23 – It's a new era

One of my boys was in San Francisco last weekend and called me about going to see an America's Cup sailboat race.  I had forgotten that it would be held during my exile.

If you haven't been following it (and why should you?) it's really worth a few minutes to see something that's both historical and new; something that's a quasi-sport; and something that is so exclusive even the 1%ers can no longer afford it alone.

The America's Cup used to be a sailboat race between the richest men in the world.  Sir Thomas Lipton (I drink his tea almost every day), Marcel Bich (do you use his pens?), Harold Vanderbilt (as in University), and Ted Turner (my main man from the big ATL, who's TV network brings us Archer), have all skippered boats in this race.

The boats used to be speedsters that married graceful lines with acres of sail area.  And the European boats had to be sailed across the Atlantic to compete in Newport, Rhode Island.  Things have changed, but the boats are definitely still built for speed and not for comfort.



Columbia, 220 tons of speed, sailed for the US in 1871




12 meter yachts competed in the 1970s when Ted Turner skippered Courageous to victory



Oracle Racing, the US defender in 2013, flying both hulls -- as she was designed to do

It's a quasi-sport, since I cannot believe physical abilities are terribly important.  The event has become so expensive (the 2013 campaigns have cost $65 to $100 billion each) that 1%er Oracle database billionaire Larry Ellison had to team up with Puma and TAG Heuer.

I'm not complaining here; in fact, I am sorry the US Yacht Racing Union (the sport's governing body) changed it's name to US Sailing.  Say what you want, this here is yacht racing, ladies and gentlemen -- there sure isn't any other use for these boats.

Anyway, this year has seen a sea change (appropriate cliché!) in the event.  For the first time ever, the races will be held such that spectators can actually spectate.  Trying to include us 99%er regular folks.

Races are just off the waterfront in downtown San Francisco, and regular folks can wander down to the Embarcadero and watch without tickets or binoculars.  (Mr. Ellison's syndicate won last time, so he picks the venue.)  Races and features are broadcast on TV and on YouTube, and therefore available to regular folks, say, hanging out in Saudi Arabia at 3 am.


T-shirt from the last campaign.  Where
is the Audi sponsored team?

TV has instituted many little things to help non-sailors understand the racing, too.  Similar to the "Fox Box" and the superimposed first-down line on football broadcasts, America's Cup broadcasts show boat speed, wind direction, race course boundaries, and lines to assess which boat is ahead and by what margin.

And the boats are fast as lightning.  The New Zealand challenger goes 40 knots -- over 46 mph.  That's scary fast for a 72-foot sailboat that is designed to lift itself out of the water: there's just not a lot of control surfaces left in the water, if you get my drift.  This year, helmets and life jackets are mandatory, and the helmets have radios so the crew can communicate across the spread of carbon fiber and trampoline.

The term "sailboat" may not be completely accurate, either: Oracle Racing's main source of propulsion is a 3-dimensional wing made of mylar film, as a replacement for Columbia's sails made of Egyptian cotton.

While I will never sail on one of these screaming meanies, watching them enhances my enjoyment of an afternoon on Boston Harbor (or rounding Fort Sumter) powered only by the wind and my wits.  Or helps me fantasize about landfalls on a pristine deserted beach in the Caribbean.  Or dream about sailing with double-stationed iceberg lookouts as we cruise up the Labrador coast to latitude 60 degrees North.

There's this famous sailboat saying: "fast is fun".  Seems to me that also applies to cars, skiing, and motorcycles.  It most definitely applies to this year's crop of America's Cup yachts.