Ropes back in the Cup!

The AC75 is a keel-less, foiling, soft wing-sailed, 75-foot monohull. This new class of boat to be sailed in the 36th America’s Cup will be unlike any other boat in the world!

Unlike the America’s Cup Class (ACC) from the 35th America’s Cup with its one working sheet, the AC75 sees the return of more traditional sail set-up. The class rule dictates that the sails will be controlled by a winch and the interface between the sailors and the sails will be more conventional, with the grinders having to drive the winch to trim the sails.

During the AC35 the team had one in house Rigger, Chris Noble, who returns to head up the Rig and Rigging department but this time with triple the support required. Therefore, the team needed to work closely with a high-performance rope manufacturer and quickly chose Britain’s Marlow Ropes as the official supplier for the British challenge.

Noble, will work alongside Marlow Ropes specialists to develop bespoke, sustainable and innovative rigging solutions for the team’s AC75 race boats. The team will also access Marlow’s expert test facilities as well as inhouse equipment including an ISO compliant 100 ton destructive tensile test machine, capable of running destructive testing and static and cyclic testing for a period up to 72 hours.

Chris on Marlow Ropes joining as the team's official supplier, “It was an easy decision to partner with Marlow Ropes in our challenge to win the 36th Americas Cup.  As a world leading rope manufacturer the quality of their standard product and development capabilities allows us to work together to fully optimise the rigging on all our platforms. As a British team it also makes it that much better to partner with a UK manufacturer – we look forward to developing the relationship further over the next few years as we head towards New Zealand”

Paul Honess, Leisure Marine Director for Marlow on the partnership, “We are very proud to be the official supplier to INEOS TEAM UK. Our collaboration with the America’s Cup teams in the past has contributed to the development of the Marlow Grand Prix range that is used on the wider race boat circuit at all levels. Developing sustainable products and bespoke rigging solutions that are tested on some of the most demanding systems found on yachts today is crucial to Marlow’s future product innovation.”

Sustainability is also of great importance to Marlow, who are pushing for greater change in the rope industry to drive their reuse, repurpose, recycle mission. This year the company will launch the first eco-conscious dockline range made from 100% recycled plastic, and the company will be reporting sustainability KPIs for the first time.