America’s Cup 2024: Andoo Australia youth team’s historic moment on AC40 foiling boat
On a historic day four young guns took to America’s Cup water under an Australian flag as our youth team limbered up for a return to the famous regatta on a mad, crazy machine.
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On a historic day a quartet of sailing young guns took to the waters of an America’s Cup under an Australian flag for the first time in more than two decades as our youth team limbered up for a return to the famous regatta next week on a mad, crazy machine.
While the team were just training in the ultra -fast foiling 40-footer they will race next week in the new America’s Cup youth regatta, it was still a memorable moment for all four who were not even born the last time an Australian boat challenged in the AC arena.
During the late Syd Fischer’s Young Australia campaign in 1999/2000, Sydney’s James Spithill - just 19 but now a two-time America’s Cup winner and helmsman with the highly fancied Italian Luna Rosa Prada Pirelli challenger in Barcelona at the 37th Americas Cup - became the youngest helmsman in history when he lead his rookie crew into battle in the Louis Vuitton Cup.
The special moment was not lost on the current team in Spain - comprising helmsmen Cole Tapper and Jack Ferguson and trimmers Tom Needham and Max Paul.
“Not in my lifetime, I don’t think, so yeah, it’s cool that we’ve got this opportunity really to fly the flag for Australia,” said Needham, a top ranked 49er sailor and former Queensland Sailor of the Year who has been working as a hydraulic engineer.
Part of the Andoo Australia Challenge campaign in the youth and women’s Americas Cup is to test the waters for a fully cocked Cup campaign.
“A really big part of our program is to have a legacy moving forward,’’ Needham said.
“It’s not about just this one event, it’s about having something for the future, so bringing youth into the sport.
“And moving forward, if that evolves into an America’s Cup program, a fully-fledged program for Australia, I think that’s the idea, and that would be a really cool project to be a part of.”
Encouragingly, after having to initially sail with two experienced members of the New Zealand crew to ensure they were familiar enough to train on their own, the Australians got crucial practice time in - without a crash or major issue.
“As part of the protocol with the AC, we start two up, so we’ve got one Aussie skipper and one Aussie trimmer on board and we’re sharing a boat with the Kiwis, which is kind of funny,’’ Needham said.
“They’re basically checking if they’re happy for us to take the boat four-up. It’s basically a compliance thing with the AC and after about 30, 40 minutes of sailing, we went to three-up and then 20 minutes later we went four-up, so four Aussies on board, and that’s how we finished off the session, which is pretty cool.’’
Youth and women’s Teams associated with the America’s Cup challenger and the defender New Zealand have all had time for on-water training on their SC 40 boats.
Australia managed to charter one briefly for a few hours of training last month but most of their practice has been on a computer simulator in Sydney.
“We spent a lot of time in the simulator and it’s very valuable to spend those hours,” Needham said.
“If we had a boat for ourselves, I’m sure we’d be sailing that five, six days a week, like some of the other teams do, but the simulator, yeah, it’s been critical for our performance.”
There are two groups for the Youth regatta with group one the boats of the AC challengers and New Zealand defender as they have had significantly more time to train for the event in their own AC40s,
Group 2 is for the invited teams which includes Australia and have had only limited time to learn the nuances of the AC40 they will race.
Group 1 will race first on September 17 with Australia racing for the first time the following day. September 22 is the Youth AC semi and September 26 the Youth AC final.
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