The America’s Cup: a New High-Tech Performance?

Sailing has never been a sport, which attracted a wide audience. The rather slow and unspectacular nature of the sport was not meant for the TV-crowd. Because of the weather, races had to be postponed several times and made it even harder, to have people’s attention – on TV and on-Shore. Raising the money and finding sponsors are difficult.

With the new generation of high-tech boats, the AC72, things might change:

• The «wing-sail» improves speed and enables to race at a much broader spectrum of wind speed: from 5 up to 30 knots. – This helps to show the races on scheduled TV-times.
• The heavy foils lift the hulls out of the water and make them fly – the speed sometimes twice as much as the wind, up to 45 knots (50 mph). A high-tech performance one of a kind.

The fascination of the race is increasing, so is the safety issue. It has become dangerous. It is still not clear, why Artemis flipped over and what happened to Simpson. He is dead.

The Americas Cup will start on the 7th September with the defender Oracle and the winner of the Louis Vuitton Cup and will end on the 21st September, after a series of 17 races.

We can expect an interesting new TV-coverage:

• sailors wearing microphones
• onboard cameras
• real-time on screen graphics

Official Americas Cup Homepage