Ah, sailing. Idyllic, lazy days out on deck amid the flapping of sails, the cry of the circling seagulls and a long cool drink.
Not for the Vestas Sailrocket team. They have just ashed the world sailing speed record, reaching more than 60 knots (110 kilometres per hour) at Walvis Bay in Namibia in a custom-designed, carbon-fibre boat that skims above the water.
The problem for Vestas Sailrocket was that at over 50 knots all bubbles begin to form around the hydrofoil that sits underneath the boat to keep it balanced. This effect, known as cavitation, drastically increases the drag and meant that the team struggled to get much beyond 50 knots. The team spent 2012 designing and ysing new hydrofoils, but still experienced the same 50 knot limit: there seemed no way past this "bubble barrier". Last week, they finally found the answer by adding all perpendicular "fences" at several positions along the hydrofoil, which seemed to solve the problem.
On the first test with the new set-up, the boat surpassed 60 knots for the first time, and on the third run, they broke the record with an average over 500 metres of 59.23 knots. The previous record was set by kite surfer Rob Douglas at 55.65 knots (103.06 kilometres per hour) in October 2010.
The Vestas team hit a top speed on this run of 64.78 knots (120 kilometres per hour). For pilot and project leader Paul Larsen that one record-breaking run was payback for ten years of hard work.
"These latest runs represent a real breakthrough in the world of sailing. It's the hydrodynamic version of going supersonic...and it feels like it," he told New Scientist. "The acceleration just kept coming. It was like a rev limiter was removed.
"Things went into fast forward and my mind had to race with the decision-making process required for this new reality, i.e. can I stop the thing at the end. We have now hit over 60 knots a number of times and are just starting to explore this wonderful new world. The boat is in its element. It's truly a machine in harmony with plenty more still to offer."
And he isn't finished yet. "The aim is to take the outright record average over 60 knots."
