Story and Photos by Fred Roswold |
By the time you read this the America's Cup will be well underway, if not already decided. So let's take a look at what was learned from Prada's defeat of America One in the Louis Vuitton Cup Challenger Series.
No American boat in the America's Cup? This historical first disappoints us as it does most American sailing fans. Not only are we forced to acknowledge that we, as a country, fell short, but we also realize that the cup won't be coming home any time soon.  I think it is important to say that, win or lose, we were and are very proud of our teams. In no way do we feel we have to hang our heads in shame over their performance this season. From the Hawaiian Abracadabra, to the Saint Francis team of America One, we think every American team did a great job, and we can tell you that the Italians and Kiwis had a lot of respect for these teams both off and on the race course. Furthermore, this outcome is probably good for the sport. It increases interest all over the world, and it gives encouragement to countries, which might want to compete.
That being said though, we would still like to see our team win, and it is worth taking a look at what happened this time, and what we think it will take to get America back in the America's Cup next time.
Why did America One lose? To us the primary factors were boat speed, tactical decisions, management focus, breakdowns, and rules violations.
Boat speed: The Louis Vuitton finals featured long upwind drag races with the boats sailing side by side for several minutes. Prada was a little faster here, and frequently seemed to be able to gain a few yards advantage. They used this advantage to gain control over America One. The speed difference was less noticeable downwind. The upwind speed difference was probably related to development time, not design superiority. Prada is the second oldest design in this cup series, (ITA45) yet it proved faster than USA61, the newest boat here. Any number of experts now agree that it takes a long period of testing and development to get the most out of a boat. Prada, with a very early start, had the luxury to spend months on testing and development. The results this time showed that this high level of preparation is as important, or more so, than technological breakthroughs. The winning team next time will need to have plenty of time on the water with the boats they are going to race in order to get the most out of what they have designed and built. Because this takes planning and money, better boat speed becomes a planning problem and a money problem. The team will need to start the project early, plan for an extensive testing cycle and have the money needed to get the boats designed, built, and on the water.
Getting the money at all is a problem and getting it early is particularly hard. Commercial sponsors tend to come on board late rather than early. Every team would love to be able to do away with the chase for sponsor money. For this campaign and for the 1992 Cup, individuals with deep pockets (America3's Bill Koch, Ill Moro's Raul Gardini and Prada's Patrizio Bertelli) committed very early and funding was assured. In addition to testing, the adequate and early funding allowed the teams to pursue every technological possibility, or as Cayard said, leave no stone unturned. It was no accident that Prada had the best spinnaker cloth and no one else had it. Individuals like Koch and Bertelli, with this kind of commitment and passion, are hard to find. But there are other ways. In 1995 and again this time the Kiwi's didn't use the fortune of one individual to finance their campaign; Peter Blake got behind the program early and lined up the sponsors, assuring the funding for their successful challenge.
Other areas that contribute to boat speed are the sails, mast, and underwater appendages. Sails and appendages are development items. Any team, with enough time, can develop these. There is significant improvement happening in the masts, and this is an area where more technology can help.
Tactical decisions: Prada's tactical calls were consistently better than anyone else's with the exception possibly of Stars & Stripes, and this gave them early leads in race after race. We carefully tracked wind shifts on the weather legs of a number of races and it was uncanny how often Prada was on the side of the new wind. They would gain on the left when the first shift came from the left, then cross over and catch the next shift on the right. Prada had a great weather team and their tactician, Torben Grael, was sensational. Is it going to be necessary in the future to have Torben Grael himself on board to win? As good as he is, we don't think that hiring Torben away from Prada is the answer. Next time around it is likely to be someone else. It will be some other hot young talent who isn't even here this time. Finding that person is one of the keys to the success of the next American team.
Paul Cayard has suggested that fewer American teams would have resulted in a stronger challenge. We don't think that it is likely that all the interested backers from the different geographical areas of the US are going to be able to pull together into a single US team. Nor does it seem to us that the pool of sailing talent was spread too thin. There are plenty of good sailors in the US. A few key people are critical but a properly funded, early team will attract the good sailors it needs. A more difficult problem is picking people who can get the job done. Finding the right sailors, particularly the skipper and tactician, is a critical success factor, and this is going to require some luck as well as skill.
Management Focus: It is hard to tell how much effect this had on their performance, but it seemed to us that America One's Paul Cayard had a lot on his plate. Too much. As skipper and CEO he steered the boat, (ran the whole boat actually), managed the entire America One team, raised much of the money, hand held the sponsors, and had to deal with the media every day. There has to be a certain amount of extra stress involved when all this is piled on one person and it seems like some distribution of responsibility would allow everyone to focus on their assigned area. A winning team for the next Cup series will have a solid, well-structured organization with responsibility clearly delineated. We'd recommend a single decision-maker separate from the sailing team. The sailors should be involved in the decision making, but the structure of the organization needs to be clear and it is great if the sailors can concentrate on sailing and let others deal with the business side.
Breakdowns: On eight of nine races in the Louis Vuitton finals America One suffered some sort of breakdown or failure. We can count 13 problems at least, including five spinnaker failures (torn or blown). Prada, during the same period, had one. Several race outcomes were affected by these problems. Even in race four, when America One was penalized on the last leg, the fundamental cause was a gear failure. They had blown out a chute earlier, were sailing the last leg with a slower sail, and had problems jibing which could have been caused by the distraction on the foredeck of an on again off again call for another spinnaker change. Prada caught up and got into a controlling position, America One wasn't ready for it and couldn't stay clear. We don't really understand the cause of the breakdown problem on America One, whether it was too much push on the technology envelope, too little practice time, or too little attention to detail. Whatever it is, it will have to be solved. We feel that the America One's spinnaker problems, which Cayard never satisfactorily explained, should have been solved earlier, and failure to do so was a significant error which let down the team, the sponsors, and their supporters.
Rules violations: Both teams were aggressive during the finals, but America One, in Paul Cayard's words, "We played a little too much with fire". We saw them cut it close and get penalties, while Prada tried very hard to play it safe and avoid this. More than once, when America One luffed Prada, we saw Prada react quickly and decisively, even to the point of spinning out to windward, to stay away from America One. When the situation was reversed the judges felt that America One didn't do enough to stay clear and assessed penalties. Maybe America One was trying to compensate for a speed disadvantage, but whatever the reason, penalties cost America One some races, and they didn't appear to cost Prada any. The helmsperson and tactician on future American challenges need to learn from America One's experience this time and always take decisive actions to avoid penalties.
So the solution to putting an American boat back into the America's Cup is: get an early start, secure adequate funding, put together a professional organization with clear distribution of responsibilities, including the decision making responsibility, aggressively go after hot talent for both the sailing team (particularly tactician) and the technology team, get the boats on the water sailing very early to be able to get the most out of them possible and to achieve a level of reliability, and pay a lot of attention to the rules. Basically this is the Prada model—it works.
The final thing to throw into this, add a little bit of luck. Even if we do this there could be teams from a dozen other countries doing it also, as Italy and New Zealand have shown us. So, do all of this, that gets you into the game, then you have one chance in 13, and you have to hope for the best. If it looks like you are not going to get all of this together, pull out, and lend a hand to someone who is.
What are the prospects that an American team will do it next time? We think it is likely. America is a big country and we have the talent and money for it. Certainly we have good sailors and the organizational ability. The backer of the next successful American challenge is probably making a decision right now, or he/she should be.
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