America’s Cup 2021 – UK INEOS team captain Ben Ainslie blames New Zealand team for team problems on day one of the World Series

The New Zealand team could face a day without an opponent on Friday as the INEOS UK team races against the clock to overcome a problem with their AC75 for the second day of the America’s Cup World Series.

The New Zealand team is scheduled to face the British team twice on Friday, however the challenger needs to repair a problem with the aluminum edge system that saw them struggle in their opening race and withdraw from the second on day one. career.

The superelevation system has been a sticking point for teams in the lead-up to the event, and Luna Rossa’s Max Sirena revealed last month that her team had had its own issues with the supplied AC75 component.

At the time, Sirena described the key design component, provided by the New Zealand team to all teams, as something from a normal car that is placed in a Formula One car.

Speaking after Thursday’s sailing, INEOS Team UK skipper Sir Ben Ainslie admitted that there was no guarantee that his crew would be ready to take their place in the water on day two due to the problem.

“We’ve probably wasted weeks of this campaign on the water dealing with the aluminum ridge system,” Ainslie said.

“I can’t speak for the other teams, but I imagine they have lost several days as well. It’s a challenge.”

The aluminum cant system, a uniquely designed component that is provided to all equipment and which is effectively the hydraulic system that controls the aluminum arms on the AC75s, was designed by Team New Zealand, so the software is proprietary team intellectual.

Ainslie suggested that the Kiwi team had been reluctant to share that software with other teams, but hoped that the issues that turned them into mere spectators on the first day of competitive racing in an AC75 would spur a better working relationship on the subject.

“I’m not saying it’s any team’s fault, I just think we have to work together better than we are to solve it, and we need some resolution for a team that loses races through no fault of their own, software,” Ainslie said. .

“We have been working together to try to solve the problem. It is more complicated, because much of the information, the software comes from the New Zealand team. On the one hand, I can understand that they do not want to share that data and that intellectual property, but Unless we understand it, it is very difficult for the other teams to answer and solve it, and it is not solved, so even if it is our problem today, tomorrow it will be someone else’s problem.

“It is not a perfect scenario, I think it has to be fixed, if it is not for our team, it will be another team, another day and it would not be terrible if the Copa América decided on something like that. We have to solve it.”

“In general, the teams have been quite collaborative on these issues; this has been a sticking point and hopefully this is the last nail that gets him across the line.”

The problem has limited the British challenger’s ability to really demonstrate what his boat is capable of. Although Ainslie admitted that they still had some ground left to regain sailing in lighter wind conditions, he trusted his equipment.

“We have a number of problems; the roll system is just one of them,” he admitted.

“Our performance in the lighter paces is not good enough; it is not where it should be and it is certainly not as good as the Italians and the Kiwis. We are working hard to solve that and that is the challenge of the Cup, it is never going. to be easy. It is particularly difficult for us and the moment, but I trust the team and we have the right people to solve this. “

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