What is it really like to sail an AC75 every day? INEOS Team UK grinder David Carr reveals what life is like in Ben Ainslie\u2019s America’s Cup crewINEOS Team UK\u2019s Britannia 1 was in full flight training in Sardinia before the COVID-19 pandemic, but is now back on the water in the Solent. Photo: Team INEOS UK \/ Lloyd Images\u201cWhen you push off the dock, your life is in the hands of computers \u2013 and the guy piloting the boat out of the water, of course. All the systems on the boat, other than the winches rattling around, rely on computers.
\n\u201cYou\u2019re very aware that you are now sailing a boat that wholly relies on computer code. But I guess when you\u2019re sitting in an airplane at 40,000 feet, it\u2019s exactly the same.\u201d
\nThis is life onboard an AC75, the flying yachts which will be used to challenge for the 2021 America\u2019s Cup. David Carr, or \u2018Freddie\u2019 as everyone calls him, is one of Britain\u2019s most experienced America\u2019s Cup sailors and grinder on INEOS Team UK.
\nDavid \u2018Freddie\u2019 Carr is one of Britain\u2019s most experienced America\u2019s Cup sailors. Photo: Team INEOS UK \/ Lloyd Images
\nThis is his fifth Cup campaign, having been part of GBR Challenge in the IACC yachts back in 2003. He shifted from big boats to cats for the Extreme Sailing Series, then moved onto the foiling catamarans of the 2013 and 2017 Cup cycles. He talks to Helen Fretter about life as part of the AC75 crew for Ben Ainslie\u2019s British challenge.
\nA surreal mix
\nCan anything really prepare you for flying a 75ft monohull? No, not in the slightest. I feel that I come from a privileged position, having sailed the old IACC classes, and I\u2019ve gone through this change in the Cup over the last ten years moving into foiling cats.
\nNow, with these AC75s, we\u2019ve got a complete mixture of the two. We\u2019ve got a yacht that foils, so it\u2019s taken the two generations of the America\u2019s Cup world that I\u2019ve lived in and shoved them together.
\nArticle continues below\u2026<\/p>\n
\t\t\t\t\t\tRoad to the America\u2019s Cup podcast episode 1: Imagining the AC75<\/p>\n
\t\t\t\t\t\t\tThere is no doubt that the AC75 is a remarkable boat; a monohull designed to fly, engineered to reach speeds\u2026<\/p>\n
\t\t\t\t\t\tAinslie gets \u00a3110 million backing from Ineos for second bid to win America\u2019s Cup with BAR team<\/p>\n
\t\t\t\t\t\t\tAnglo-Swiss chemicals and manufacturing company Ineos will fully fund Ben Ainslie\u2019s America\u2019s Cup team in what is the biggest \u2013\u2026<\/p>\n
When I get on the boat, part of me feels like I\u2019m stepping onto a Mini Maxi to go yacht racing. Then all of a sudden you\u2019re doing 40 knots and back in that dinghy sailing mode. It\u2019s such a strange combination.
\nThe loads are now massive, going through all the sheets, the forestay loads, headstay, runners. We\u2019re back in 20 tonne loads that you would associate with traditional yacht racing. But then the boat just releases and goes ripping, and it is an unbelievable speed.
\nWith the AC72 catamarans in 2013, and then in Bermuda on the AC50, you were very much standing on top of the platform, but you felt very connected with the boat; you could look through the trampoline and over the side. You could see the water rushing past, so you had a good idea of boatspeed. And you could hear the foils really well \u2013 you could tell how fast you were going by listening to the pitch of the squeal.
\nNow, with these 75-footers, if you can feel and see the environment, you\u2019re in the wind and that\u2019s slowing the boat down. So it\u2019s unlike any boat I\u2019ve ever sailed in terms of feeling, for the vast majority of the crew.
\nThe aim is for two or three guys to have a view of what we\u2019re about to sail in, and then everybody else not to really. The trimmers obviously need to see the sails, Giles [Scott, tactician] and Ben need to be able to read the water, but the rest of us are playing a game of getting out of the wind; it\u2019s about tucking the grinders away.
\nAnd what that does mean is a big disconnect from the environment you\u2019re sailing in so you heavily rely on the data stream coming into your display to see what state of play the boat is in for sail trim, energy, positions of appendages. So, it\u2019s a funny day out when you sail these boats.
\nPrior to social distancing, training with a full crew. Photo: Ralph Hewitt
\nIf you\u2019ve got everything dialled in really well, it\u2019s a really smooth platform. The pitch and heel and the kind of heave of the boat, the way that it\u2019s sitting above the water \u2013 you feel very little. But what you really feel in the corners that I\u2019ve never felt in the small cats, is the G-forces are huge. The rate of turn in the tacks and gybes is very fast, and you do get thrown around your cockpit a lot, which is quite good fun!
\nFundamentally the liveliest point of sail is the bear away, where you\u2019re going through the power zone, turning downwind. That\u2019s where the mainsheet trimmer, Iain Jensen, Ben and the pilot have to be perfectly in control. Now, if they are in control, they rip the boat away and you are seeing massive speeds, they have to ease very little sail and we\u2019re off downwind.
