CC MEMO -- Malmö Schedule

[Updated Friday, 5 August and again on Thursday, 18 August.]

Below is based on Attachment 2 to the Act 6 NOR. It is unofficial and for consolidated guidance only. For the official schedule refer to the NORs and ACM advisories. A few CC-relevant additions are in italics:

SCHEDULE for MALMÖ-SKÅNE LOUIS VUITTON Act 6 (Match Racing) & Act 7 (Fleet Racing)

Day Date, Time -- Event; Remarks

Sun 14 Aug -- Ship unload begins; Malmö.

Thu 18 Aug, 1730 -- Competitors Meeting; Jury Room (1st floor, Regatta Operations Office, ACM Office Building located at the Malmö Högskola).

Fri 19 Aug, 0730 -- Start of Measurement Controls.

Sat-Tue 20-23 Aug -- Measurement (by appointment).

Tue 23 Aug, 0900-1700 -- Challenger Commission Meeting; Slagthuset Conference Centre.

Tue 23 Aug, 1200 -- Practice Race(s) 1st Warning Signal.

Tue 23 Aug, 1830 -- Competitor’s Meeting; Jury Room.

Wed 24 Aug, 1400 -- Measurement Deadline.

Wed 24 Aug -- Various Flagged Vessel meetings (see Regatta Notice #22) throughout the day.

Thu 25 Aug, 1200 -- Act 6 Racing; First Warning Signal.

Fri 26 Aug Fri, 1200 -- Act 6 Racing; First Warning Signal.

Sat 27 Aug, 1200 -- Act 6 Racing; First Warning Signal.

Sun 28 Aug, 1200 -- Act 6 Racing; First Warning Signal.

Mon 29 Aug, 1200 -- Act 6 Racing; First Warning Signal.

Tue 30 Aug, 1200 -- Act 6 Racing; First Warning Signal; followed by Docking Ceremony & Prizes unless racing carries over to the Reserve Days.

Wed 31 Aug -- Act 6 Reserve Day; racing if necessary to complete the Round Robin.

Thu 1 Sep -- Act 6 Reserve Day; racing if necessary to complete the Round Robin.

Fri 2 Sep, 1200 -- Act 7 Racing; First Warning Signal (also Act 6 Reserve Day if necessary to Complete the Round Robin).

Sat 3 Sep, 1200 -- Act 7 Racing; First Warning Signal.

Sun 4 Sep, 1200 -- Act 7 Racing; First Warning Signal, racing followed by Docking Ceremony & Prizes.

Mon 5 Sep, 1200 -- Challenger Commission meeting (Acts 6-7 debrief).

Mon-Tue 5-6 Sep -- Pack-up and ship loading.

REGATTA DIRECTOR -- Act 7 Notice of Race

Have been waiting to post the Act 7 NOR, which was issued by the Regatta Director some time ago, pending the issuance of the amended Act 6 NOR and the Act 6 SIs. This, as you will have seen from our preceding post, took place yesterday.

Dyer advises this morning that he will issue an amended Act 7 NOR (to conform to the schedule amendments made in the Act 6 NOR), as well as the Act 7 SIs, early next week.

If in the meantime you need Dyer's original Act 7 NOR, it is available here.

REGATTA DIRECTOR -- Act 6 NOR and SIs

Today the Regatta Director issued an amended Act 6 Notice of Race (with Amendment #1 dated 26 July 05), and the Act 6 Sailing Instructions.

Both documents reflect the agreement on various Race Ops issues of the past few weeks between the Regatta Director, the CC and the Defender per our earlier post.

CC MEMO -- New Cup Info Search Engine

[Updated Wednesday, 14 September 05]

The CC strives to provide tools to Challengers in line with our mission, "To relieve the Defender from the burden of holding the Cup."

