chances of Ben Ainslie’s British campaign, which has Giles Scott in the tactician role. He notes too that Artemis Racing under Percy has a mix of Finn and 49er sailors, while Dean Barker is a long shot with his Japanese campaign. Jimmy Spithill – well, he muses, Oracle is in a world of its own, but it would be interesting to put him in a Finn and see how he goes.
He does acknowledge Frank Cammas’s talents coming out of the multihull tradition and Pete Burling’s 49er record earns him the highest praise in Devoti’s vocabulary: ‘He is very special, no doubt about it.’ Time will tell.
On the subject of Burling, his extraordinary run with Blair Tuke in the 49er class continues with a third world title. With it the pair scored an unprecedented hat-trick of New Zealand Sailor of the Year awards, for 2013, 2014 and 2015. Special indeed. Ivor Wilkins
AUSTRALIA Measure once, cut twice
Arriving at Hobart’s Constitution Dock shortly after securing their eighth Sydney-Hobart line honours win in 2014, the crew of Bob Oatley’s Wild Oats XI turned to welcome Ken Read and the crew of Comanche, who on their first offshore race had powered out past Sydney Heads to lead the fleet south, but finished second to Wild Oatsby just over 49 minutes.
In the ensuing debrief the Oats brains trust were obviously acutely aware of the astonishing acceleration and speed of Comanche given the right conditions, and the parking lot Ken Read’s crew had to frustratingly endure in Bass Strait, as the pressure shut down for the wide-hipped newcomer, leaving a snifter of breeze to push the slender Wild Oats into the lead and the record books. Every Hobart has a lot of what-ifs, and Ken Read and his crew could add a chapter to that book. Clearly Comanchewould be back, hungry for line honours, and so Bob and Sandy Oatley with skipper Mark Richards began the search for more speed.
With the planned 2015 Transpac collaboration with Roy Disney and his team, time was a factor in how much work could be done on a now 10-year-old design. All options are considered, but the two big structural components of the 30m supermaxi, the keel and rig, had always performed well, so why risk what is reliable? All eyes then focused on the bow, and by April this year designers Reichel-Pugh and builders McConaghy Boats were looking at how much of the bow section they could realistically alter. Changes were both subtle and dramatic. With the limit on the boat’s length of 30m, 11m of new bow was fitted, stretching the bow length by 2m (the bowsprit is also now 1.3m longer at 3.9m); and to accommodate this increase 2m was trimmed from the stern. Changing the rig position without moving the rig itself was a smart move – moving the boat around the rig rather than the rig around the boat eliminated a massive amount of additional work. With the mast now 2m further aft, the longer J measurement allows more sail options (the furling J1 has grown by 60m2to 280m2) and also increases the potential for the bow to lift earlier in offwind sailing. The new bow section is slightly fuller yet retains the sleek and slender trademark Reichel-Pugh profile, with none of the chines or topside folds evident on other recent big boat launches. An extra metre was also added to the daggerboards for more upwind bite. Much planning was involved: cutting into your record-breaking maxi is a major challenge. The first cut was done at the base in Woolwich. But this was just the first slice, made forward of a watertight bulkhead to allow Oats to be motored across Sydney Harbour like an oversized Optimist. She was then lifted onto a truck heading to Sydney’s northern beaches. Once at McConaghy the real cut was made 4m further aft, and the new bow already fabricated was offered up.
At this point I would like you to pause and consider all that is involved here. A new bow and deck section had been made while Oatswas racing to Hawaii, so the measurements taken were critical to accommodate the multitude of curves from topsides down to bilge and up to the deck. To minimise any errors the maxi’s hull was 3D scanned prior to being shipped to the States, giving the team at McConaghy the hull shape to within a millimetre.
CLASS CLASS 40 S S..Y. LONGBOW 30 OCTOBE R 2015 / NEWPOR , RI OBER 2015 / NEWPORT, R I
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SEAHORSE 19
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