Foundational change for America’s Cup

When Team New Zealand won the 2017 America’s Cup, they created the AC75 Class for their 2021 defense. This foiling monohull took yacht design to another level, but it also further increased the cost to successfully compete. Yacht designer and past Seahorse magazine editor Julian Everitt comments on recent changes for the 2027 America’s Cup:

We now have an official new acronym, ACP, to add to the lexicon of the America’s Cup. ACP (sounding somewhat like a well-known antiseptic) has been formulated to smooth the apparent wounds that are inherent in today’s America’s Cup.

The Cup would be dead, according to (Kiwi leader) Grant Dalton without this fundamental change in the way future America’s Cups will be run. Fellow ACP instigator, (Challenger of Record) Ben Ainslie, concurs that the new America’s Cup Partnership (ACP) is ‘critical to the future success of the Cup’.

And there is no irony either in Dalton’s doomsday proclamation, ‘it would have been pretty much the end of the cup’ about the likely endgame for the AC without the new partnership protocol, when, in fact, it could well have been the design decisions, taken by Team New Zealand, to develop foiling monohulls that might have precipitated this apparent collapse of interest in the ‘Auld Mug’.

That, and the simple fact Team New Zealand couldn’t afford to defend the Cup with the expensive ‘toys’ they created.

But getting down to the nitty gritty of this ‘valiant’ effort to save the America’s Cup from itself, what are the fundamental elements of future matches under the ruling Partnership?

Well, perhaps the biggest, most shocking, new Partnership agreement is for the abandonment of the need to design and build new hulls. Under this new Partnership, old hulls will suffice – indeed only existing ‘hulls’ will be eligible to compete in the next round of the America’s Cup If anything signaled the end of 174 years of AC history, it is the relegation of the boat itself to an irrelevance.

The Cup has thrived throughout its history, in a large part, due to the visual advancements, both evolutionary and revolutionary, of hull shape. The new AC Partnership deems hull shape unimportant. What more is there to say about the ‘boat’ element being expunged from America’s Cup competition in the interests of creating a commercially viable sailing event?

Editor’s note: If the AC75 proved to be prohibitive, this wouldn’t be the first time the cost to compete exceeded interest. The 1937 America’s Cup was the final edition for J-Class yachts, and when the competition resumed after World War II, the 12 Metre was chosen as a more affordable yacht to restart interest in the Cup.

Details: https://www.americascup.com/

Defender New Zealand and Challenger of Record from Great Britain confirmed the Protocol for the 38th America’s Cup on August 12, 2025. No additional challenge entries have yet been revealed. After the 2024 event, Barcelona, Spain declined hosting another edition, with the venue moved to Naples, Italy . Racing will be in the spring and summer of 2027.