The Maxiﾒs are back. Five IMS Maxiﾒs, all from different designers, raced together for the first time in the Kenwood Cup this past August. Being onboard Boomerang in Hawaii for this historic event reminded me a bit of the first beat of an Americaﾒs Cup final. There is so much unknown, so much speculating has gone on in the boat yard and at the dock, and now the moment of truth.

The line up of Maxiﾒs include the Bruce Farr designed Sayonara, German Frers designed Boomerang, Reichel-Pugh designed Morning Glory, Bruce Nelson designed Falcon, and Sparkman and Stephens designed Sagamore. Sayonara clearly dominated the regatta. Helmed by Chris Dickson and supported by a mostly Stars & Stripes and Team New Zealand crew, Sayonara was sailed closer to her potential than the other yachts. Also being a year older than Boomerang and Falcon gave her an advantage as far as being more optimized and having the bugs worked out. Morning Glory, with owner Huasso Platner at the helm and Russell Coutts calling the shots, looked very fast and was the only Maxi to win a race off Sayonara but unfortunately she broke her mast in the fourth race which was on just the second day of racing. Obviously Platner and his gang will be looking forward to the Big Boat Series in San Francisco, this September and a chance to show their true form for an entire series. George Coumantarosﾒs Boomerang, which set the record in the Newport to Bermuda Race earlier this summer, looks to me like it has some inherent strong points with her long length and large sail area. But in Hawaii we definitely were not achieving her maximum potential. Still we were able to finish second in the ILC Maxi classification and first in the owner/driver ICAYA classification. Falcon, which finished third in the ILC Maxi class, was not quite up to ﾓMaxiﾔ rating in Hawaii but will be there for SF I am sure. She is also being helmed by her owner, Don Smith, and is being used for crew training by the PACT 2000 team. Sagamore, sailed by her owner Jim Dolan, rounded out the fleet but made significant improvements during the week. Jim has sailed his boat consistently himself and has improved not only his skill level but the performance of the boat as well. The owner/driver vs. professional/driver issue is one topic that makes for interesting debate. As a matter of fact, John Thomson drove his yacht ﾓInfinityﾔ and was the top yacht at the Kenwood Cup. The Big Boat Series in San Francisco is the next appointment for these large racing machines and having them all on the Bay should bring back memories of 1988 when 10- IOR Maxiﾒs graced the Bay for the World Championship. It will also serve to continue to remind us believers that the Bay is the best arena for the Americaﾒs Cup in the world.

Speaking of the Americaﾒs Cup, my challenge, AmericaOne is continuing to make progress toward our goal of bringing the Cup back to the USA in 2000. We have recently signed up meteorologist Roger Badham(IL Moro and oneAustralia) to begin our data collection and analysis program for the Huraki Gulf in Auckland. This work is very important to the design process in the near term and to the racing program in the longer term. Getting a handle on the parameters of conditions that we can expect on the race course is invaluable to the design team in their work of producing the fastest boat. Later, having a good historical data base will be valuable in producing reliable daily forecasts for the racing team. Currently there is no data from the race course. There is a lot of data, collected over the last 20 years from land based stations surrounding the race course. Due to topographical influence, the data collected from these land based sites is probably not what the race course has experienced on those same days. So to make use of the 20 years of land based data we need to collect data from those same land sites and the race course simultaneously. From this data we hope to develop a correlation and make use of the 20 year land based data.

We have also retained Frank de Board who will be responsible for our experimental work in towing tanks and wind tunnels. Making sure these experiments are conducted in a way which produces reliable data is no simple task. Frank is highly respected in this field having worked for oneAustralia for their 1995 campaign. Obviously having experienced people like Frank and Roger join our team is very encouraging to us and our supporters. The Cup is a long way off but our belief at AmericaOne is that the technical process is critical to the outcome of the races and that an early start in this area is a great advantage.

If you want Americaﾒs Cup news check out AmericaOneﾒs Website: AC2000.org. The news there is updated continuously. Get the latest from all the syndicates, find out what New Zealand is like, personal reports from the Sardinia Cup, Big Boat Series or Match Racing events by John Kostecki and Paul Cayard, or buy a souvenir from our shipﾒs store.