One thing is for sure: winning yacht races at this level is all about teamwork ? and everyone around here agrees that Emirates Team New Zealand's tight teamwork on the boat is what makes them so hard to beat. But few people know that the back-office teamwork on the ETNZ base is just as impressive.
It's 6.30am ? barely light yet ? and the base has come alive as NZL84, one of the two race boats, arrives from its overnight berth on the other side of Viaduct Basin and the huge Travelift is manoeuvred in to place above it.
Lifting a 25-ton yacht out of the water is no picnic, yet the half-dozen shore crew members perform the operation like a tightly choreographed, highly drilled dance troupe.
As they start to wash down the hull (even the minute organisms that have attached themselves to the hull overnight will create enough drag to slow the boat down) and begin equipment checks, NZL92 is being rolled out of the left-hand shed, where it has spent the night, undergoing a more intensive regime of checks.
During the Louis Vuitton Trophy the yachts alternate ? one remaining in the water each night. "Not ideal but it's important that we allow the public can see it at close quarters," says Sean Reagan, ETNZ's construction manager.
By 7.30am both boats are afloat again, ready to have sails loaded and final checks made before being towed out to the race course with the first crews on board.
With such valuable equipment, and the enormous stresses the boats undergo when sailing, those checks would be necessary under any circumstances. But with all of the teams in the Louis Vuitton trophy using just these two boats, the issue is 10 times greater.
With four races every day for 12 days, the boats work harder in the Louis Vuitton Trophy than they would in an entire three- to four-month America's Cup campaign.
Add to that the fact that the different teams handle the boat in different ways and it compounds the problem says James who services the winches.
With the race boats gone, James and the other shore crew load spare parts and tool boxes into various ETNZ support boats and head out to the course where, if there's a problem, they're on hand to fix it immediately.
Co-ordinating all of the activities on the base is the shore boss, Andy Nottage, who seems to have a walkie talkie glued permanently to his mouth. The softly spoken Nottage is perhaps the least "bossy" gaffer you're likely to find ? but there's no need to bark orders anyway, it seems: the shore crew seems to work together almost symbiotically, each knowing exactly what he needs to do, when. Nottage's job, it seems to me, is like being a conductor leading an especially complex orchestra.
With almost everyone out on the water, peace descends on the base. But that could change at any time, as a crew might come back from racing with a ripped sail that needs mending. Today could be one of those days, with brisk winds out on the race course and teams with a lot at stake maybe pushing a little too hard and breaking something.
And that's how it turns out: as the racing and shore crews come back off the water there's a flurry of activity. A blown spinnaker is taken to the spare sail loft (from where Alinghi ran its winning America's Cup campaign in 2003) where it has to be dried before repairs are done. The sailmakers won't be home in time for tea, by the look of it.
The mainsails and jibs are also hauled up into the loft every evening (they are part of the setup that ETNZ has loaned for this regatta; the teams provide their own spinnakers) and examined for damage, centimetre by centimetre. With each mainsail covering an area close to the size of a Boeing 747's wing, it's a huge task.
This has been a good week for working overtime: as well as sails, ETNZ's shore crews do carbon-fibre work on the hulls, mast and anywhere else that may need it. Just one example: four broken spinnaker poles in as many days.
Today Dylan, one of the boat builders, has found a small crack on one of the poles; it wasn't visible and he found only by running his hand along its entire length. An hour of grinding should get the area smooth enough so that he can begin the reconstruction, which he thinks will take another two hours; a snapped pole would take a team of three 12 hours to repair.
Meanwhile, Jamie and his colleagues will be stepping on board the yacht which, by now, will have been reversed into the dock, had thick bands of webbing slipped under the hull, and have been lifted onto a Travelift then trundled slowly back into a hangar.
By the time the sun rises in the morning (but, hopefully long before that) the boats will be handed back in perfect condition, ready to go racing again.
slane@thenational.ae
Real estate tokenisation project
Dubai launched the pilot phase of its real estate tokenisation project last month.
The initiative focuses on converting real estate assets into digital tokens recorded on blockchain technology and helps in streamlining the process of buying, selling and investing, the Dubai Land Department said.
Dubai’s real estate tokenisation market is projected to reach Dh60 billion ($16.33 billion) by 2033, representing 7 per cent of the emirate’s total property transactions, according to the DLD.
The biog
Hobby: Playing piano and drawing patterns
Best book: Awaken the Giant Within by Tony Robbins
Food of choice: Sushi
Favourite colour: Orange
Specs
Engine: Dual-motor all-wheel-drive electric
Range: Up to 610km
Power: 905hp
Torque: 985Nm
Price: From Dh439,000
Available: Now
NO OTHER LAND
Director: Basel Adra, Yuval Abraham, Rachel Szor, Hamdan Ballal
Stars: Basel Adra, Yuval Abraham
Rating: 3.5/5
UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
At a glance
Global events: Much of the UK’s economic woes were blamed on “increased global uncertainty”, which can be interpreted as the economic impact of the Ukraine war and the uncertainty over Donald Trump’s tariffs.
