Sean Langman goes kite flying on AAPT

• NEWS
• 06 Dec, 2004 12:37:00 PM

Sean Langman goes kite flying on AAPT

Innovative offshore sailor Sean Langman has set a new benchmark for spinnakers in the 60th Sydney Hobart Yacht Race – he plans to fly a kite-sail on any long downwind runs out in the Tasman Sea.

Innovative offshore sailor Sean Langman has set a new benchmark for spinnakers in the 60th Sydney Hobart Yacht Race – he plans to fly a kite-sail on any long downwind runs out in the Tasman Sea.

Langman flew the 420 square metre kite sail in a sea trial off Sydney on Saturday and showed a video of the test sail to the new sponsors of his Open 66, AAPT, and to the media in a video at the Australian National Maritime Museum today.

The kite-sail looks like half a giant parachute and flies well above the masthead where the wind can be up to a third stronger than the wind where sails are normally set.

The video clip shows the kite sail, which is 30 square metres bigger than AAPT’s conventional spinnakers, high above and for’ard of the mast, appearing to lift the bow of the boat out of the water as well maintain fast boatspeed.    The mainsail had been dropped, but Langman said this would not happen when the boat was racing.

“If we get a fresh nor’easter on Boxing Day we could quickly open up a 20 nautical mile lead on the super maxis,” a confident Langman told his sponsors and the media.

Officially called an Outleader Kite Mark II, the kite sail measures as a spinnaker and is controlled by three lines to the deck.  It is normally flown between 50 to 150 feet and the video clip of Saturday’s sail showed the sail about 70-feet above deck level and ahead of the flow of the boat. 

The kite sail was developed under contract to BMW Oracle Racing for use in the 2003 America’s Cup in New Zealand. However, it was never used due to time deadlines.

According to designer, American Dave Culp, more than 40 yachts from 30 to 75 feet LOA worldwide have this kites,  but AAPT is the first big boat to race with one in Australia.

Meanwhile, the West Australian-built White Hot has arrived in Sydney after a 4,000 km road transport across the continent and is due to have its mast stepped today.

The boat, a F36 Razer was designed by Brett Bakewell-White,  the designer of Konica Minolta, and built by Peter Milner for Sydney yachtsmen Warren Cottis and Nigel Short.