Marcelino Botin: nervous times for a yacht designer
Spanish yacht designer Marcelino Botin is part of the design team that drew the lines of NZL 92, Emirates Team New Zealand’s boat which dominated the Louis Vuitton Cup Finals two weeks ago. Now Botin waits with anticipation to see how ‘92’ will fare against SUI 100, Alinghi’s choice to defend the 32nd America’s Cup.
This must be a nailbiting time for you, watching NZL 92 about to compete in the America’s Cup?
“It is. You always want to measure yourself against the best guys, and Alinghi are the best guys, so yes, interesting times.”
Do you pay much attention to the speculation about Alinghi being the faster boat?
“They’re definitely the favourite for this match. They’ve been the best team for the last two or three years. On the other hand, just because of the way the Cup is organised, the Defender has more time for testing and developing, while the challengers have more opportunity for racing. They are favourite, but we’ve definitely got a chance.”
By the very nature of the Louis Vuitton Cup, Alinghi has had two months more to focus on development. Does that give them an inherent design advantage?
“They’ve had more than two extra months to work on the design. By June last year we had to decide on our second boat without having sailed it against any other boats, while they obviously had a lot of time to sail against other boats, and had to time to modify their previous generation of boats. That’s the situation you have to live with. We’ve had more time in the water, and had more to develop things on the water. So it’s a bit of a trade-off.”
When you compare the hull form and package of the two boats, what conclusions can you draw?
“There are things you see and things you don’t see. You see the hulls, appendages, mast and sails. We’re pretty happy with our package. It’s got good all-round attributes for match racing. It accelerates well, tacks well, it’s good in a variety of conditions, and from that point of view we are pretty happy and we’re satisfied. It’s a pretty good boat. But you never know, they could have advantages in all areas, it’s very hard to judge other teams. The best boat is usually a compromise of many different things, but what works for them may not work for you. It’s hard to draw conclusions.”
But you have the narrower hull, which should make you better in the light winds?
“I’m not sure we do have a narrower hull. We might be narrower at deck level, but at waterline I think Alinghi might be similar or even narrower. “
So you don’t go along with this idea that you’ll be strong below 10 knots, and they’ll be stronger above 10 knots?
“I think they’ll be strong in all conditions. SUI 100 seems to be narrower than SUI 91, it seems more downrange than SUI 91. I think the boats will be similar on waterline length.”
So as a designer for the team, how have you been contributing in the final build-up to the Match?
“There’s little we (the designers) can do at this stage. All we can do is optimise the boat for the conditions, but the whole team knows how to do that. As a team, we try to understand Alinghi’s strengths and weaknesses and match that with the equipment we’ve got, with keels, rudders and so on. We just try to match the opposition as best as possible. The objective is to look at your opponent, guess what he’s going to do, act accordingly, then look at the weather forecast and work out what your performance will be in relation to the expected weather.”
What weather do you expect for the Match?
“Our first impression is that it could be light. The series is pretty long, it’s hard to make a long-range prediction.”
What will you be thinking as the boats cross the start line of the first race?
“It will be a nervous moment. I’ll be on the ETNZ tender with Live Sailing on board, which let’s you know how you’re doing. I just hope it’s a great match and that people enjoy it.”
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