Growth forecasts: Cut for 2025 from 2 per cent to 1 per cent. The OBR watchdog also estimated inflation will average 3.2 per cent this year
Welfare: Universal credit health element cut by 50 per cent and frozen for new claimants, building on cuts to the disability and incapacity bill set out earlier this month
Spending cuts: Overall day-to day-spending across government cut by £6.1bn in 2029-30
Tax evasion: Steps to crack down on tax evasion to raise “£6.5bn per year” for the public purse
Defence: New high-tech weaponry, upgrading HM Naval Base in Portsmouth
Housing: Housebuilding to reach its highest in 40 years, with planning reforms helping generate an extra £3.4bn for public finances
Killing of Qassem Suleimani
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The rules on fostering in the UAE
A foster couple or family must:
- be Muslim, Emirati and be residing in the UAE
- not be younger than 25 years old
- not have been convicted of offences or crimes involving moral turpitude
- be free of infectious diseases or psychological and mental disorders
- have the ability to support its members and the foster child financially
- undertake to treat and raise the child in a proper manner and take care of his or her health and well-being
- A single, divorced or widowed Muslim Emirati female, residing in the UAE may apply to foster a child if she is at least 30 years old and able to support the child financially
In numbers: PKK’s money network in Europe
Germany: PKK collectors typically bring in $18 million in cash a year – amount has trebled since 2010
Revolutionary tax: Investigators say about $2 million a year raised from ‘tax collection’ around Marseille
Extortion: Gunman convicted in 2023 of demanding $10,000 from Kurdish businessman in Stockholm
Drug trade: PKK income claimed by Turkish anti-drugs force in 2024 to be as high as $500 million a year
Denmark: PKK one of two terrorist groups along with Iranian separatists ASMLA to raise “two-digit million amounts”
Contributions: Hundreds of euros expected from typical Kurdish families and thousands from business owners
TV channel: Kurdish Roj TV accounts frozen and went bankrupt after Denmark fined it more than $1 million over PKK links in 2013
The major Hashd factions linked to Iran:
Badr Organisation: Seen as the most militarily capable faction in the Hashd. Iraqi Shiite exiles opposed to Saddam Hussein set up the group in Tehran in the early 1980s as the Badr Corps under the supervision of the Iran Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC). The militia exalts Iran’s Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei but intermittently cooperated with the US military.
Saraya Al Salam (Peace Brigade): Comprised of former members of the officially defunct Mahdi Army, a militia that was commanded by Iraqi cleric Moqtada Al Sadr and fought US and Iraqi government and other forces between 2004 and 2008. As part of a political overhaul aimed as casting Mr Al Sadr as a more nationalist and less sectarian figure, the cleric formed Saraya Al Salam in 2014. The group’s relations with Iran has been volatile.
Kataeb Hezbollah: The group, which is fighting on behalf of the Bashar Al Assad government in Syria, traces its origins to attacks on US forces in Iraq in 2004 and adopts a tough stance against Washington, calling the United States “the enemy of humanity”.
Asaeb Ahl Al Haq: An offshoot of the Mahdi Army active in Syria. Asaeb Ahl Al Haq’s leader Qais al Khazali was a student of Mr Al Moqtada’s late father Mohammed Sadeq Al Sadr, a prominent Shiite cleric who was killed during Saddam Hussein’s rule.
Harakat Hezbollah Al Nujaba: Formed in 2013 to fight alongside Mr Al Assad’s loyalists in Syria before joining the Hashd. The group is seen as among the most ideological and sectarian-driven Hashd militias in Syria and is the major recruiter of foreign fighters to Syria.
Saraya Al Khorasani: The ICRG formed Saraya Al Khorasani in the mid-1990s and the group is seen as the most ideologically attached to Iran among Tehran’s satellites in Iraq.
(Source: The Wilson Centre, the International Centre for the Study of Radicalisation)
Formula Middle East Calendar (Formula Regional and Formula 4)
Round 1: January 17-19, Yas Marina Circuit – Abu Dhabi
Round 2: January 22-23, Yas Marina Circuit – Abu Dhabi
Round 3: February 7-9, Dubai Autodrome – Dubai
Round 4: February 14-16, Yas Marina Circuit – Abu Dhabi
Round 5: February 25-27, Jeddah Corniche Circuit – Saudi Arabia
The Perfect Couple
Starring: Nicole Kidman, Liev Schreiber, Jack Reynor
Creator: Jenna Lamia
Rating: 3/5
Blue%20Beetle
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Company profile
Name: Steppi
Founders: Joe Franklin and Milos Savic
Launched: February 2020
Size: 10,000 users by the end of July and a goal of 200,000 users by the end of the year
Employees: Five
Based: Jumeirah Lakes Towers, Dubai
Financing stage: Two seed rounds – the first sourced from angel investors and the founders' personal savings
Second round raised Dh720,000 from silent investors in June this year