OK, Allegro Crew, here is a whole email on HOW to watch the AMERICA'S CUP.
I wrote it for my sister and brother in law who live 2 blocks from the
America's Cup Village in San Fran. I figured I'd forward it on because,
well, we are Team ALLEGRO!!
here are two sites you'll want:
- Official America's cup site * http://www.americascup.com *
- *Great *explanations by a boring narrator *
http://www.cupexperience.com/ *
*(1.) Watch a five minute history of the america's cup
here<http://youtu.be/A23b2zhqZ7I>
(5:53)*
Note that the America's Cup was traditionally about yacht design. Each
yacht club would design their own yacht to race. Also, the race was one
regatta consisting of several races over several days. The race doesn't
happen on a regular schedule. It happens when ever the holder of the cup
is challenged by some yacht club from some country other than their own.
When that challenge happens, the holder of the cup gets to make the rules
for the contest.
and for the 2013 America's Cup, the San Francisco yacht club COMPLETELY
COMPLETELY rewrote the rules. They spent a ton of money to create a
never-before-seen design of giant catamarans- the 45 foot AC45 and the 72
foot AC72, they standardized that design for all competitors, they created
a whole series they are calling the "America's Cup World Series" sailed on
the AC45 leading up to the main event which will be sailed on the AC72. And
they modified many of the basic Racing Rules of Sailing to make the event
television friendly.
*(2.) Now read the attached
eBook<http://www.cupexperience.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/09/eBook01-How-t...>
*
Don't worry about following the links in that ebook right now. Note the
electronic penalty system. pretty wild. when I race, we raise a small red
flag on the backstay to lodge a protest. if the boat you are protesting
agrees with you and concedes that they fouled you, they sail a 360 degrees
turn and continue with the race. if they don;t agree, they don't do
anything and the protest gets adjudicated by a committee after each boat
presents their case at the yacht club after the race. again to be
television friendly, they have created a *real-time penalty system*. that
has never been done before in the history of sailing. it's revolutionary.
(as a side note, I've never been protested nor have i ever lodged a
protest on Allegro. We were protested once on another boat i was racing on
a few years ago. For the club racing i usually do, it's kinda considered
poor sportsmanship to protest. we're just not that serious)
*
*
*(3.) Now watch the explanation of the 5 man crew on an
AC45<http://youtu.be/ShbCRjHHh-s>
(4:24)*
Note that when you watch the race, some boats will have a passenger (the
"6th man") sitting at the way back. it's usually a member of the sailing
press although during the august regatta in san fran, the american boat
took olympic runner Michael Johnson as a passenger. He fell off in the
middle of the race - you can *see it here <http://youtu.be/qPYc-Nh4vzM>.*Funny.
*(4.) Now watch the explanation of the course <http://youtu.be/Rcu5bu-F1vw>
(9:02)*
Note that the idea of course boundries doesn't exist in normal sailboat
racing. it's a rule created to make the sport more televisable. it keeps
the boats closer to the spectators and forces some tactical battle between
boats.
*(5) Now I think you are ready to watch the matches from August 23rd in San
Francisco <http://youtu.be/VndIuL_NlJY>*
the racing on the 23rd consisted of 2 match races followed by 2 fleet
races. match races are, of course two boats going head to head and the
fleet races are all the boats battling it out. each race is about 20
minutes or so. Note the PRODUCTION quality! They are producing a TV ready
event complete with commercial break without even having a contract with a
TV channel. I hope this sport gets picked up by ESPN soon! I want to see
monday night sailing competing with monday night football ;-))
ENJOY! and dammit i'm jealous. but I'll be out there in sept, 2013 for
the main event!
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