Rolf Vrolijk on Valencia Sailing

During our tour of the Alinghi base we had the chance to have a chat with Rolf Vrolijk, principal designer of the 32nd America's Cup Defender. His views on the future of the America's Cup boats are very interesting.

Valencia Sailing: You have recently stated that the current ACC design has reached its limit. Could you elaborate on that?
Rolf Vrolijk: The current design has reached its limit because of the way the rule has developped and the boats have developped into a certain corner of the available options. What that means is that they are optimized for the match racing we are doing now. The question is what we will be doing in the future.

Valencia Sailing: That was to be my next question. You have also stated that if Alinghi won we could se multihulls in future America’s Cup racing.
Rolf Vrolijk: Yes, I might have said that. What I basically want to say was that it is completely open what will happen after this America’s Cup, because it’s firstly up to the Defender and the Challenger of Record to decide which class they want to race. Under the Protocol you can race whatever you want.

Valencia Sailing: Wouldn’t such a change be a problem for the smaller teams as they wouldn’t be able to use previous boats?
Rolf Vrolijk: Yes, but that’s the America’s Cup. The America’s Cup has a history, it has always been like that but everything will depend on who wins, on where the Cup goes and I think it’s a completely open question at this stage.

Valencia Sailing: What is your personal opinion? Is there any design you are in favor of?
Rolf Vrolijk: As a design group we are always in favor of a development class, an open rule, without box rules or limitations, just a few basic limitations, and I think this would be much more interesting. This is my view as a design group, but there are also the interests of the public, the sponsors, television and they can be in complete contradiction with our interest.

Valencia Sailing: Would you agree with the statement that the new rule favors SUI 75?
Rolf Vrolijk: No, not at all. The new rule was drawn up together with the Challenger of Record, BMW Oracle, and its main philosophy was to allow the previous boats race with more or less no major modifications. That was the cenral idea of the rule.

Valencia Sailing: Do you expect to see big differences in the new boats next year?
Rolf Vrolijk: I think most people expect too much out of it. I think it will be even difficult for some teams to come up with a completely new boat from scratch that is better than their existing boats. In my opinion, there could be some surprises.