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NEWPORT, RI, August 28, 2010 -- If wing technology didn’t have everyone’s attention after BMW Oracle Racing’s victorious 33rd America’s Cup, it definitely does now. The high speeds and almost instant acceleration of cambered foils had members of America’s Cup syndicates, top designers, and all sailors in awe. 

Canadian C Class Catamaran Team of Fred Eaton, Magnus Clarke, Steve Killing, Rob Paterson, and Rossi Milev have been along for the entire ride, one way or another. Clarke, Paterson, and Milev took six months off from their C Class program to manage wing protection for the largest wingmast ever built for a race-boat: BMW Oracle’s (223 foot) 68 metre-tall wing. Reunited in March, their team brought four wings to the International C Class Catamaran Championship hosted by New York Yacht Club on Narragansett Bay this past week.

“Upwind the camber is moderate, but downwind with the flap set at 40 degrees, the wing will produce almost double the force of an equal area soft sail,” explains Killing.

Eaton and Clarke raced Killing’s latest design, Canaan, to a thrilling victory today in the final day of match racing. 

NEWPORT, RI, August 27 -- The wind was light and patchy on this first day of match-racing in the International C-Class Catamaran Championship. Canaan, the black cat raced by the Canadian defenders Fred Eaton and Magnus Clarke, was in her element yesterday, winning three of three races. 

Today, was not so smooth. After a significant shift to the south the seabreeze filled in at 12 knots and the third attempt to run a race was a success. More of a success for Alpha however, sailed by Australians, Glenn Ashby and James Spithill.

At the approach to the line Canaan stalled, losing the start and six legs later the first match-race. 1-0 for Australia. In the fleet race designed for the French, British and second Canadian entry, Orion retired. Invictus, of England, crossed the finish line first, and despite powering around the course, just milliseconds after crossing the line Patient Lady VI’s wing tumbled.

NEWPORT, RI, August 26, 2010 -- What a difference a day makes. Today was all Canaan all the time at the International C-Class Catamaran Championship at the New York Yacht Club’s Harbour Court. The stars today were the Canadian defenders Fred Eaton and Magnus Clarke, who won all three races, while Alpha, yesterday’s leader, sailed by Australians Glenn Ashby and James Spithill, finished second in all three races. In point of fact, Canaan has won four straight races, winning the last one on Wednesday.

These two teams will match-race tomorrow and Saturday to determine the winner of the International C-Class Catamaran Trophy in play since 1961. This is the 25th iteration of this regatta.

Missing from today’s racing – indeed the competition – was Aethon, sailed by Steve Clark and his nephew, Oliver Moore. Seconds into yesterday's first start, Moore fell overboard and Clark crash landed into the wing, which unfortunately suffered significant damage. They had to drop out of this much anticipated regatta.

Before today's first race Patient Lady VI had some rigging failure, they were towed in to shore and the crew headed back to the race course to observe in an effort to build their knowledge base of the C Class cats. Orion and Invictus  completed all races, often sailing close, but Orion punctured their wing just before reaching shore.

Yesterday the C-Class Catamaran Aethon capsized after the start of race one of the International C Class Catamaran Championship (long nicknamed the “Little America’s Cup”) and her wing was destroyed. The team hit a patch of turbulence left by a freighter for which they were not prepared and were unable to react in time. Crew Oliver Moore lost his footing and was washed off the boat with the mainsheet wrapped around his leg. As the wing rapidly trimmed in, the boat capsized and helmsman Steve Clark, unable to get out of his trapeze in time, fell through the wing, breaking the mast in the process. Both crew members would be fine, and the platform would suffer only minor damages, but what was left of the wing was all but disintegrated in the three-mile tow back to New York Yacht Club’s Harbor Court.

Click to see horrifying video of the crash!

“The thing I would like to stress here,” said Clark, “is that this was not a product of the conditions. It was a freak accident that could have happened at any time, at any wind speed. If the wing is trimmed all the way to windward and can’t be eased the boat will tip over, and these boats are not designed to do that. It’s a tough end to the last 18 months of work Oliver and I put in, but sometimes these things happen.”

NEWPORT, RI, August 25, 2010 -- The nor’easter departed New England today — more or less — and is off to ruin Canada for a couple of days. Its departure — better late than never — gave the half-dozen winged multihulls sailing in the International C-Class Catamaran Championship at the New York Yacht Club’s Harbour Court a chance to stop talking and start performing. As if they needed any other encouragement.  

Wednesday’s racing took place near Half Way Rock, north of the Pell Bridge, to minimize the remnants of the seas and breeze from the northeast. The wind at the start of the first race was 16 to 20 with puffs pushing it a bit higher. In the first race, Alpha, sailed by Australians Glenn Ashby and James Spithill, had a brilliant port-tack start. It was a shot over the bow. Ashby is an Olympic Silver Medalist and nine-time A-Class, world champion; Spithill was helmsman on BMW Oracle’s wing-sailed trimaran that won the recent 33rd America’s Cup.

Certainly a major story line was the first-leg capsize of Aethon, Steve Clark's and Oliver Moore’s C-Class Cat. This was a new boat for Clark, an American, the absolute prime-mover in the class, who held the International C-Class Catamaran trophy for 11 years, from 1996-2007. Clark has been as important to the class as Tony DiMauro was to the previous generation. These boats motor — on the sunny side of 20 knots — and the disturbed air off a freighter set off a chain reaction that resulted in a capsize and the loss of the wing.