The designers' challenge

Saturday 31 October 2009 15:30 GMT

The new Volvo Open 70 Rule and Notice of Race has been studied by the men tasked with drawing the lines of the new generation of challengers for the 2011-12 race - the designers.

Today we publish the views of two of the industry's most influential design houses - Juan Yacht Design (JYD) , responsible for the last two winning Volvo Open 70s (ABN AMRO ONE and Ericsson 4), and Botin Carkeek, who designed PUMA's il mostro.

Santiago Lange, double bronze Olympic medallist and Volvo Ocean Race competitor, who now works alongside fellow-Argentinian Juan Kouyoumdjian at JYD, has mixed feelings about the new Rule.

"From all of the draft rules and Notice of Race we have received from the Volvo Ocean Race organization, these are the best ones," Lange, a crew member aboard Telefonica Black in the 2008-09 race, said. "I think they have achieved what they were looking for when they started to develop the rules for this race.

"I think designing will be a lot more challenging in terms of refinements. This will be the third race under these rules and the boats will get closer which will result in a greater effort to get an advantage.

"For example, the limitations, on the amounts of sails may results in teams having very different strategies on sail inventory. This could end up with the boats being more spread out. Choosing the right sail inventory could be quite an important factor."

However, Lange does have issues with the administration of some aspects of the Rule. "The point that worries us the most is the function of the arbitration panel," he added.

"We believe that there should be a measurement group, an interpretation group and an independent body, as the arbitration panel to decide any difference of understanding between these bodies and the participant.

Botin Carkeek, based in Santander, Spain, boasts a plethora of winning designs, including TP52s and IRC yachts.

BC's Adolfo Carrau, while applauding the structure of the Rule, has concerns over costs. "In general, the version three rule is well written and has addressed some issues which were not clear in the previous version," he said.

"In concept it has not changed much, although there are some specific changes in the Notice of Race regarding sail limitations and stack positioning, which will affect design considerably. This is a dramatic change in the sail crossovers, compared to the previous event.

"So it's almost like starting from scratch in some areas, which will benefit teams with more R&D budget. We are not sure this was the intention of the rule makers, as costs will not go down."

For designers any rule changes will affect their programme and subsequently the simulations they perform on these designs.

 

Lange believes the major impacts will be felt by the ban on two-boat testing, limiting the amount of pre-race sails, reducing the amount of sails onboard that can be used (Click on graphic to enlarge)

during the race, limitations on foils and only being able to build one new boat.

"Basically all this means is more simulations and research in the design office to compensate for the reduced amount of testing you are able to do in the water," he said.

"The limit on stacking in the aft watertight compartment will also have an impact in the performance of the boats and on their hull shape."

Limiting the number of appendages a team can build has been introduced to cut costs, but Lange believes this will move that budget over to the R&D of the appendages. "Yes, we will have to be more conservative in design and there is less room to try something very extreme," he added.

Botin Carkeek has a slightly different view on this subject. "Depending on the different team's build and launch dates, we could push for more radical or conservative designs," said Carrau. "Experience tells us that unless you have the boat ready very early, then there's no time to experiment with appendages or masts in full scale."

The 2008-09 race saw teams build two new boats and test them against one another pre-race. The teams will only be allowed to build one new boat this edition, making it harder to test, but reducing the cost substantially. "We will have to rely more on accurate simulations, rather than two-boat testing," said Carrau.

"It's clear that designers with recent experience in Volvo Open 70s will have an edge, as our VPPs (Velocity Prediction Programmes) are well tuned and validated against real data. This means that the R&D budget will have to increase, and more time will be spent doing research on sails, hulls and appendages. But overall cost will be much less than a two-boat campaign."

Kouyoumdjian's last two Volvo Ocean Race projects (ABN AMRO and Ericsson) have both been successful two-boat campaigns, but as this is a thing of the past how will they adjust? "In previous editions the teams we worked for would build two boats in the same boat yard, which allowed us to build the second boat later in the program. This gave us more time for research," Lange said.

"In an equivalent time frame, the second boat would be started in December, while now we will be starting later than June, which will be risky. This is why we had to start the research early, before the rules were published.

Lange adds: "The Volvo Open 70s have been breaking 24-hour records subsequently since they were born. At the moment the Volvo Open 70, Ericsson 4, holds the monohull 24-hour record but with the rule changes and the limitation of sails, crew will have to push hard to break that record."

Finally, both design houses are looking forward to discovering the route of the 2011-12 edition which will be announced in March next year. "The clock is already ticking and new teams are eager to go sailing," says Carrau. "We congratulate Volvo for making announcements early, and also hope to have the basic course outline as soon as possible."

Interviews: Sophie Luther and Helena De La Gandara

 

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