what are you sailing these days?

Eric, I agree. Richard is just trying to sell ad space. It is the new world order of the media, and it nauseates me.

There is some good information buried in the "shock and awe" prose of Gladwell
Oracle closer taking Match point with vital Day 6 win

Sadly, the AC34 scars didn't fair well with NZ. Hindsight being 20/20, it does look that team NZ would be better served with Barker at the helm, he's just that good.

Agree with you also regarding Artemis, Nathan and Iain are really good together, the team is blazing fast and boat handling is right up there with the best teams. . . . They are so close to putting it all together.

Ben is frustrated and it shows. Think he might jump off the boat and attack a photographer? I can't get that picture out of my mind.

There is some good information, but Gladwell also needs to check his facts before publishing. For example:

is wrong. The NZL/GBR race was shortened at mark 6, but the USA/JPN race was not. Oracle sailed all 7 legs of the course.

On another note, I was surprised to hear USA hail RC and ask if the race was being shortened -- and even more surprised to hear RC reply. In regular fleet racing, that would constitute outside help and would break rule 41.

Thanks -- I needed a laugh.

Where are the crowds?

I was there in Chicago and the massive and loud crowd was a spectacle in itself and NBC repeatedly panned their cameras across the crowded Navy Pier.

Not so in Bermuda. Has anyone noticed that the grand stands seem to be empty? NBC annoyingly cuts to close ups of a dozen fans waving appropriate flags but rarely (never?) do they show crowds of people on the hard or in the huge grand stand. Sometimes I think those group shots are staged.

Is this like the faked moon landing? AC35...fake news! Is foiling just a trick of CGI?

Eric, I agree with a lot of your points in your longer post. I have some slightly different opinions on some of the skippers, but haven't watched an interview in a few days.

They do have an open channel with the RC. They're fed a lot of data from the RC as well.

One way to solve this problem in "normal" racing is for the RC to make announcements to the fleet (not to answer a specific boat). This takes caution obviously, the RC has to wonder why the question is being asked. If the change is unclear, that's a good reason for a fleet announcement. If you're answering a specific boat who just isn't paying attention, that's probably worthy of radio silence. Either move could cause a redress hearing under the wrong circumstances, but generally speaking, everyone wants more communication from the RC.

Mike

A few days ago, I found Peter Burling to be a bit arrogant, but he's really toned that down in the past couple of briefings. He's adopted a more unassuming attitude that I think goes over much better.

I also thought that Ben Ainslie should have apologized for hitting JPN, or at least shown some concern for the wellbeing of Softbank's crew -- not just his own boat's damage. Karma, however, appears to be catching up with him.

Regards,
Eric

On the mega yachts, watching the BT Sport feed, and there are a lot of them, including the Maltese Falcon.

MF folder

Where was it that you heard the RC reply? I don't recall it. I remember Slingsby on a hot mike wondering where the next mark was, like he was talking with JS.

I heard the RC reply with the information that should sail on and finish at the grandstands. I think USA really thought they were finishing before the last reach.

I was really surprised at the exchange too, for a minute I could really relate to the skipper having no idea what the course was.

Oracle has rudder damage and is trying to repair in time for race. . .

A-cat, F18, and J22. I think I'm going to list the F18 for sale soon because it just doesn't hit the water very often. My a-cat is a 2007 XJ that's super clean and I've updated it with foam decks and modernized some rigging stuff. Otherwise, it's bone stock and fast. I love the boat and have had some good results with it.

With regards to the biased reporting, it's sailing. We are a small community and there is ALWAYS some raw emotion when it comes to the America's Cup. They really buttoned up the rules about teams not speaking bad about the cup this iteration and we haven't heard ANY of the usual finger pointing and crying like we usually do (and does Grant Dalton even existing anymore!?).

As far as broadcast reporting, there isn't that much for these guys to hone their skills on but there is definitely room for improvement. I scream at the TV every time they cut to commercial right after the first downwind gate rounding - that's the most critical decision making stage in my mind and I want to see how the teams are setting up against the boundaries for that upwind leg. I do think they are making a conscious decision to keep the coverage simplified so it doesn't overwhelm the common viewer. I agree with the approach and while I DEFINITELY would enjoy seeing more of the nuances that I know of racing, I do think it would be too much and would quickly lose the common viewer that they are trying to attract. I have been having a regular morning debrief with several guys here at work and they are chock full of questions about the racing and the cup history. Hell, we even got into prismatic coefficients this morning. ;-) My point is, they're staying entertained enough to keep coming back and they don't feel like the coverage is lacking - they often comment in the positive about the digital markers on the water and how much easier this is to understand. I think this really is the point.

Gladwell will occasionally get spurned on by something but he will recenter and lean back toward the middle of the road, usually. He came out in Oracle's defense when the allegations of kinetic energy use were lodged from that book a couple of years ago (can't remember the Author's name...I just re-read it again and I still don't understand how you can rotate a 100 foot tall on it's base and generate and increase of forward driving energy from the wind that is already coming across it at 40 knots... It sure as hell doesn't work on my catamaran at 2, 10, or 15 knots and I've never seen a bird fly by rotating his wings around a central axis....but I digress.)

Regarding attendance, we also need to remember that we're just in the early phases of the cup - there's a lot left to go and it is a weekday in Bermuda. If I were scheduling time to go to Bermuda to watch the cup, it wouldn't be right now, either - it would be during one of the later rounds. And, besides, people in Bermuda have to work sometime like the rest of us.

I'm glad that it is the spectacle that it is. I just hope people don't lose interest by the time we get to the finals - it's a LOT of racing densely placed over a pretty big span of time.

The venue is really stunning though, better than San Francisco since there is no current.
Is Bermuda a "normal" holiday destination for you US guys? I looked into flying from Europe but it was a it too pricey.
Valencia was the perfect AC location for us Euros though, return ticket was only around $200.

The F18 Worlds are held at Sarasota next year, might be a good reason to hold onto it for another year?
https://sarasotasailingsquadron.org/event/2018-f-18-world-championship/

It's the wing winch clutch lock.

Ken REALLY like his pen

Great racing by Artemis today, beating USA and JPN. Only NZL looked better, achieving the long anticipated 100% fly time. USA made a couple of mistakes and their luck with comebacks finally ran out. Emirates is now in the lead overall and the winner of the potential AC point will be decided in their match with USA. Emirates looks so smooth, though, that I think they are more likely to win.

Either way, FRA is out and NZL will be top seed in the playoffs. I wonder who they will choose to race first? BAR looks like the easiest boat for them to beat. Then again, which one (GBR or JPN) is more likely to beat SWE? Ben Ainslie has been more successful at that in the past but Dean Barker came close today.