Cup Insider Exclusive: Terry Hutchinson Interview
Cup Insider Exclusive: Terry Hutchinson Interview
American Magic’s skipper and president of sailing operations gives an update on what the US Challenger has been up to since the conclusion of AC36.
As the sailing world waits for the announcement of the Protocol for the 37th America’s Cup from Defender Emirates Team New Zealand on November 17, Cup Insider editor Justin Chisholm sat down with American Magic’s president of sailing operations and skipper Terry Hutchinson for an update on what the US Challenger has been up to since the conclusion of AC36.
During the interview they discuss:
the frustrations of not knowing the timing and venue of the 37th America’s Cup
the American team’s view of the potential venues for AC37
how the American Magic syndicate debriefed the last Cup cycle
the key lessons learned from that debrief
the potential upsides and downsides of the introduction of the new AC40 foiling monohull
the prospect of a Women’s America’s Cup and a Youth America’s Cup
American Magic’s relationship with the US Olympic programme
Ineos Britannia’s tie up with the Mercedes Formula 1 team and the potential benefits and challenges of that relationship
the chances of Terry racing aboard the American AC75 at the next Cup
Emirates Team New Zealand’s signing of Nathan Outteridge and which helmsmen American Magic’s may or may not be targeting
It's been it's been about three months since American Magic syndicate announced it was planning to challenge again for the next America’s Cup. Was that decision ever in doubt? Was it ever a possibility that you wouldn't challenge?
I think for any America’s Cup Challenger, before the event details are released, the decision on whether or not to actually enter is always in question.
We are sitting here today at the beginning of November, and we don't have a venue and we don't have a Protocol yet – although we're anticipating the protocol to be released on the seventeenth of this month. I think from an American Magic perspective, we need to see the rules of engagement. We need to understand where the venue is.
Obviously not knowing the venue is difficult for everyone. Are you frustrated by it, or do you understand the difficulty of the situation the Defender is in?
I understand the situation and I understand why these announcements have been delayed by the Defender. As a Challenger, the only way to fix the frustration with your lack of power over the America’s Cup it is to win the regatta. That's just a very honest statement. When you win the regatta, you get to avoid being frustrated by these things.
Saying all of that, we're still frustrated. We're not in a position really to comment because we don't know all the ins and outs of those dealings by Emirates Team New Zealand and INEOS Britannia.
Obviously, we still have our team base up in Auckland and we have all of our gear in that shed, in anticipation or hope that maybe AC37 is going to be there. But I don't think it's our role to really comment because we didn't win AC36.
Would Auckland be your preferred decision for America’s Cup 37? Is that where you want to go?
Absolutely. Our Team Principals want to see a venue picked that first and foremost is a good fit for the America’s Cup as an event. American Magic wants the event to have a lot of teams, good racing, and a healthy commercial and media environment. We prefer that a venue have a strong connection to the sport of sailing, or even better, to be a proven Cup venue.
Some of the venues that have been shortlisted by Emirates Team New Zealand fit all of those criteria. Some of them give us some pause, and some worry. Unfortunately, as a Challenger we are pretty powerless to impact the venue and Protocol details.
For the good of the Cup, and for the good of the teams, we all hope that Dalts, Ben and their teams get the details sorted as soon as possible and act in the best interests of the sport.
When you made that feeling known to the to the Defender and the Challenger, what response did they give you?
I talk to Dalts and Emirates Team New Zealand pretty frequently. I give him very honest opinions when he asks for them, and sometimes even when he doesn’t ask for them. It’s part of my job to advocate for our team and to also help him understand the AC37 Challenger’s perspective.
At the end of the day, what we are wanting to do is not just to go racing, but to invest in Emirates Team New Zealand’s event, and to invest on a pretty significant scale. Dalts knows that. He knows he needs multiple Challengers. He and I are in very regular contact and I give him feedback. Once again, as a Challenger there’s not much we can control.
How did you debrief the American Magic campaign for the 36th America’s Cup?
After we got eliminated in the Prada Cup we gave ourselves a couple of days off and then we worked on the campaign debrief. It was an anonymous debrief with one of our high-performance coaches and he put together and tracked and correlated all the information.
The six questions that we asked were antagonistic questions by nature, because you wanted to get to the raw emotion of what people were feeling. The only way you get better at our game is by being critical of yourself.
We wanted that criticism – that was something that was really important for us to know and to understand [in order] to be better in the future and to take those lessons forward.
We aim for the mindset of always getting better event after event after event. That's the only way that we really know how to do it. Critical self-analysis is so important to development, so that's what we did.
Were there any surprises for you in the answers to those six debrief questions?
I think that – almost to a person – everybody could see the potential that we had as a team. Everybody could see how well the team was operating. If the team hadn't been as strong as it was, Patriot would never have gone sailing again.
The crash could have been something that caused an implosion [in the team] from the inside. But I look at the nine days we took rebuilding a bullet hole in the boat, and I see that as the best example of American Magic as a team.
After what happened, obviously there were a lot of people that were unhappy. I think we were all a bit in shock. But there wasn't a lot of personal attacking that took place post-Cup, which was really rewarding.
