On the ride home last night, I was listening to one of my favorite podcasts, Stuart Streuli’s Sailingworld podcast. This week, Stuart was interviewing, Pete Melvin, one of the engineers behind, Alinghi’s America’s Cup Catamaran.
The engineering challenges in building a multihull of that size are mind-blowing. I had to listen to the podcast twice to fully get it. It makes me wonder though whether this could end up being a battle of boat physics where the race was won on the design table. I doubt it will be a fiasco like ’88 but the difference in strategies between BMW Oracle and Alinghi are large enough that it could be a one-sided affair. I guess we won’t know till February.
