CSB - Mark Orams - Sailing expert

Talking the America's Cup - where by the end of the week the first team will be sent home from the challenger series. 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Course from the sports field to the shearing shed. It's
the Country Sport Breakfast with Brian Kelly on gold.

Speaker 2 (00:07):
Sport thirteen away from eight o'clock here on gold Sport
in the Country Sport Breakfast, talking America's Cup now and well.
Team New Zealand yesterday quelled any concerns that might have
been lingering over the condition of their AC seventy five
after it was dropped from a crane a couple of
days ago. Joining us to talk America's Cup. Doctor Mark
orm who know who's a thing or two about sailing

(00:28):
market Morning.

Speaker 1 (00:29):
Morning, Brian.

Speaker 2 (00:30):
That was a bit scary seeing that beautiful boat dropped
from the crane, wasn't it.

Speaker 1 (00:35):
Yeah, it certainly was. I had a look a bit
of the video footage afterwards, and it dropped from a
decent height and made a decent being when it hit
the cradle. So in one sense, kind of unlucky that
that happened. So I don't really understand why the crane failed,
But on the other hand, lucky that the damage wasn't

(00:56):
severe and that it didn't happen at a time in
the regatted that that really compromised Team New Zealand's ability
to progress forward to a successful defense because the.

Speaker 2 (01:06):
Boys came back very very quickly, worked over night, worked
very very hard, and repaired it back on the water
what within about twenty four hours was amazing.

Speaker 1 (01:14):
Yeah, the shore crew that Emirates Team New Zealand has,
like the entire team have been together for multiple campaigns now,
I mean they know this stuff inside and out. Shawn
Reagan and his team, they sort of while they never
want something like this to happen, if it does, they
really just swing into action and go, well, this is

(01:35):
our time to shine. You know. The guys out on
the racetrack get all the attention, but the shore crew
when they get a crisis that they need to step into,
they relish that and they just take it on. Those
who watched the Bermuda America's Couple recall it at that
day they were foiling catamarans that the Team New Zealand

(01:55):
bug capsized dramatically against the British and there was major damage,
and that exact same shore team took that on and
fixed that repair and the end result was that Team
New Zealand was able to win the America's Cup. There
so that the shore crew did a great job. The
structural damage wasn't huge, and so they were able to

(02:16):
just basically cut out the damage piece of the hull
to fit a new piece back and scarf it back
in and do everything they needed to make it look
like it had never happened.

Speaker 2 (02:25):
It's been a fascinating first round Challenger series so far,
and at the end of this week, I believe one
team is going to be going home. What have you
made of the series so far and the challenges?

Speaker 1 (02:36):
Yeah, in some ways a bit predictable. Going in. The
word was that both Team New Zealand and Lunar Rossa
were the Italians were a step ahead of everybody else,
and that's proved to be the case both in the
preliminary regatter a couple of weeks ago and in this
first round robin. And then there's sort of daylight back
to American Magic and any Ospritannia, and then the bottom

(02:59):
two fighting it out as to which one ends up
packing their boat away and winding up their campaign on
Monday next week. So it's coming really quickly for either
a Lingy Red Bull racing the Swiss entrant or Oriente
Express racing the French entrant. It's hard to pick at
this point, I'd say that the French have the faster boat,

(03:20):
but less experience and are making more mistakes. But the
Swiss will be really having to review their campaign. They're
just not on the pace despite being one of the
first campaigns to start sailing the AC seventy five that
they purchased from Tim New Zealand, the winning boat from
the thirty sixth America's Cup here in Auckland tte Hu

(03:41):
Tai and so they had a good start and they're
not a brand new America's Cup team even though they'reknew
to the foiling aspect of it. So if they end
up packing their bags on Monday, that will be an
absolute failure as far as their campaign's concerned. I think
the French will view it differently. They are the last
challenger to come in a brand new syndicate, a campaign

(04:05):
where none of them had sailed an AC seventy five before,
and they purchased the design package off Team New Zealand,
so they will see even if they do go home
on Monday, they'll be disappointed, but they'll see it as
a success because they've had some wins, they've shown they've
been competitive, and they see it as a springboard to
the thirty eighth America's Cup. I think so two slightly

(04:27):
different potential outcomes and reviews of it depending on which
team you're in.

Speaker 2 (04:32):
And I guess every time they go out on the
water for a race, they're improving all the time, all
the teams, including Team New Zealand, aren't they they're learning.

Speaker 1 (04:40):
Well, that's absolutely imperative in the game and any kind
of research and development design game, you have to keep
stepping forward, and we are seeing those improvements the difficulty
for the challenges, particularly those towards the bottom of the
scoreboarders they cannot hold anyth back because they are at

(05:02):
the risk of going home, whereas at the other end
you've got the luxury if you like, through already being
competitive to not having to put your best kit out there.
Grant Dalton's already been pretty public about the fact that
Emirates Team New Zealand are not using their fastest setup.
To my eye, I see that they're using older sales

(05:24):
Lunar ROSSI Pritor Bralli has put a new set on
for round robin, round robin runt one. But it's not
just that I suspect that Emirates Team New Zealand has
a configuration of their foils that they consider to be
better than what they're currently using, so they've got a
few cards yet to play in their hand, whereas the

(05:44):
others I think are having to just play everything they've
got and try and just improve with their current kit.
So it looks it looks a little bit ominous for
the other challenges. Lunar Rossi, Pritor Bralli absolutely in the
prime position emorates Team New Zealand I think will be
comfortable with where they're at, but they won't assume anything.
They need to continue to step forward as well. Well.

Speaker 2 (06:05):
We look forward to the remainder of the races. Of
course the Louis Vaton after that, and then finally the
America's Cup. Mark, thank you for joining us this morning.

Speaker 1 (06:12):
Great absolute pleasure.

Speaker 2 (06:14):
Doctor Mark Aham's are joining us to talk America's Cup.
I love the look of these boats. They're just like
a Formula one car, state of the art Formula one car.
You can barely see the crew members now they're almost
below the deck with the tops of their crash onwards.
Incredible