That's a cultural thing that you need to have and it’s a credit to the people that we brought into our extended family. The sailors that we hired and the shore team that we brought in – everybody really, really worked hard.
Was a team the size of American Magic a difficult beast to manage?
We travelled to Auckland with 78 people and then we had another 15 that already lived in New Zealand. Back in the US we had another 40 incredible boatbuilders.
In terms of what it’s like to manage, I think as much as anything you're relying on everybody to give you honest feedback. If you have enough of an open-door policy, then if people aren't happy, they can come in and say something. That's really all you can ask for. Most of the team members were with us all the way through the end. I think we all saw the same things and I think we're all equally as disappointed by the outcome.
What can you tell us about the key lessons learned from the 36th America’s Cup?
I think the first one is that we evolved on two different continents. We had a European based design team – we did that to get going quickly – and we had a US-based sailing operation and a build facility in Bristol, Rhode Island – which was awesome.
But we commuted between Pensacola and Newport – and that was hard. Even though we achieved a lot of sailing, it was taxing. Going forward I think we have to set ourselves up in one venue and be content there year-round. We know we don't want to be moving people continually. It's just hard on everybody. It's hard on the families. It's expensive.
Everybody recognised that the ‘new team’ dynamic was always going to be hard.
Creating ‘The Mule’ [a scaled down 28-foot test/development boat] was really a positive step forward for that team development. The 10 months that we had with that test boat was just glamour from a team building perspective.
Then, on the racing development side, I think it's hard to judge three and a half years of campaigning on literally two and a half days of racing. The Prada Cup critics were [previously] our best friends when we had a good Christmas Cup.
Many people thought the team looked quite slick before the Christmas break.
And I think we were slick after Christmas too – in ways that we didn’t get to show.
In sport, you don't win every single race that you sail and you're always playing the long game. We had a great race going during the race we went over and crashed. To us, that was the team we knew we could be. As racers, we are always going to be critical of our results. But despite how hard the ending was, we did a lot right; the boat was fast, and we know we can build on all of it.
How do you view the introduction of a new smaller foiling monohull for the preliminary regattas of America’s Cup 36? As a team, do you see the new AC40 as a benefit – or a distraction from the task of designing and building the main boat?
I don't know yet.
I think it depends on the schedule that they lay out and how the rules are set up around it – what features you can develop on the boat versus what you get if you choose not to develop on that boat for your AC75.
I can see how you could let it become a distraction. But I also can see how if you manage it properly – you use it to help develop some of the racing skills you need, or if you can do some appendage development with it – it could be a good tool.
Certainly, you're going to have to consider having two of them. That's expensive for a team too – when the point of the boat seems to be partially about cost control. So, if you consider having two of them, you're probably not going to sail your existing AC75 and just wait until you get a new one.
It's going to be really hard to do both, especially in the time frame that we're talking about here. It would be a shame not to use the great boats that already exist, especially since class continuity is a stated goal of Emirates Team New Zealand and INEOS Britannia.
We haven't seen the Protocol, but I've had great communication with Dalts and Ben. They're smart guys. Their plan will make sense, I’m sure. You can get yourself all wrapped up in it and complain about all these things. Or you can just accept that until we win the regatta, we can’t control any of this.
What makes the America’s Cup hard to win is managing all these complications that come up. If you put some of the pieces of the puzzle together, you're going to have a good chance of winning.
Is the upside of the AC40 that teams will not have to risk their main boats in the AC World Series events?
Yes, that's definitely a bonus. Plus, some of the things they're talking about introducing, such as younger sailors and female sailors [Ed. Note: a reference to the recently announced Women’s America’s Cup and Youth America’s Cup events]. These are the ancillary benefits of that small boat concept and if the execution is high level, it could be great.
We have seen the success of initiatives to increase the involvement of female sailors in sailing’s grand prix events – such as the last edition of The Ocean Race. This Women’s America’s Cup seems to be a good pathway to get more women sailing in the America’s Cup?
It does. It would be awesome to see some of the outstanding young female athletes that we have in our country – really talented sailors – get them out on one of these things and let them go send it.
Our Olympic program specifically, and the youth programs under that, are currently producing a lot of talented sailors. One of things going on right now out of the public eye is American Magic working with the U.S. Olympic program to find ways we can help each other. I’m very excited about that.
Paul Cayard [Ed. Note: newly appointed executive director of U.S. Olympic Sailing] and I have a great relationship. I always communicate to him what we're doing and what we're thinking. We want to be really careful not to pull sailors out of the Olympic program in ways that are not helpful to those sailors, to the program, or to our national effort to win medals.
And yet, there is quite a bit we can work together on. Right now, we're working on a new version of our simulator, which could help our Olympians. That is just one example, but the intention is to build the relationship to a spot where the Olympic team can benefit from our intellectual property and other types of support.
And we have a couple of great designers working for both programmes, and our team principals and our whole staff care about working with our Olympic program and helping whenever we can.
You mention the simulator. As you wait for news of America’s Cup 36 is that where the American Magic team is focusing its attention?
