Team New Zealand is helping a champion sailor achieve a childhood dream with a world record attempt.
Glenn Ashby on Lake Gairdner in South Australia Photo: Emirates Team New Zealand
Long-time Team New Zealand member Glenn Ashby is the motivation behind the attempt to beat the Wind Powered Land Speed World Record.
Growing up in Bendigo Australia, Ashby dreamt of going faster than anyone else had done, powered by the wind.
Speed has always been at the centre of Ashby's existence, on yachts, motorbikes or land yachts.
The quest for speed has won him three America's Cups, an Olympic silver medal and 17 World Championships in four different classes of boat.
Now in some downtime before the next America's Cup campaign Ashby has convinced Team New Zealand to try something different.
Team New Zealand has always commissioned external contracts to keep the design team sharp and engaged during these periods.
So, when the independently funded project to attempt to beat the Wind Powered Land Speed World Record emerged it was not hard to find willing designers, engineers and shore crew to put their talents to the test from being fastest on the water of the America's Cup to being fastest on land ever.
The speed record attempt had been discussed for a number of years by Ashby and Team New Zealand chief executive officer Grant Dalton, who himself had a long-held interest in such a record shot.
Photo: Emirates Team New Zealand
Ashby has been on the end of dozens of Zoom calls back to the Team New Zealand base unable to re-enter New Zealand for the past 10 months.
A core group of Guillaume Verdier, Romaric Neyhousser, Benjamin Muyul, Jeremy Palmer, Romain Gard, Tim Meldrum, Sean Regan, Adrian Robb, Jarrod Hammond and Dave French have been working through the new design and engineering challenges entirely focused towards beating the existing record of 202.9km/h which was set in 2009 by Richard Jenkins in Greenbird.
"In doing our research and digging deeper and deeper into the intricacies of the design challenges, it became very apparent that Richard really did an incredible job with his world record design." said Ashby.
"As a team we explored some pretty creative and innovative conceptual ideas in the quest for more speed, however in the end our design and performance principles evolved into a concept reasonably similar in basic layout to the existing record holder, which really emphasised to us what a huge challenge this will be."
Without a silver bullet in terms of a revolutionary design, and very much like what is predicted in the 37th America's Cup with the next generation of AC75's, the gains will come down to the small improvements and refinements that add up to overall advancements and success.
"Like the America's Cup we just need to be doing it better across the board by utilising our experience, skills and tools gained as a team to date,"
"And then, like sailing, there is always the weather gods and doing everything we can to be ready when the right conditions are presented at the location."
Team New Zealand principal Matteo de Nora, who is a significant supporter of the world record attempt, is clear on why now is the right time for the challenge.
"We are seeing some very close collaborations now where the design is crossing into Formula 1 territory with Ineos Britannia and Mercedes and Alinghi and Red Bull Racing for a start," he said.
"This isn't a coincidence and is focused on the top line speeds and lessons that can be learnt the faster you can go. So, this project will be beneficial in continuing to evolve and learn so much more in the aerodynamic realm which was a significant factor in AC36."
Team New Zealand Wind Powered Land Speed World Record design and planning Photo: Emirates Team New Zealand
The obvious element of uncertainty and point of difference for all the Team New Zealand designers is tyre technology and the dynamic forces associated with tyres on the ground, as opposed to hydrodynamic forces on foils in the water.
"This is the big unknown for us," explained TNZ Mechanical Engineer Tim Meldrum.
"Tyres on a flat salt surface going at over 200km/h is a whole lot different to foils in the water at over 50 knots. The rules stipulate we must run on a flat natural surface. The best ones we know of where it can be windy are dry salt lakes. With the tyres being the only point of contact to the salt it is a pretty important factor in finding the sweet spot in maintaining sufficient grip- with the least amount of rolling resistance."
Another contradictory problem to the norm in the America's Cup is around weight.
In the AC75's the less weight in the boat the easier it will be to fly and faster it will be.
With a land yacht, weight is a positive in certain respects according to construction manager Sean Regan.
"In land speed, weight will be our friend if used in the right location. So, we can refine our construction techniques that account for additional weight in certain aspects and not be so focused on weight savings. On the outrigger pod we are actively adding weight or ballast to counter the wind force on the wing sail, without which, the craft would just tip over. Not something we want for Glenn approaching such high speeds."
It is these sorts of design problems that will have to be overcome in the typically condensed lead up to a shot at the World Record in July or early August which Ashby and the team are working towards attempting on one of Australia's vast salt lakes with Lake Gairdner in South Australia or Lake Lefroy in Western Australia as potential locations.
Any world record needs to be stringently verified and will require officials from the North America Land Speed Association to measure and record the run with a specific set of rules that must be adhered to in order to qualify for the World Record.
