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The America’s Cup has a long history in which teams seek to gather details about their competitors. As these efforts escalated, it became an expensive aspect of the event, so it was with good intentions that the 37th edition had banned spying.
Instead, neutral reconnaissance units administered by the event authority would shadow each team on each and every sailing day, collating reports, photos, videos, and interviews which are then uploaded to a single source for all the teams to view and process independently.
While this plan also gave the public a heightened level of information, the content proved to be painfully dry and technical for the casual viewer. The information also proved to be suspect, according to Ben Ainslie, skipper of the British challenger.
“We have the reconnaissance that covers all of the teams and that’s quite entertaining when you know how your day has gone and you read the write up, and in many cases it’s a million miles off the reality,” said Ainslie. “So, we expect that that’s the same with the other teams as well.
“Until we actually line up proper with these other teams, you’re sort of guessing. There’s a long long way to go between now and when we start competition so it is about getting this boat up to the performance to know it’s optimized. That’s the key.”
For his complete interview, click here.
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