\nBut if one of those three is slightly out of whack with each other, you can have a pretty hairy day out. You can have a big touchdown and there\u2019s plenty of water coming over the deck.
\nThe team can be on the water training for 6-8 hours a day. Photo: Team INEOS UK \/ Lloyd Images
\nHeads down
\nFor the grinders, we are back in that world of moving hydraulic oil, so it\u2019s good that it is written within the rules that we have winches to tack and gybe jibs and Code 0 sails from side to side. I must say, from a personal point of view, it\u2019s nice to rattle a winch.
\nIt just feels like sailors should hold ropes. Rightly or wrongly, I think it\u2019s a good look! And it\u2019s something that the wider sailing community can look at and relate to, versus a bunch of guys moving hydraulic pumps, which doesn\u2019t necessarily translate through the sport.
\nBut in terms of what I do, we have generic tactical stuff on our displays, and then you have a specific part of your display to tell you about what you\u2019re controlling.
\nOn all the AC75s the crew positions are designed to keep crew low down to improve aerodynamics. Photo: Team INEOS UK \/ Lloyd Images
\nWe have power meters on our handles and our live heart rate at all times, and with the amount of training that we do in the gym we\u2019ve got very, very aware of where we can sit in terms of heart rate zones, and what that means in terms of the power going into the handles.
\nSo I just completely look at my iPad. For a 30 minute race, I am measuring my heart rate for my effort into the pumps, because I want to make sure that I\u2019m sitting in a zone where I know I\u2019m producing good wattages to keep the boat flying nicely. I\u2019m looking at the energy state of the boat and I\u2019m looking at the bits that I\u2019m trimming.
\nEvery manoeuvre, which will be a maximum of every 90 seconds \u2013 and if you\u2019re sailing tactically on shifts you might be flicking around every 30 seconds \u2013 you\u2019re going to be close to your max power output for 20 seconds. Then it\u2019s all about how well you can recover before the next big hit.
\nPhoto: Team INEOS UK \/ Lloyd Images
\nPutting the hours in
\nBefore the coronavirus hit we had an amazing block of training time down in Cagliari. Ben and I would joke that it was like old-school Cup tuning days. It reminded me a little bit of 2007 [with Victory Challenge] when we would push off the dock and be out at sea for eight, nine hours.
\nWhen you were two-boat testing in 2007 you would just sail and sail and sail. You\u2019d adjust one small thing on one boat and sail and sail again. Now we\u2019ve got very good at breaking down the day into smaller training blocks. But if we have a really good day on the water, the designers and the performance team will have five hours of data to pick their way through, ready for the debrief the next day.
\nWe have a rotation of grinders. You do get tired, so the maximum you\u2019ll do sailing at any one time is about 90 minutes. Then you\u2019ll peel out, have an energy bar and drink, and watch and learn from the RIB. You\u2019ve still got all the communication going into your ears from the yachts and the designers, and then you\u2019ll step back on and sail again.
\nTeam principal and skipper Sir Ben Ainslie. Photo: Team INEOS UK \/Lloyd Images
\nIt\u2019s important that we always do every [training] manoeuvre as a race manoeuvre and actually the harder you attack the manoeuvre, the safer it is. Quite often in these foiling boats it\u2019s when you do a lazy tack or a lazy gybe that you actually become unstuck. But there is a lot of straight line stuff. Ultimately, the fastest boat is going to win the Cup and that formula will never change. Maybe a slight thing that\u2019s changed is the boundaries. Whereas ten years ago you could come off the start line and the navigator would say: \u201c15 minutes on this tack, 15 minutes on the other,\u201d now there\u2019s definitely more emphasis on re-acceleration.
\nAs a grinding unit we quite like to push for some \u2018hot laps\u2019 at the end of the day. A hot lap is where you put some boundaries out, take all of your learning from that day, and then you chuck it onto a racecourse and do some hot laps. That basically means two to three windward-leewards, and you just keep going. So if you have a bad gybe or you\u2019ve got to reaccelerate, you\u2019ve just got to imagine that you\u2019re racing another boat and push through to the finish. It\u2019s a nice way to tick off a day.
\nDaily grind
\nThe sport jumped when we started foiling, and certainly by 2017 it had turned into a proper endurance sport. In the last Cup cycle there was a group of us that had to have a level of metabolic, Crossfit-style conditioning to sail the World Series boats \u2013 which was great fun, hiking and top handling winches and hoisting Code 0s. This time round, without that small-boat World Series, we have turned into a grinding squad and we do so much grinding volume in the gym it\u2019s phenomenal.
\nFreddie Carr and the rest of the squad put in long hours in the gym: he can do up to 15 hours a week on the static grinder. Photo: Team INEOS UK \/ Harry KH
\nWe basically just cycle with our arms the whole time. In fact [some] of the boys, if they were to cycle on a Wattbike for an hour and cycle on a Wattbike with their arms for an hour, they would do better with their arms than with their legs! We\u2019ve got a funny looking group right now. Strength is important, but a lot of our strength training is there for injury prevention. We\u2019re not necessarily trying to get really good at bench pressing. But if you\u2019re lifting weights and have good form and a reasonable level of strength, then it\u2019s basically a good level of injury prevention.
