Foiling Week 2014 at Lake Garda overall

by Johno Fullerton, Grand Prix Sailing on 18 Jul 2014 Foiling Week 2014 took place on Lake Garda from 5 - 11 July and is already causing quite a stir in the fast and furious world of foiling.

The new event created by Luca Rizzotti with colleagues Andrea Ratti and Domenico Boffi was dedicated to the designers, builders and sailors of all types of foiling craft from kite foilers to large catamarans.

After a warm up regatta, the Italian Moth Championships had set the scene, the main event consisted of a series of forums where foiling experts could discuss and debate ideas, issues, theories and experiences. A combined mixed fleet then sailed an endurance race around a trapezoid type course off Malcesine on Lake Garda.

The afternoons were available for invitational races, speed runs and boat testing of brand new foiling concept boats, all at a spectacular destination with perfect launching facilities and a fully operational club at Fraglia Vela Malcesine.

Cutting edge designers and top sailors mixed with a sprinkling of adventurers and dreamers to make an eclectic mix of ‘magnificent men and their flying machines‘ coming together for a week of foiling fun and frolics.

Invitational Races and Speed Runs
The endurance race held in a gusty 12 - 16 knots on a trapezoid type course off Malcesine became quite a contest between the foiling kites and the Moths, each trading places on different legs of the course. In the end it was the kites who got the edge with local Simone Vannucci (ITA) scoring two bullets to win from Austrian Adrian Geislinger and Slovenian Toni Vodisek in third. Daniele Domenicale (ITA) was fourth in a single foiler and Australian Josh Mcknight, the first Moth in fifth overall.

Some of the craft on display on and off the water

GC32 Class with CEO - Andrew ‘Maca’ MacPherson
More familiar looking to fans of the AC72 is the GC32. Designed to fit in a trailer you can tow behind your car, and to be rigged and launched without a crane, GC32 Class CEO has grandiose plans for the GC32 Great Cup circuit.
‘Maca’ believes he could get 20 or more GC32’s foiling at a number of regatta locations all over the globe in the next few years!

It’s a boat that can easily take sponsors for rides, whilst in Lake Garda, one of the demo boats sailed by Sebastian Col and Josh Macknight hit 37.9 knots on the lake with two guests onboard!

The GC32 may also be evidence that the design space of practical foiling catamarans is converging. It has the same length to width ratio, and the same exact daggerfoil rake range, as the AC62 Class rule according to Kevin Hall of Artemis Racing.

NB: Our run with two journos onboard effortlessly achieved 35 knots in 15 knots of breeze on Lake Garda!

C-Fly and offshore speed projects
The British C-FLY project is a catamaran with diamond foils on the bows. It’s a successful concept-proving boat. Their goal is to break ocean going records on foils. The sea-keeping characteristics of their design and the prototype are notable. The idea for this design is consistent reliable lift through seaway, not top speed in flat water.

Standby for another ocean-record foiling pursuit to be announced soon. Vestas Sailrocket 2 and Paul Larsen and his team have similar plans to sail across oceans above the water the whole way.

Seminars presented by legends of foiling
The morning forums featured legends of the sport, past and present including Martin Fischer, Tom Speer, James Grogono and Andrew McDougal to name just a few. See www.foilingweek.com for the full list.

Martin Fischer, a member of the Groupama and Oracle tri design teams, designer of the Flying Phantom and design team of the GC32 catamaran, amongst many others, was first up to as the keynote speaker on day one.

Martin provided a historical overview of foiling accompanied by an absorbing in depth presentation on the five main components of foiling consistently: Lift, Heave Stability, Pitch, Robustness and Cost!. With the memories of the last AC still very much in mind, there was a lot of emphasis on the word ‘Stability’.

Tom Speer - Oracle Team USA - Aero and Sail Project Leader
Tom had the seminar audience glued on the second day with his subject matter: 'The hydrodynamics of A Class Cat foils and stability'

Tom’s analysis of the design of A Class cat foils will be an absolute must for all budding A Class cat sailors. His graphs comparing the evolution of foils from J, C, L and Chevron foils has some very interesting conclusions.

