America's Cup: Launching the AC45 - not that difficult?

9:14 PM Sat 22 Jan 2011 GMT

'AC45 lifts off with wingsail - Auckland (NZL) - 34th America?s Cup - AC45 trials' Gilles Martin-Raget/www.americascup.com Click Here to view large photo

Erecting the wingsail and launching the wingsailed AC45, and her larger sister the AC72, were expected to pose some problems for the America's Cup team support team crews. In monohull terms it is like trying to launch an ACC yacht with her sails up. One false move and the beast is in charge. In this series of photos and video we show how the Oracle Racing shore, design and build team have worked to overcome these issues. In the first video, Matthew Mason runs through the pre-launch process (bear in mind that this was just the second day of trialling ...

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by Richard Gladwell