Team BDA Hopeful Combines Passion, Degree
Emily Nagel, a 22-year-old in her final year of an Engineering Degree at Southampton University in the United Kingdom, is aiming to represent Bermuda as part of the the island’s Team BDA in the Red Bull Youth America’s Cup, with her endeavors in the sport including not only sailing, but boat building as well.
Regarding her history with the sport, Ms. Nagel said, “I started sailing at the Royal Bermuda Yacht Club when I was 10 years old; I was taught by Paul Doughty, like many of the Red Bull candidates.
“It wasn’t until I went to boarding school in the UK, however, that sailing really became my passion. I started sailing RS Fevas and was a member of the UK National Squad. We competed in multiple Worlds and European Championships and I caught the sailing bug.
“However, while at school I was always told that I couldn’t focus on both sailing and academics, and so I never followed the high performance pathway and instead focused on my studies and my sailing was made up of team racing on the school circuit.
“I decided to study mechanical engineering at University as science and maths have always been my stronger subjects. It was while I was at university that I started taking sailing more seriously. I’ve competed in team racing, match racing and fleet racing, representing both the university and GBR overseas.
“It was five weeks into my mechanical engineering course that I decided to switch course to Ship Science; it is a combination of mechanical engineering and Naval Architecture which basically means instead of learning to design cars and plains we focus on boat design, which as a sailor was a no brainer to switch to.
“Now I am able to combine my passion for sailing with my degree, I am hoping to go into High Performance Yacht Design after graduation; designing the America’s Cup yachts would be the real dream.”
Team BDA candidate Emily Nagel displays the hydrofoil she built from scratch:
Regarding her boat building skills, Ms. Nagel said, “The actual boat building has really only started this year as my course is much more about the theory and science. In our Masters year however we have a group design project and my project is to design, build and test a foiling research platform for a Nacra F18 that is interchangeable with other boats.
“This would allow you to put hydrofoils on any small two person catamaran without having to change the hull, brining foiling to more people. My role within the team has been to design and build the actual hydrofoils so I’ve spent the past few months designing them on the computer, running CFD [computational fluid dynamics] on the designs to determine the right size and shape to lift the boat out of the water [it will weigh almost 400kg] and now we are in the build phase.
“They are made out of 13 layers of carbon fibre which we had to lay up by hand so took 15 hours of cutting materials and 24 hours of actually putting them together.”
When asked how it feels to be a candidate for Team BDA at the Youth America’s Cup, Ms. Nagel said, “Being a candidate for Team BDA is incredibly exciting. I have followed the America’s Cup for a very long time so when trials were first announced I signed up immediately.
“I have been training solidly for the past few months, particularly focusing on my upper body strength. I have made significant improvements since the last camp but I’m still not as strong as some of the boys so no time to rest just yet.”
When asked about her future with sailing, Ms. Nagel said, “Currently my plans are quite open, the next year depends on what happens with Team BDA and how much time is spent training for that. Ideally I will be looking at finding a job post 2017 with a yacht design company.
“Unfortunately there aren’t any in Bermuda, so I will most likely be looking overseas – unless I can convince Oracle to give me a job!”
The final training camp for Team BDA candidates will be held from March 23 to March 27, where coaches will have a close eye over the athletes and sailors as once again they are put through intensive physical training, sailing drills, and mental tasks.