Kevin Hall (Artemis Racing) commented 'The primary assumption was that the windward foil will remain down. This means the tradeoffs are very different to those on the AC72'

At the end of the week Tom was invited to go sailing on the GC32 cat. He looked slightly hesitant climbing into his sailing gear but try wiping the smile of his face when he came ashore!

'Having spent 40 years working with teams on foiling this is the first time I have ever gone foiling myself' he remarked!

Andrew ‘AMac’ McDougall (Moth builder and sailor)
With 40 years of experience of Moth development and construction ‘AMac’ gave the keynote speech on the final day, describing the development of the tools he has used to design cutting edge sailboard sails and Moths for the last 30 years.

He also dropped a hint on the impending launch of the ‘Waszp’ a revolutionary new mini moth design due to be launched in a couple of month’s time.

The Waszp prototype is similar in design to the Moth but with a smaller sail area with the club sailor in mind. It has a wishbone boom, collapsible wings that neatly fold into a box and can be transported with ease.
Standby for the launch very soon.

James Grogono - (Designer and Sailor)
Designer and sailor of Icarus and nicknamed ‘the grandfather of foiling’, James is one of the pioneers of foiling craft delivered his speech - ‘60 years of Icarus - from failure to success’.

James invented the first hydrofoil conversion of a standard sailing catamaran. For 10 years he held a ‘secret’ idea that foils would add speed to fast small sailing boats. There was no easy way of testing this until publication of the Tornado design in 1967. A perfect platform for foils had been created fortuitously by the designer.

In 1969 he acquired a Tornado, designed and structured wooden foils, screwed them on, and set sail. ‘Icarus’ flew slowly above the water, but suffered various failures and breakages. There was no incentive to progress into high tech metal foils without accurate speed measurement, so he applied himself, with others, to creating the sport of ‘Speed Sailing’.

In 1972 the first Speed Week was held at Weymouth, UK. ‘Icarus’, with her new metal foils, was the fastest hydrofoil, reaching 21.5 knots over the 500m course.

Over the next 15 years ‘Icarus’ held the B Class Record at speeds which increased slowly up to 28.4 knots. Grogono played a large role in ‘Mayfly’ and ‘Icarus 2’, which were one-man and three-man versions of the same concept.

Kevin Hall (Artemis Racing AC team)
Kevin Hall explained some of the strategies used when approaching an AC35 team campaign. Kevin was head of the Performance and Instruments Department at Artemis Racing leading up their 2013 effort to make it to the America’s Cup. With all the interest in the new AC62 Kevin held the attention of the room, you could have heard a pin drop!
'The passion in the air was so thick you could cut it with a foil.' said Kevin after the event.

Forums and Round table discussions
There has never been an event where so many experts had gathered in the same room with a common interest. One attendee remarked: 'If the Foiling Week seminars where run 10 years ago, many of the designers and boat builders could have saved a lot of time and money by sharing their knowledge at this unique forum of expert minds!'
Additional speakers presented studies on Engineering, Fluid Dynamics, Foil shapes with much discussion about stability, ventilation and cavitation.

One discussion led to an established need for a fast foiling stable support boat-Rib for regatta support and media use. Boat designers around the room were scribbling notes.

See website for playbacks of forums
See the foiling week website for playbacks of the seminars and interviews with panelists. www.foilingweek.com

Weird and Wonderful - ‘Wacky Racers’
In the boat park there were craft including foiling kiteboards, foiling windsurfers, an abundance of Moths and a number of prototypes like the 5.9, (A Class look alike cats), the Mirabaud LX (monohull-tri, you be the judge?) and even the W:Foil, resembling something out of ‘Chitty Chitty Bang Bang’ a propeller powered motor vessel that caused some amusement as it attempted to foil the length of Lake Garda!

The important thing about the many different platforms is not how they were different. They were brought together by the common joys of flying above the water instead of sailing on it.

Summary
The best thing about The Foiling Week was being under one roof. The joy of investigation and discovery, the step-change in performance brought by foiling, and the passion which comes from sharing these things face to face.
Who needs boat shows when you can go on a demo run during Foiling Week and showcase the best that foiling can offer?

