Human role remains vital despite technology

By PETER GRIFFIN

Despite state-of-the-art weather forecasting technology, deciding whether the America's Cup boats should race on the Hauraki Gulf was all a matter of "interpretation".

So says Harold Bennett, the principal race officer for the America's Cup and the man in the gun last week from Swiss challenger Alinghi as racing was postponed for the sixth time.

Alinghi boss Ernesto Bertarelli even suggested the cup should have an independent race committee.

The criticism fails to ruffle Bennett, a member of the New Zealand Yacht Squadron. He faced similar jibes during the last cup.

"It doesn't worry me. I know we're doing it the right way," he said before Friday's race, when Team New Zealand's mast broke and the cup slipped further from their grasp.

"We're all looking at the same data, it's the interpretation of the data that differs. And if you're losing, you've a different interpretation to when you're winning."

Most New Zealanders will remember America's Cup 2003 for the disintegration of the Black Boat and Team New Zealand's campaign, but it was also the cup in which technology played its biggest role to date.

The "orange roughy" data collection boxes on the back of each racing yacht returned more detailed information than ever before, and more reliably and quickly. Assembled by mobile data specialist Econz, the boxes contained a GPS receiver, miniature computer and wireless modem that delivered information to shore via Telecom's highspeed mobile network. Details of wind speed and boat and marker-buoy positions were transmitted from the gulf to a Telecom exchange where it was fed to Animation Research and Virtual Spectator for TV and internet graphics - and also to Bennett, giving him all the information at his fingertips as he studied conditions from the flying bridge of Defiance. Other information was collected from boats and weather buoys dotted around the harbour.

For Econz, providing the technology was not a big money-spinner, but was a good showcase of what could be achieved.

Project manager John Clarkson said Econz would be keen to be involved in the next cup, but that would be "strategically difficult" with its move to Europe.