Full Race Replay | The PRADA Christmas Race | America's Cup

The PRADA Christmas Race is a one day knock out series, based on the seeding from the PRADA ACWS Auckland, NZ and the last chance for teams to take on the Defender before the 36th America’s Cup Presented by PRADA.

Race 1 – Emirates Team New Zealand vs NEOS TEAM UK

Race 2 – New York Yacht Club American Magic vs Luna Rossa PRADA Pirelli

Race 3 – 2nd Place from Race 1 vs 2nd Place from Race 2.

Race 4 – 1st Place from Race 1 vs 1st Place from Race 2.

The 36th America's Cup presented by Prada will be contested by the winner of the 2017 America's Cup, the Royal New Zealand Yacht Squadron represented by their team, Emirates Team New Zealand, and the winner of the Prada Cup, the challenger selection series which takes place in January–February in 2021.

#AmericasCup #AC36 #Auckland2021

[hansman]

1:20:35 Guy casually taking a piss on national television....lol

[Gottenhimfella]

Here's an idea for identifying the corners of the playing field for the spectator fleet: a decent sized helium balloon 10m above the water at each end of each boundary, flying from a pre-laid buoy (or perhaps for the AmCup, a remotely repositionable floating platform for faster course relocation or adjustment). There might be an additional balloon at the midpoint of long boundaries. All the balloons on a particular boundary to be the same colour.
In stronger breezes the balloons could be smaller, perhaps with streamers from the tether line if difficult to see.

[kerryhanford]

Team NZ look good in these light winds as especially they do at the high end.

[twister]

What have we learnt? The Americas cup has eaten itself. What a huge disappointment. Zero racing once past the start line and zero racing in anything but optimal conditions.

[Rascallucci]

So, the whole Christmas Race decider is cancelled? Not even postponed to next week?

[claudiocampanelli]

NZ is a another wolrd, it is an amazing team and they have an amazing sailboth

[zbuk]

oh, women and men! what a weekend! greets from Poland, thanks for Your job well done ;)

[roythompson]

The 'penalty' for splashing down and coming off the foils is far too great, sorry, this is just not what we want to see...

[vanislerider]

When these boats race in these conditions they still sail faster then conventional monohulls!!! It's a far cry from what they are capable but it's still sailing and racing.

[vipecrx]

"You just have to walk in to the club (that costs 50k initiation + 15k yearly fee) to see that it is the same as any other yatch club..."

[Jacob-W-]

I hoped it would've been a fleet race set up for this christmasrace, oh well let's see how this one turns out, I just binged the world series.

[Jacob-W-]

So when are they going to re start this christmas race? next weekend?

[theVoyage]

I feel bad for the British, their VMG was down to paddling speeds briefly there.

[garfield]

From little britain: "Computer says no"

What? You don’t go out on the water tomorrow? Why not? I don’t understand that. What a pity 😳😢😭😭😭

[andrew.l.]

Unlucky for a sailor at 1:20:37. Camera caught him having a slash over the side lol

[mitchand]

I think my favourite team INEOS tried to sail home half way up the first beat against ETNZ.

Ben don't you dare!! We got 3 months to fix things and try gain some speed.

[JohnWilson-csiq]

I don't know why the commentators kept banging on about the splash down costing American Magic the race. Ok, it didn't help them but they won the start, were ahead by 185 meters at 2:23:13 Team NZ pulled them in & crossed ahead at 2:23:56. The splash down happened at 2:25:15 when Team NZ were a good 100 meters in front & all but Team NZ not splashing down it was game over at that point. Proud to be a Kiwi. :)

[davidmartin]

INEOS proved they have the best hull of the two, when off the foils and 'sailing' we were consistently 3 knots faster..! It just would have taken half a day per race. I'm British and want to see us competing, only three of the four teams being competitive makes for a very uneven format sadly.

[robertrjm]

I am not convinced about this new class of sailing boats.

Admittedly, they are an incredible piece of engineering and technology, but having a sailing boat which can only sail in a very narrow range of conditions as set up prior to a race is not very representative of the sport of sailing.
YES, there is a phänomenal amount strategy and boat handling skills required but if conditions change as they have done in this race, it makes a mockery of the sport.
When the boats a flying, they are a sight to behold, but if they are sitting ducks in the water, they are boring. The time it takes to get a boat foiling is just not sensible.
Winning a race by miles, because of one irrecoverable, or slow to recover, a mistake such as a splashdown by another crew is not very exciting.
The other aspect is the layout of the course. Adapting the location of a rectangular up-down course to suit the wind conditions having the wind come down the course, is just not exciting (race day 3) and one sees either a procession or a near symmetrical split. A real challenge would be a triangular race course where the boats are challenged to a much wider range of conditions and have to adapt, but then the boats would have to be able to sail in a wider range of conditions including changing sails, including spinnakers or reefing them to adapt, but that does not seem to be possible.