So it's been 7 years since Alinghi won and took the oldest trophy in international sports to a land-locked country.
This year marks their 2nd defense of the cup with the challenge once again coming from well known American asshole and crappy sailor Larry Ellison (founder of Oracle) and the BMW-Oracle race team (hopefully Larry will stay out of the boat this time around).

It was supposed to have started already but the teams are being ultra picky about the weather...presumably because of their massive boats.
Here's a good write up on that:
http://www.freep.com/article/20100210/B ... ericas-Cup

Speaking of those boats...they are simply things of beauty.
115 feet long, 80 feet wide...tens of millions of dollars of carbon fiber and titanium.

Oracle is challenging with a massive trimaran which can either be powered by a "traditional" (I use that term loosely) mast and soft sails, or with a giant wing sail that's twice the size of a wing on a 747.


Alinghi is defending with a catamaran (which looks awfully fragile to me) which sports a traditional mast and soft sales.


I used to sail a lot as a kid in lake Ontario and I was an instructor for a little while.
Is anyone else going to watch the races?

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Hold my beer and watch this...

Nope. Only sailing I wanna watch is Sailing the Seas of Cheese.

wiat, these things are sailboats

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PSA: I am an overly sarcastic person. If you take me at my word, then i will most likely anger and offend you.

Tens of millions of dollars and they only get used in 1 regatta.

Those carbon sails alone are hundreds of thousands of dollars and only get used once. After a race day they're no longer stiff enough to use again.

and there's Stuuuu'u's in Portland...not sailing.
Primus doesn't count.

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Hold my beer and watch this...

Lifestyles of The Rich and Not So Famous......... Talk about an exclusive club.

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"I'll rap you with my cane; you pencil necked geek!!"

-Bowler, imitating Freddy Blassie, at the very first M & G.

The boats look sweet, like the boat in waterworld.

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Proud LGBTQQ Individual

And here I thought Crosscheck was just trolling for sailors on shore leave.

Ham

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Do you believe yet?

If anyone cares, Oracle BMW racing just kicked the snot out of Alinghi in race 1 by over a 15 minute delta.

This seems to be a vindication for their hull design choice and their sail wing which far outperformed Alinghi's traditional sails in today's light conditions.

This was the biggest race delta since Dennis Conner and "stars and stripes" won with the first catamaran in 1988.

Race #2 is on Sunday and is a must win for Alenghi. If Oracle BMW pulls it off the cup comes home to wait for a new challenger. Oracle BMW sails out of San Francisco's Golden Gate yacht club.

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Hold my beer and watch this...

Race #2 on right now
http://www.americascup.com/en/regate/re ... la-course/

This race is much closer although Alinghi has yet to perform a penalty turn.

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Hold my beer and watch this...

want to know how freakishly awesome these boats are?


They can sail 30 knots in 8 knots of wind....insane.

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Hold my beer and watch this...

I never realized how large these boats actually were.

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Wheelhouse

BMW-Oracle won race 2 and swept the challenge.

The America's Cup is returning home

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Hold my beer and watch this...