Rather than traditional plodding sailboats, this year's contestants will race two-hulled catamarans, which can hover above the water on hydrofoils in healthy winds and attain speeds of over 40 knots (46 miles or 74 km) per hour some four times faster than their predecessors.
And over the past two decades, more sailors have rounded Cape Horn than in the 80 previous years; they have done so in increasingly light boats, including catamarans and trimarans, with very little loss of life.The sailors of yore in the days when CNN did not exist to broadcast their fate, and when The Economist was too busy covering the empire died unnoticed.
He moved the Cup from Spain to San Francisco, and replaced plodding monohull boats with blazing-fast catamarans that can sail far closer to shore, hoping to lure fans to watch in person and make for more compelling viewing on television.In the months leading up to the event, the scheme appeared to be running aground.
Adam Zaczeniuk, a senior manager at the yard, hopes it can stave off bankruptcy for a fourth time, as it has done on three previous occasions since the end of communism.Some niche businesses related to shipbuilding are doing well in Gdansk, such as Sunreef Yachts, a maker of luxury catamarans with price tags of €3m ($4m) upwards.
The 72-foot (22-metre) carbon-fibre catamarans with their 132-foot wing sails were the fastest sailing boats ever designed, capable of downwind speeds in excess of 50mph (80kph) on their foils as they almost literally flew past the shoreline spectators.But one boat was clearly much quicker than the other sailing upwind.
Each hull of its catamarans has an underwater duct which serves two functions (see illustration).
The spectators who line up along the San Francisco Bay to watch the catamarans zip by should probably cheer for a successful title defence by Oracle if they hope to see the race in person again.
Thanks to on-board GPS equipment and cameras mounted on helicopters hovering over the course, viewers were given precise measures of the catamarans' velocity and the exact distance between them.
They feature smaller catamarans, known as AC45s (pictured), which are testing the skills of their five-person crews and generating plenty of buzz.
So for the moment, Thames Clippers' civilised catamarans to and from Waterloo, like Thames Executive Charters' daily commuter boat from Putney, with coffee and newspapers and a sundeck for the summer, remain a secret pleasure for the cognoscenti.
The navy's growing fleet of powerful destroyers, stealthy frigates and guided-missile-carrying catamarans enables it to carry out extended "green water" operations (ie, regional, not just coastal tasks).