Kevin Hall remarked on his blog: 'The Foiling Week on Lake Garda could easily become the mecca of modern sailing and design. The enthusiasm from organizers and participants matches the grandeur of the vision perfectly. I hope sponsors are already climbing over each other for next year’s event'
An event not to be missed in 2015!

Results

TFW MIXED FLEET RACE - July 10th

	Mixed Fleet Race 10/7/2014
Pos.	Class	Sail Nr.	Name, bow number	Points	Race 1	Race 2
1	Kite foiler	ITA 9996	Simone Vannucci	2	1	1
2	Kite foiler	AUT 2	Adrian Geislinger	4	2	2
3	Kite foiler	SLO 3	Toni Vodisek	7	4	3
4	Single foiler	ITA 8	Domenicali Daniele	16	12	4
5	International Moth	AUS 4142	Josh Mcknight	27	3	dns
6	Kite foiler	FRA 39	Benjamin Tillier	29	5	dns
7	International Moth	ITA 4139	Stefano Ferrighi	30	6	dns
8	International Moth	ITA 4092	Carlo De Paoli	31	7	dnf
9	International Moth	FRA 11	Sebastien Col	32	8	dns
10	International Moth	ITA 3887	Matteo Gritti	33	9	dnf
11	International Moth	ITA 4093	Stefano Rizzi	34	10	dns
12	Single foiler	ITA 16	Michele Petrucci	35	11	dnf
13	Double foiler	ITA 9999	Edoardo Bianchi	48	dns	dns
13	International Moth	AUS 6	Rob Gough	48	dnf	dns
13	International Moth	SUI 4112	Chris Rast	48	dnf	dns
13	International Moth	UK 4	Ben Paton	48	dns	dns
13	International Moth	GBR 4038	Tom Ofter	48	dns	dns
13	International Moth	SUI 3836	Adriano Petrino	48	dns	dns
13	More than 4 crew foiler	SUI 22222	Swiss Watch Manifactur	48	dns	dns
13	More than 4 crew foiler	22221	Spax Solution	48	dns	dns
13	Up to 4 crew foiler	SUI 9998	Thomas Jundt	48	dns	dns
13	Up to 4 crew foiler	GBR 9997	Philip Kenchington	48	dns	dns
13	Windsurf foiler	FRA 76	Bruno Andre	48	dnf	dnf

TFW MOTH INVITATIONAL - July 9th
Final

Pos.	Sail Nr.	Name, bow number	Points	Race 1
1	AUS 6	Rob Gough, 2	1	1
2	AUS 4142	Josh Mcknight, 9	2	2
3	UK 4	Ben Paton, 6	3	3

TFW MOTH INVITATIONAL - July 9th
Selection races

Pos.	Sail Nr.	Name, bow number	Points	Race 1	Race 2	Race 3	Race 4
1	AUS 4142	Josh Mcknight, 9	8	2	1	3	2
2	UK 4	Ben Paton, 6	11	5	3	2	1
3	AUS 6	Rob Gough, 2	13	7	2	1	3
4	SUI 4112	Chris Rast, 3	22	1	4	6	dnf
5	GBR 4038	Tom Ofter, 7	23	9	5	4	5
6	ITA 4092	Carlo De Paoli, 5	23	8	6	5	4
7	FRA 11	Sebastien Col, 8	25	4	8	7	6
8	ITA 41	Stefano Ferrighi, 13	32	3	7	dnf	dnf
9	ITA 4093	Stefano Rizzi, 0	36	6	dnf	8	dnf
10	AUS 111111	Andrew McDougall	44	dns	dns	dns	dns

 

MOTH NATIONAL OPEN – July 4th – 6th
Final Results

 

