So what went wrong with the Ben Ainslie team?

[LONG_KEELER]

LR must have been doing an awful lot wrong during the RR's when INEOS made a clean sweep. What exactly were the discoveries ?

How about a nice conspiracy theory concerning the magnets mentioned on here. Does the ride height
and stuff checked after each race ?

 

[KINGFISHER 8]

They took a heavy weather boat to a light wind venue. They went well in the stronger winds in the round robin series and failed in the more recent light winds. Normal winds in Auckland in Feb are light. You'd think someone might have looked it up before they designed and built it. In other words it was built for 15-20 knots. They took a water pistol to a gunfight.

 

[davidej]

They took a heavy weather boat to a light wind venue. They went well in the stronger winds in the round robin series and failed in the more recent light winds. Normal winds in Auckland in Feb are light. You'd think someone might have looked it up before they designed and built it. In other words it was built for 15-20 knots. They took a water pistol to a gunfight.

If what you said is right, they took a shotgun to a water pistol fight.

 

[kof]

Article by Mathew Sheahan the LR win

Sense of inevitability about Italian America’s Cup qualification - Yachting World

 

[ProMariner]

The Kiwis and the Italians were always half a design generation ahead of the other 2, better foils, hulls and rigs. This gives the sailors more confidence to jab it about on the race track, whereas the yanks and englanders were putting everything they had into overcoming the shortfalls of their platforms. That, and Ben is not a natural match racer. It was only ever a competition to see who would win the chance to get thrashed by the Kiwis anyway.

 

[ip485]

Yes I agree with what seems to be the concensus - not only a better boat, but a better team, who looked far more comfortable and rehearsed that ours ever did. I think by any measure it was a comprehesive win, and I am afraid we did not deserve to progress any further (which of course is a great shame).

 

[LONG_KEELER]

I think they did the best with what they had. You can't win them all.

Their clean sweep of the RR's now appears even more remarkable.

As mentioned by a previous contributor, it's a weird and quirky format and doesn't appeal to all sailing tastes
but the boats themselves are mad but technically brilliant and would probably never have appeared otherwise .

 

[Bathdave]

Article by Mathew Sheahan the LR win

Sense of inevitability about Italian America’s Cup qualification - Yachting World

Interesting article, especially the observation that being challenger of record may be a poisoned chalice ...it certainly seemed to me that LR having that status helped them, and it seems to be widely anticipated that Ineos will be COR if NZ win next month

 

[Billyo]

Rumours in the bars down here at the weekend is Inieos will become the COR as they are happy to continue with the foils Other, scary, rumour is team NZ were clocked doing 57 kts.