San Francisco has formally approved the letter of intent for their America's Cup hosting bid - so they're officially in the running and with a pretty good leg up in actually getting the event.
http://www.sail-world.com/USA/index...;ntid=20&tickeruid=0&tickerCID=0


Core Composites is starting to build wing molds for the AC45 class....check it!:
http://www.sail-world.com/USA/index...;ntid=20&tickeruid=0&tickerCID=0

And some more detail on some of the building technique and distribution methodology of the AC45 class. I found a couple of interesting things:

- the stern section (presumably aft of the rear beam) detaches from the rest of the hull so it will fit in a 40' shipping container.

- they're building molds with formers and strip planks but then covering with a thickened epoxy putty substance...THEN they're milling it to final shape. Most of the milled plugs I've seen started with a solid foam block and were milled from there. I suppose it's more cost effective to build up the wood structure than purchase the ginormous foam blocks it would take to make hull molds for a 45 cat?

Look how short those bows are! It looks like a skinny Infusion F18!

sail-World article

I have been a little surprised at how fast a couple of teams dropped out of the event due to the format. I have a feeling, however, that we'll see several newcomers welcome the format.

United Internet Team Germany is out
Team Origin (UK - Sir Keith Mills) is also out

New Zealand just hired several French mulithull designers. but has yet to make any announcement.

I'm pretty sure I heard mumblings of a French team throwing their hat it (which would make sense...they're the leading mulithull fanatics).

I like how all the hotheads over at SA are lamenting the fact that TO is not joining the AC and are blaming the new format as the cause of their non-participation.

If, as a multihull sailor, you want to get your blood boiling just head over the SA AC forum and just start reading.

You'll want to throw things through windows.

Apart from ETNZ and the challenger, it is not clear to me how many teams will actually enter though.

Rusia team Synergy just entered. Wonder if any of the extreme 40 teams will enter (or have big enough pockets for it). I'm wondering if we will see teams do the AC 45 circuit but not the actual AC (get the experience, test the waters, then maybe wait for the next round). As exciting as these cats are going to be, I think that it might be too big of a hill to climb for a lot of teams.

The french are IMHO doing the wrong thing. You would think this would be the perfect time to mount a new team using all the multihull experience in the country. Instead the old guard, who lost all their previous AC attempts miserably, are preparing for a challenge on a platform they know nothing about.

Funny things are happening as well with match racing stars like Sebastien Col asking for help for trying out an A cat on the french multihull list...

I honestly haven't been over there in a while - there's no point discussing anything with the other party won't acknowledge fact.

T.O. did leave because of the format - they didn't think it was financially viable / marketable and they were pretty vocal about it with their press release....which surprised me because it would seem that this rendition with the extended racing cycle and the greater potential for spectator-friendly drama gives more marketability to the event as a whole.

Three things are for sure:

• this is happening on massive wing rigged catamarans
• some of the "old guard" will and leave whilst spitting on it on their way out the proverbial door.
• there will be new, fresh teams, entering
• this will be great exposure for multihull sailing in general.

Hotheaded (monohull) sailors on the SA forum freaking out that there are no monohulls in the AC.

Reverse it, and you (roughly) get...

Hotheaded (multihull) sailors on the CS forum freaking out that there are no multihulls in the Olympics.

How does this surprise anyone?

The part that makes me laugh is that there are VERY FEW Olympic sailors that post here, and probably the same is true at SA (very few AC sailors probably spend much time posting there). And for the most part, we (and they) don't even sail the affected classes.

Sad, really, that so much effort/energy is spent (wasted) on these essentially spectator pursuits, rather than building youth programs, etc.

Mike

I enjoy keeping up with everything and don't really have a dog in the race but big +1 to Mike!

Absolutely!

For those interested, the plugs for the Vudu F12 youth cat can be seen here.