The SP80 and Syroco teams have both launched remarkable boats. They look like a pair of spaceships and are powered by ultra-fast kites instead of sails. Both boats are built to reach terrifying speeds.
The current world speed record has stood for just over a decade at 65.37 knots (121.06 km/h), set in 2012 by Paul Larsen in the Vestas Sailrocket II. But records are there to be broken, and both the SP80 team and the Syroco team approach the record completely differently from Larsen. Both teams have a target speed of 81 knots (150 km/h) hoping to shatter the record that way. To do so, both teams use huge kites attached to the boats with strong lines to prevent capsizing.
SP80
The SP80 has a 10.5-metre design that can accommodate two people in tandem - one in the back seat, to operate the kite. This is attached to a control arm behind the cabin. The other person controls the craft. In August, the SP80 team tested the craft's aerodynamics on Lake Geneva, where it reached 30 knots while being towed behind a boat. Watch the experiment here:
The team is now working on making the om sail section ever more roger, more powerful and faster.
Syroco
You would hardly call the Syroco a boat anymore. The team calls it a "weightless yacht", but in fact it is a kite on a line that runs more or less straight down into the water, where it is attached to a hydrofoil. As the wing and kite pull on each other, the line is pulled taut.
Hydrofoils are naturally limited by cavitation to a speed of about 100 km/h. The hydrofoil wing creates a high-pressure area on one side and a low-pressure area on the other. The low-pressure area becomes so low that the water starts evaporating, creating a huge drag. The team has developed an ingenious method to still get above the 100 km/h speed limit. Take a look:
Both teams continue to tune, tweak, test, accelerate and chase the record at the same time!
