A sporting event that transcends the realm of sport and is destined to leave its mark on the Catalan capital. This is how the Louis Vuitton 37th America's Cup is conceived by its corporate director, Albert Vilumara; the Barcelona Sports Councilor, David Escudé; the America's Cup coordinator for the Port de Barcelona, David Pino, and the competition expert communicator Santi Serrat. All of them starred this Wednesday in the first session of the cycle Everything you want to know about the America's Cup, promoted by The New Barcelona Post with the sponsorship of the Port de Barcelona, the Barcelona City Council, Estrella Damm and the Fundació Barcelona Capital Náutica. The event, which aims to bring the competition closer to the public, also has the participation of America's Cup Event Barcelona (ACE) and the collaboration of Giny and Must Media Group.
During the day, moderated by journalist Ana Boadas at the Antigua Fábrica Estrella Damm, all of them agreed in predicting that the competition "will be a success" and councilor Escudé went further by making a promise: "We promise to make history, in the good sense of the word," he proclaimed 141 days before the competition begins. And it is that the America's Cup will turn Barcelona into a "great blue pavilion," with the same spirit that propelled the 1992 Olympic Games: the city does not adapt to the event, but rather the event adapts to the idiosyncrasy and character of the city, according to the councilor.
Precisely this spirit is one of the intangible elements that the America's Cup wants to bring forth, with a legacy that contributes to "recovering the feeling of pride in the ability to organize great events," according to Vilumara. The corporate director of ACE is clear about the element that will determine the success of the sporting event: "That we manage to get citizens to go down to the sea and experience the America's Cup." To do this, they will shy away from visions that contemplate it as an elitist event, and will open it "to as many people as possible." Thus, they foresee free access to beaches and docks near the regatta course, which will be located between the W Hotel and the Arts Hotel, shifting depending on the wind. "The idea is to be able to see it from the beach, also with the support of screens," he explained.
The America's Cup will have an economic impact on the Catalan capital of more than 1.2 billion eurosSerrat has gone further, and believes that "the success must be that the Barcelona resident understands what it means for an event of this type to be in the city, also for reasons of image, prestige, and projection." And it is that the event will represent a global showcase for Barcelona, which was selected from among 60 cities by the New Zealand team, which holds the rights to organize this edition as the defending champion. The characteristics of Barcelona's coastline and infrastructure were key to the choice, as was the "city's capacity to host an event like this," according to Vilumara.
The presentation of the candidacy and the organization once elected was frantic: in five months, the spaces for the teams were conditioned, which were finally located in Port Vell in a moment of "enlightenment," according to Pino, also director of this port. In a process with "many problems but a lot of help," Port Vell has hosted the teams since last summer. And these are not precisely small teams: they gather between 100 and 150 people, including athletes, engineers, trainers, and other profiles.
Objective: increase television audience by 50%
The activity of these teams also affects the economic impact that the competition will generate in the Catalan capital: it will be around 1.2 billion euros, calculated based on the expected expenditure by teams, visitors and participants, according to data from a study by Pompeu Fabra University (UPF). This was explained by Vilumara, who highlighted the importance of the television broadcast of the sporting event, which represents the main expense for the organization. It will include the use of drones, helicopters and technologies such as augmented reality to "draw virtual regattas". With one goal: to increase by 50% the viewers of the last edition, which stood at 941 million people.A transformative legacy
The legacy of the America's Cup is becoming palpable in the Catalan capital and its surroundings, with transformations such as that of the Port Olímpic and the Port Vell. As its director has detailed, the multiple renovations underway in the Port Vell amount to more than 120 million euros, with 70 million coming from private initiative, such as the renovation of Maremagnum and the recovery of the old Imax to host the America's Cup Experience. "Everyone is joining in and everyone is getting on board" with the America's Cup wave, and the Port Vell has accelerated transformations that include the launch of the new nautical bus and the opening of the Moll de Pescadors.
But the competition aims to leave a legacy that goes beyond urban reforms, and that includes consolidating the women's category of the competition, the Puig Women's America's Cup, which debuts for the first time in history.
In addition, the attraction that the regatta will exert towards the sea will serve to promote nautical activities and to increase the passion for sailing, something that will materialize with various initiatives, among which is the promotion of the first Catalan women's foil team. All in order to bring nautical sports and their practice closer to a citizenry that looks more and more to the sea.
The schooner America and a silver jug
The first session of the cycle organized by The New Barcelona Post began with a journey through the 173-year history of the regatta, captained by Santi Serrat. The competition, currently considered one of the most complex sporting challenges disputed worldwide, has its origin in 1851, when the New York Yacht Club received an invitation from the Regatta Committee of the Universal Exhibition to be held in London to participate in regattas in Cowes, south of England. The New Yorkers moved their boat there, the schooner called America which now gives its name to the emblematic regatta. This boat was the first in history to be designed expressly "to win a competition," Serrat emphasized. The contenders competed around the Isle of Wight, in a regatta in which the crew of the America won. As a prize, a silver jug valued at one hundred guineas, and another that they did not consider at the time: to give its name to what has become the most important sailing trophy globally.
The victory of America, whose design broke with the traditional rounded shape of boats, opened a first era of the competition in which races were disputed in compensated time; that is, corrective coefficients were applied, so the boat that arrived in first position did not necessarily win. That changed in 1930, when they became real-time: here, the first one did win, which meant that "the races gained in excitement, which contributed to their popularization."
As Serrat has narrated, in 1958 another stage began, in which hydrodynamics and aerodynamics began to be fully applied in the design of the boats. It was in this phase that the America's Cup became popular and began to expand internationally. About four decades later, in 1992, the fourth stage of the competition opened, marked by technology and by boats built with composites and carbon fiber. These evolutions led to the need for large budgets and the massive entry of sponsors into the regatta. The importance of technology gained weight and specialization, to the point that teams of designers were required, replacing individual designers.
The hydrofoils with which the New Zealand teams, current title defenders, worked marked the next stage: that of flying boats. "The foil lifts the boat out of the water and allows it to fly," Serrat illustrated. The first of these boats were the AC72s, which "each time they capsized required between three or four million euros for the damage generated." They have evolved to the boats that will sail the Mediterranean off Barcelona, the AC75s, in an evolution that Serrat has exposed by comparing sizes and designs of the vessels from the origin of the competition to today.
The regatta can be followed from the Barcelona coast with free access, or through a television broadcast that will use drones, helicopters and technologies such as augmented realityThe design of the flying boats requires a large technological investment and a diversification of design teams, as well as a navigation and a tactic that breaks with everything before it. The evolution, complexity, and media attraction of the sporting event have led to it being positioned as one of the three most important in the world in terms of number of spectators, along with the Olympic Games and the World Cup. With the celebration of the Copa América, Barcelona will become the first city to host the three competitions. Thus, "Barcelona is once again positioning itself as a leading city in the organization of sporting events," Vilumara claimed.
The session has been the first of the cycle promoted by The New Barcelona Post with the purpose of bringing the America's Cup closer to the public. The cycle will be completed with three more sessions, all before the competition begins in August. They will take place on May 15, June 19, and July 17, and will focus respectively on the functioning and rules of the competition; on understanding the reasons why the America's Cup is considered a benchmark in innovation and sustainability, and on debating the legacy that the event will leave on the city. All of this in a context where the emblematic competition is finalizing preparations, ranging from the fine-tuning of the boats to the study of the movement of Barcelona's waves, as Serrat explained: "The moment of truth is approaching."