We have a little bit of knowledge about the virtual development that Team New Zealand has done. You'd have to say that their simulator is probably their best development tool because it's operating at a level where the underlying physics is very well validated, and their sailor’s ability to go practice and train in that world and have it be realistic is also validated.
Any simulator has to be of high quality. We're four years into our development in an area that they're many more years into. So, we have a little bit of catching up to do there. It's a logical progression but we are quite focused on that.
If you're committed to winning the America's Cup you have to commit to some of the newest design processes and you have to build the infrastructure to get it to a usable level. And we have years of great development work behind us – and ahead of us. It's all just a part of the process.
Might we see some new partners for American Magic’s America’s Cup 37 campaign?
We’ve been pretty lucky to have Hap Fauth, Doug DeVos and Roger Penske involved with our program. They have all been really engaged with the team since it was founded. As a team we've navigated through some really interesting times, and they have supported us through all of it.
As crazy as the pandemic period has been, it’s also obvious there is still a lot of interest in the America's Cup in the U.S. The social media traffic surrounding the event and our team in North America was actually pretty impressive. The broadcast was well done – even though the access process and the time zones were hard on viewers back home in the U.S.
It’s clear that the interest is there and we know that new partnerships will be crucial to building a strong team that endures for multiple cycles. If the opportunity comes up to bring the America's Cup World Series to the United States, that would definitely be exciting and help the sport in the U.S and abroad.
Even though we don’t know the venue or timing of the 37th America’s Cup yet, there have been some milestone moments in this latest Cup cycle recently. One of them was Ineos Britannia’s announcement of their partnership with the Mercedes Formula 1 team. Did you perhaps view that announcement with a slight sense of dread?
I think an America's Cup team is all-consuming and I can imagine a Formula 1 team is all consuming too. But, without question, that has the potential to be a great relationship.
You don't sleep better at night knowing that an already-great team like INEOS is out there getting better. But you also know the challenges that they face. I mean, that's a hard managerial exercise, from my perspective.
You mean the challenge of balancing the motorsport and sailing campaigns?
Yes. They're very different disciplines – but there's obviously a ton of overlap.
It's amazing in the last 24 months what the show ‘Drive to Survive’ has done for Formula 1. As a new fan and an avid watcher of it I am continually impressed by that sport. I’m also impressed by INEOS's ability to win across multiple sports, and I'm always impressed by what Ben does as a sailor. So you can't help but be concerned when they blend all of that potential together.
Potentially, waiting in the wings for the announcement of the venue, there’s Alinghi who are rumoured to have done a deal with the Red Bull F1 team. Does it feel like you need a Formula 1 team on board to challenge for the America’s Cup nowadays?
Look at what Team New Zealand did to win the regatta in 2017. They were in a David and Goliath situation, and while I’m sure a motor sports team would have helped, they had really, really smart people already.
So did we at American Magic during the last Cup. We did whatever it took to get ourselves organised and we were always incredibly grateful to what Hap, Doug and Roger did to support our team, and to Airbus and TSI and the partners, and everyone else.
I know through my conversations with Dalts, they had a great competitive advantage by living at home and being in their own element. They didn’t have a start-up cost, or moving costs, and other things like that.
The proof is always going to be in the pudding. It's great to have a partner that has so much CFD and computing power, and yet, you still have to create synergies between the motor sport and the sailing, and between your core team and your partners. And that’s one of the major challenges of our sport – and part of what makes it so great.
For American magic, I'm excited to have Scott Ferguson as our design coordinator and some of the people that he's bringing in.
We have a very strong ethos right now that if we're hiring one old guy like myself, then we're bringing in somebody young to help learn as well and to get mentoring and training. Scott’s done a really good job of striking that balance. We're going to continue to operate as best we can underneath the radar and develop that team and put those people in a spot that they can design and develop. Having somebody like Scott – a multiple America’s Cup winner who also has experience of losing the Cup and knows the elements of both outcomes – well there's a lot of value in that.
You just described yourself as an ‘old guy’. Is that a clue to the fact that you may not be racing on the boat next time around?
It's hard to stomach that thought. But I want us to win the regatta and we're going to hire sailors that put us in a position to do that. I love sailing the AC75. There are moments of sailing those things that are exceptionally cool. But I also need to make sure that I honour my responsibility to our principals and that we have a winning team in place.
Another big milestone moment very recently was Nathan Outteridge signing for Emirates Team New Zealand. He's a big name in the America’s Cup world and it’s a significant signing. You must also be trying to secure a top name helmsman. We have heard Tom Slingsby and Paul Goodison are targets?
Firstly, Goody is a great teammate. He’s incredibly talented and a pleasure to have both in meetings and onboard the yacht next to you. And with Tom – what else can you say? Just simply one of the best sailors on the planet.
One thing we know is how hard – skills wise – all the positions are onboard. There are a finite number of people in the world who are qualified to sail an AC75, just as there are a finite number of people who can even get an F1 car into first gear from park.
This is the top of our sport – and the skills are rare. That’s how it should be.