of the regatta still finished ahead of China who completed every race.

Shorty Trimingham

The Club is sad to announce the death of “Shorty” Trimingham at the age of 87.  A member of the Club since 1952, he was the first non-Englishman to win the Prince of Wales Cup in 1954 in the International 14.  He had an equally impressive record in offshore racing including competing in the Admiral’s Cup for Bermuda in Wizard of Paget, and co-founding the Onion Patch Trophy Series.