In 2007 Russell Coutts approached VPLP to design USA 17, the fastest racing sailing boat to contest the America’s Cup. Little did the team know that the project would take three years of relentless modifications, improvements and developments to produce a trimaran featuring 35 m floats and a 68 m pivoting wing mast! Proof of the pudding came in 2010 with victory over the Swiss catamaran Alinghi in both races of the 33rd America’s Cup in Valencia (Spain).
For VPLP, it was the most enriching and intense investment of time and energy that the firm had ever known. Winning the America’s Cup justified VPLP’s approach of continuously researching and testing hypotheses. It also vindicated the firm’s policy of optimizing weight, power and simple yet efficient sail plans, a policy applied to each and every boat designed by VPLP.
