America's Cup

So I mostly just follow Formula 1 racing, but I also have a soft spot for America's Cup sailboat racing. They aren't exactly standard transportation, but they're really interesting designs, extreme ways to mess with rules and produce boats that go very fast. The current crop are catamarans with 100 foot high hard wing-sails rather than fabric, and they have hydrofoils to allow the boat to lift out of the water and fly across it, using the hydrofoils and the sails with manual tuning through human powered winches, to zoom 5-10 feet above the water, mostly. Truly amazing. I really respect the engineers who came up with this, and the people who actually built and tested these sailboats, and the crews who eventually learned how to run them for races. I don't like that the course in SF Bay is too damned small. It should be much bigger, going around bridges and into the Sacramento River current near Angel Island, not just back and forth a few laps from the prison to the end of Fort Mason. It would be more interesting with a bigger course.

See how cool that is? This is technically the Louis Vuitton Cup, which is a semi-final race before the America's Cup itself. Its still cool. Some of this technology can be applied to cargo ships, just like Formula 1 race technology eventually because Fuel Injection and Variable Valve Timing (VTEC). Race technology DOES end up in more boring vehicles, if its reliable and a good advantage for commercial purposes. I applaud that application. Good show!