America’s Cup World Series – San Francisco

San Francisco

The AC World Series is over after the Super Sunday race amid the Blue Angels, the Blue Grass Festival the 49ers and the Giants.

Today’s race was heavily weighted with 40 points for first place rather than the 12 points for the winner of the first 6 fleet races. Artemis Red got off to a great start and led and the first and second marks. Meanwhile Artemis White was near the black of the fleet with Oracle Spithill bringing up the rear.

Up the first windward leg, we on Artemis Red were not going that well compared to Korea and Oracle Coutts. At the windward gate, we got caught by Oracle Coutts and made a mistake there in allowing him to force us to tack and round the left mark when we were all set to round the right mark. We almost capsized and had a bad set of the gennaker. Later we were penalized and in slowing for that Oracle Spithill and Artemis White got by us.

Things got worse and then got better again for Artemis Red and we finally finished 5th.

Meanwhile, Artemis White was sailing well and fast. Terry and the guys did a great job of working their way through the fleet to finish third in the race and third place overall.

Compared to a month ago, I feel that we have improved as a sailing team. I say that because the reality of this regatta is the Ben Ainslee sailed the best and Terry Hutchinson and his team, with Iain Percy as tactician, were second best. I think “Super Sunday” is great for the excitement but “Super Sunday” skews the results with the wighting of the scoring. So I make those observations by looking at things from a true performance standpoint. Nathan Outteridge and Artemis Red were a new team with four days of sailing together prior to the first race. Having a 53 year old crew member probably didn’t help the kid but was was good for Artemis Racing for the long run. Also having both teams in the semi finals of the Match Racing is a decent result.

The AC45 sailing will take a break for now and I for one will miss it. It was amongst the most challenging and exhilarating sailing I have ever done. The young sailors of today have a lot to be thankful for due to the changes that have been made in the America’s Cup. And the world is seeing sailing like it has never been seen before. From tonight, Artemis Racing is focused on our AC72 and the development of that very challenging piece of equipment.

Congratulations to the Oracle boys for winning. I want to thanks my buddies Curtis Blewett, Rodney Ardern and Phil Jamesion for taking me for one of the best rides of my life this week. And Nathan, the only 26 year olds’ who have better jobs than you are those kids driving those Blue Angel jets around on US tax payer dollars!

Paul