America’s Cup: The winds changed for the Prada Cup Final and America’s Cup match

The wind limits for the Prada Cup Final or the Copa America will not be increased.

The upper boundaries are set to increase from 21 knots to 23 knots for each of the Auckland Summer Regatta prestige events.

But record rival Luna Rossa and defender Team Emirates New Zealand, in consultation with regattas director Ian Murray, decided to stick to the 21 knots used so far during the World Series, the Prada Cup, and the semi-finals.

This comes after a review of AC75 yachting performance and differences between yacht wind gauge data and race management data due to different gauge heights.

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A minimum wind of 6.5 knots remains in place.

Luna Rossa and UK’s Eneos team are competing for the Prada Cup Final out of 13 races, starting on Saturday.

The limits of the upper winds were a contentious issue when the regattas were originally drawn up. The New Zealand team was pushing 24 knots while Luna Rossa wanted to reach 20 knots.

Sure enough, the monocoque was performing at the frontier of the upper winds although the dramatic flip of American Magic came while racing in that windy region, complicated by an unexpected storm while trying to hard maneuver.

The event organizers also decided to return the 15-minute time limit for the teams participating in the Prada Cup Final and the Copa America match.

It gives the team a chance to beat their last-minute hiccups.

The INEOS UK team effectively used this to fix a major sailing problem and go ahead with beating Luna Rossa in the last-round race and securing a direct entry into the Prada Cup Final.

The base was then dropped in the Prada Cup semi-final, alarmed by American Magic who felt he might have used it if technical issues emerged from the coup repairs.

The team is allowed to use it only once during each series, although this race must be abandoned that day or the delay request proves that it was due to the failure of the systems independent of that competitor’s responsibility, a “15 minute card” will be returned and can be used again by Relevant competitor.

Another requirement is that if the Prada Cup Final has been pushed past the last two spare days, the ‘Card’ cannot be used in the last 60 minutes available to start.