Event website

Pos.	Sail nr.	Name, Club	Points	Race 1	Race 2	Race 3	Race 4	Race 5	Race 6	Race 7	Race 8	Race 9
1	AUS 4142	Mac Knight Josh, RPAYC	7	1	1	-4	1	1	-2	1	1	1
2	ISV 4022	Kotoun Anthony, Sail Newport	20	2	2	2	6	2	4	(dns)	-11	2
3	GBR 4	Paton Ben, YC Lymington	27	6	3	5	3	4	3	3	(dns)	(dns)
4	GBR 4038	Offer Tom, Rock SC	30	5	-8	3	4	6	5	5	2	(dns)
5	AUS 6	Gough Rob, RYCT	36	3	4	1	2	3	1	(dns)	(dns)	22
6	ITA 4093	Rizzi Stefano, SVOC	41	7	5	6	5	5	-11	-12	7	6
7	SUI 4112	Rast Chritopher, TYC/RCO/MBYC	42	-19	6	7	-12	9	10	2	3	5
8	GBR 3985	Hiscocks Simon, WPNSA	43	8	7	8	(ocs)	7	-13	6	4	3
9	AUS 3900	Mc Dougall Andrew, Black Rock YL	45	4	9	(dns)	10	-14	6	4	8	4
10	ITA 4108	Stuffer Harald, AVLC	64	10	-15	14	9	10	-16	7	6	8
11	ITA 4092	De Paoli Carlo, CV TORBOLE	69	14	-18	11	-17	11	12	9	5	7
12	ITA 3855	Mazzetti Fabio, CV ARCO	74	12	11	9	8	-13	-15	13	10	11
13	SUI 3626	Reneker Matthias, RCO	79	13	14	-17	-16	12	9	10	9	12
14	ITA 4030	Lanulfi Marco, YC Acquafresca	86	11	(dns)	(dns)	7	15	8	15	16	14
15	SUI 4032	De Siebenthal Jean Pierre, SN GENEVE	97	15	-24	-20	19	19	7	14	14	9
16	ITA 3901	Stuffer Peter, AVLC	99	16	20	-21	-21	16	14	8	12	13
17	ITA 41	Ferrighi Stefano, FV Riva	100	9	(dns)	(dns)	13	8	dns	11	13	10
18	FRA 3879	Blanc Pierre, C. VAR MER	111	17	12	13	18	-20	17	16	-21	18
19	GER 3389	Huber Thomas, SVBb	122	-27	17	10	15	22	(dns)	18	25	15
20	ITA 4027	Ziliani Mario, ANS	126	21	16	-22	-23	17	22	19	15	16
21	SUI 3858	Schneiter Sebastian, SNG	127	-25	-25	12	20	18	18	17	17	25
22	ITA 3912	Dubbini Leonardo, SC GARDA SALO’	129	18	10	-26	11	26	20	(dns)	20	24
23	ITA 3887	Gritti Matteo, AVAS	134	22	13	-24	-24	21	19	21	19	19
24	GER 3843	Maege Carlo	151	24	19	15	14	25	25	(dns)	29	(dns)
25	FRA 11	Col Sebastian, YCPR	151	-26	23	16	-26	24	26	23	18	21
26	FRA 3875	Marie Benoit, SNO NANTES	151	20	28	19	22	(dns)	(dns)	22	23	17
27	SUI 3836	Petrino Adriano, CVLL	160	23	21	25	(dns)	23	24	24	(dns)	20
28	ITA 3949	Monzini Michele, CFV Skiffsailing Dongo	164	-31	22	18	-27	27	21	25	24	27
29	AUT 3435	Schönleitner Michael, UYCAs	167	-28	26	(dns)	25	28	23	20	22	23
30	AUT 3219	Stelzl Maximilian, UYCAs	184	-32	27	23	28	-30	27	26	27	26
31	GER 3986	Thias Michael, WSGR	201	30	(dnf)	(dns)	30	31	28	28	26	28
32	ITA 3392	Rizzotti Luca, Skiffsailing	221	29	29	(dns)	(dns)	dns	dns	27	28	dns
33	ITA 855	Conti Davide Lupo, Skiff Sailing	231	(dns)	(dns)	dns	29	29	29	dns	dns	dns
34	ITA 4138	Ferrighi Gian Maria, FV Riva	252	(dnf)	(dns)	dns	dns	dns	dns	dns	dns	dns
34	GER 398	Gimpl Klaus, SC Altensee	252	(dns)	(dns)	dns	dns	dns	dns	dns	dns	dns