Boat speeds - are the Kiwis really pushing 60 knots?
No, almost certainly not. Team New Zealand skipper Glenn Ashby was quick to pour cold water on the 60-knot rumours. Ashby insisted it wasn’t even possible due to cavitation (a phenomenon which occurs when water pressure around the foil is lowered to the point where the water starts to boil).
“There once was a movie saying, Tell him he s dreaming, so it s very much that with the 60 knots,” Ashby said last week. “The boats are definitely getting faster and we re pushing the boundaries pretty hard.but you run into some barriers at just over 50 knots. That s physics.”