U.S. SailGP Rushes To Fix Wing For Halifax
SailGP Tech and Shore Teams will be under pressure to fix the U.S.’s damaged wing in time to get them back on the water for Halifax, the league’s commentators have said.
The U.S. team dramatically capsized before racing started in Bermuda, causing significant damage to their wing which couldn’t be repaired in time for racing. But SailGP commentators said repairing the wing in time for Halifax on June 1/2 will still be a push.”
“It’s fingers crossed the Americans can even get their wing ready in time,” commentator Emily Nagel said, pointing to the fact that ‘Halifax isn’t that far away’. “The pressure is really going to be on the Tech and Shore Teams to get that wing repaired and get that team out racing.”
“If the team is forced to miss another event, it will be ‘pretty much no go for the Grand Final,’ she added.
Fellow commentator Stevie Morrison agreed, highlighting the significant damage sustained to the wing. “They broke the main element – on a normal sailing boat it’s a bit like the mast, and because they hit the water so hard and so fast, it snapped that element,” he said. “It’s actually a big repair for the Tech Team to get done.”
The U.S. team also need to ‘reframe’ their approach to ‘their SailGP campaign,’ Morrison said, describing it as ‘naive’.
“They’ve come in talking of Finals,” he said, “I think they need to be working on the basics, working on the maneuvers, chipping away and slowly getting better.”
Nagel agreed, arguing the team “hasn’t necessarily done the work between the events.”
“I would expect them to be in the simulator, I would expect the wing trimmer to be learning the button panel,” she said.
After the incident, wing trimmer Victor Diaz de Leon admitted the capsize was due to his error of accidentally pressing the wrong button on his control panel.
Despite the set back in Bermuda, Morrison said the team will be ‘fired up’ ahead of the upcoming events in Halifax and New York.”
They say it’s how they bounce back that will define them and what better way than being on home turf?” Morrison asked. “Expect big things fro the U.S. team going forward.”
The F50 fleet will next meet for battle at the ROCKWOOL Canada Sail Grand Prix | Halifax on June 1/2.
