America’s Cup dream still alive
How Ainslie set Britannia back on course towards glory
Staying calm and carrying on
It is important to stress that Ineos were not that slow in the middle or upper wind-range prior to Christmas. Their straight-line speed was OK. It was in manoeuvres, and especially in light airs, that they struggled. Anything under 12knots and they fell off their foils, finding it difficult to get going again.
In these radical new boats, getting up on the foils can make 30 knots of difference. Small changes can therefore make huge differences out on the water.
“It doesn’t necessarily take that much,” Ainslie said. “It’s a few small tweaks that can get the whole package going. The boat just gets powered up and gets better and better and the sailors get more confidence and you get this momentum going.”
Modifying the boat
Unsurprisingly, Ainslie will not say exactly what changes they have made, but he admits they have modified pretty much everything bar the shape of the hull, which is not allowed under class rules.
It is clear Britannia has a new rig and sail plan – Ineos raised eyebrows by using a smaller jib, or headsail, than rival boats in the first races last week, suggesting they did not need to “power up” as much as they did before Christmas to generate the necessary lift. They have also made changes to the rudder, the elevator and control systems. Perhaps most importantly, they have made changes to their wing foils.
Teams were permitted to change up to 20 per cent of the mass of their foils, and Ineos appear to have made full use of that latitude, with their foils cutting through the water much more cleanly.
What is not clear is whether there is something “under the hood”, which rival teams do not yet know about or understand. After the first day’s racing last Friday, Luna Rossa protested about the outhaul system on Britannia’s mainsail. Ineos had to change it overnight, but did not appear to suffer.
Mercedes know-how
Ainslie claimed in an interview with The Daily Telegraph last week that the team’s partnership with Mercedes F1 was a “game changer”.
The team’s Applied Science division worked on everything from a more efficient gearbox on the boat’s grinding pedestals to improving computational efficiency and runtime of simulations, to manufacturing manifolds, to testing parts on their rig in Brackley. They designed and built Britannia’s foils in-house.
F1 teams are used to developing upgrades and making modifications week-to-week, so three weeks was a long time for them. Thomas Batch, Applied Science’s principal engineer, is one of two Mercedes employees based with Ineos in Auckland.
“There’s been a huge amount of work since the World Series,” he said. “The design team, the sailing crew feeding back and then the shore team executing those plans. We’ve also had the guys in Brackley consulting, and guiding us.”
Ainslie’s leadership
Ainslie has a record of stunning comebacks on his CV, in both Olympic and America’s Cup sailing.
As an individual, he is a ruthless competitor; aggressive and extremely driven. But he also showed when he came on board the Oracle boat in 2013 and helped them turn around an 8-1 deficit to win 9-8 what he could do as part of a team.
Tactician Giles Scott said the fourtime Olympic champion had helped to engender a “siege mentality”.
The ‘brains trust’
The afterguard is effectively the “brains trust” of sailors comprising helmsman, tactician, sail trimmers, and flight controller(s), as opposed to the muscle on the boat; the grinders turning the handles on the pedestal winches.
The Ineos afterguard has been credited as being a huge factor in their comeback with Scott largely operating in a free role as tactician and therefore able to look up and read the shifts. Ineos also made a late change to their crew set-up, bringing in Luke Parkinson to share flight controller responsibilities with Leigh Mcmillan. It seems to have made a big difference.