To that end, we are pleased to announce a new, comprehensive, multi-lingual (including Chinese) internet search engine that gives Challengers access to virtually all Cup information on the net -- whether of a general, sportive or technical nature; even historical and images. The search engine is available here.




P.S. Perhaps this post should be back-dated to, say, 1 April 2005. Obviously, Valencia's summer heat is finally getting to us.

CC MEMO -- China Team Website URL

China Team's attractive website is no longer available at the old Le Defi URL; you may wish to update your links to http://www.china-team.org.

CC MEMO -- Dawn Riley Ink

CC member Dawn Riley (K-Challenge) is featured in a nice article in yesterday's San Francisco Chronicle.

Entitled "Sailing camp floats kids' boats -- True Youth aims to make the sport accessible to all", it is well worth taking the time to read. Nice ink for Dawn and her organization True Youth, but more importantly some very good p.r. for the America's Cup.



Dawn Riley winning the Cup in '92 with Bill Koch's
America Cubed.

CC MEMO -- LV Acts 6-9 Race Ops Update

Over the past two weeks, Regatta Director Dyer Jones has again consulted with the CC and Defender on a number of race operations issues for the upcoming Louis Vuitton Acts 6 and 7 in Malmoe, SWE (Aug/Sep), as well as the subsequent LV Acts 8 and 9 in Trapani (Sciliy), ITA (Sep/Oct). The following consensus was acheived, and the relevant Notices of Race and Sailing Instructions will be issued or amended accordingly....

To help assure that the round robins in match racing Acts 6 and 8 will be completed, even if the wind is not as cooperative as it was in Valencia:

+ For Malmoe, Thursday 1 September will be a "reserve day" not an "off day" (likewise Thursday 6 October in Trapani).

+ For Malmoe, Friday 2 September -- the first day of the fleet racing Act 7 -- will also be an Act 6 reserve day and used, if necessary, to complete the match racing round robin. However, this only if it looks like both Saturday and Sunday will be sailable and, therefore, it is likely beyond a reasonable doubt that three of the five fleet races scheduled for Act 7 will be completed (likewise Friday 7 October in Trapani).

+ For Malmoe, races may be started (warning signal made) an hour later -- up to 19:30 instead of 18:30 -- since that far north there is still plenty of light later in the day. Same is under consideration for Trapani, subject to sunset times, course locations, towing distances, etc.

+ Courses for match racing Acts 6 and 8 may be a single lap (windward-leeward, 2 legs of 3.o nautical miles each), which would make it easier to get in three flights per day if necessary. However, all Act 7 and 9 fleet races will remain minimum two laps.

Other race ops issues agreed:

+ Starting line entry-end assignments for Act 6 will be the opposite of Act 4, i.e., if Shosholoza had starboard entry against Mascalzone Latino in Act 4, Shosholoza will have port entry against Mascalzone in Act 6. For Act 8, entry will be assigned according to the 2005 ACC Championship standings (a la Act 4).

+ We will switch to using high point scoring for the ACC season championship. Thus the season championship will now be scored the same as the fleet-race Acts -- 12 points for first place, 11 for second, etc. -- and similar to the Valencia Plan CSS scoring system (which is also high point, but 11 points for 1st, 10 for second, etc., since with Alinghi not counting there are only 11 teams).

Other issues of note confirmed (status quo):

+ There will be no MDS program or ACM/MDS weather boats at either Malmoe or Trapani.

+ Only one race need be completed in fleet racing Acts 7 and 9 to constitute a series.

A number of race ops issues pertaining to the 2006 Acts were also discussed and tentatively agreed, and these will be the subject of another post shortly.

All involved with the CC appreciate the constructive, consultative approach of Regatta Director Dyer Jones, and the good working relationship with Alinghi's Hamish Ross.

CC MEMO -- Postus Interruptus

Our posting hiatus is coming to an end. We have enjoyed a couple weeks off, and will be back at it this week. Thanks for your inquiries to see if we had survived the Acts and the hectic days immediately following.