\nIf we\u2019re doing a high volume block of training we could be three hours on the grinder in the gym, broken down into two sessions, maybe four times a week. So you could be close to 15 hours of grinding in the gym before you\u2019ve sailed. If we\u2019re doing a training block to increase our lactate tolerance, then those hours would reduce, but the minutes that we do at a higher heart rate go through the roof. They\u2019re the nasty weeks when you\u2019re working close to max heart rate; they\u2019re when you want to be having a good night\u2019s sleep.
\nAnother day in the office?
\nGo downstairs on Britannia 1 and it feels like you could be in a space shuttle getting blasted off to the moon. The amount of computer programming and logic that goes into sailing the boats is mind blowing. And because of that, the learning curve for all of us is so steep. The saying that every day\u2019s a school day couldn\u2019t run more true for this project at the moment.
\nIf you\u2019re not sharp every day, if you\u2019re not taking in information and learning and discussing and knocking the ball around for ideas with your sailing teammates and the designers and the shore crew, then I think the day it becomes just another day at the office is the day you stop developing. And that\u2019s when the boat\u2019s not going fast. I personally have never had that day yet. Maybe, hopefully, we\u2019ll get there about a week before the Cup, because that\u2019s when a lot of the development will be done. But right now, the learning curve is vertical.
\nThe AC75 is a true reflection of the last 20 years of the America\u2019s Cup. It is almost like a foiling IACC class. Previously the catamarans felt like you were on a twitchy little dinghy most of the time, whereas this is definitely a foiling yacht. It is insane. It\u2019s when you\u2019re not sailing the boat but are in the RIB chasing it that you can actually look at what it\u2019s doing and you\u2019re like: \u2018What on earth?\u2019
\nAmerica\u2019s Cup schedule
\nAuckland America\u2019s Cup World Series \u2013 17-20 December 2020
\nThe Prada Cup (Challenger Series) \u2013 January 15-22 February, 2021
\nThe America\u2019s Cup \u2013 6-21 March, 2021
\nWhere now for the America\u2019s Cup challengers?
\nPhoto: ETNZ
\nThe Defender, Emirates Team New Zealand
\nNew Zealand is famously one of the first countries in the world to declare itself COVID-19 free. However, the ETNZ squad was unable to sail for most of the lockdown period, as they\u2019d despatched their AC75 Te Aihe, along with 16 containers packed with equipment and chase boats, to Europe for the planned Cagliari and Portsmouth events. The shipment was sent straight back from Italy, arriving in Auckland at the end of May. The Kiwi team, meanwhile, began training with a scaled down \u2018surrogate\u2019 boat.
\nNew Zealand currently has stringent border restrictions and the host team now has the huge advantage of losing no further time in transport and quarantine.
\nPhoto: Carlo Borlenghi
\nThe Challenger of Record, Luna Rossa Prada Pirelli
\nThe Italian Challengers were preparing to host the first opportunity for the four AC75s to race against one another when Italy became one of Europe\u2019s earliest COVID-19 hotspots. Despite stringent lockdown, the team was able to continue some construction work and was the first to launch for \u2018socially distanced\u2019 training, with additional power sources and remote controls replacing up to six crew members.
\n\u201cSailing a 75ft boat that sails at 40-45 knots with only five people on board managing it is impressive. A lot of work has been done to allow us to continue developing,\u201d reported Luna Rossa skipper Max Sirena in April.
\nPhoto: INEOS Team UK
\nINEOS Team UK
\nINEOS Team UK relaunched its first AC75, Britannia 1, in the UK in the first week of June. \u201cWe have placed an e-grinder on the boat,\u201d explained skipper Ben Ainslie. \u201cThat is effectively a large battery pack which reduces the requirement of the number of crew on the boat [and] enables us space out as much as possible.\u201d
\nThe second British boat is reported to be on schedule at Jason Carrington\u2019s build facility in Hythe, in the UK, due to be launched in New Zealand in October. The UK and US teams have been granted NZ entry visas.
\nPhoto: Dylan Clarke
\nAmerican Magic
\nAmerican Magic faced multiple challenges: unable to train out of their US base in Pensacola, Florida due to COVID-19 restrictions, but unable to remain there until lockdown was lifted. \u201cWe can\u2019t stay in Pensacola due to the approach of hurricane season,\u201d explained skipper Terry Hutchinson.
\nThe team took a gamble to ship its first 75, Defiant, to New Zealand before the country\u2019s entry rules were confirmed \u2013 but have now had their visas confirmed. Meanwhile, the team\u2019s second AC75 is being built in Rhode Island, and will also be commissioned in New Zealand.
\nFirst published in the August 2020 edition of Yachting World.
\nThe post INEOS Team UK grinder David Carr explains what it\u2019s really like to sail an AC75 appeared first on Yachting World.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
What is it really like to sail an AC75 every day? INEOS Team UK grinder David Carr reveals what life is like in Ben Ainslie\u2019s America’s Cup crewINEOS Team UK\u2019s Britannia 1 was in full flight training in Sardinia before … <\/p>\n