Jake, The crew was substantially reduced to help lower the cost of entry for an AC team (that old head count issue that all organizations deal with) and later on it developed that there were times when the power needs were beyond what the crew could create in the moment even though they have made massive efforts on developing the physical output of the crew. That is why there has been so much hydraulic system and equipment design and development for this AC. They need to apply the hydraulic power as efficiently as possible and even then be able to accumulate power around the course so that they have enough to meet "peak demands", like the leeward mark when the foils are changing and adjusting and there are big trims on the wing and jib. The partner companies have been finding applications for this work on systems they can use in their native industries, especially airliners. So in that engineering sense it is not absurd but on a conceptual level it definitely is!

I will be there to watch the end of the quarterfinal series and I am really hoping to get closer looks at the boats and equipment; not likely except for maybe the odd boat out at that time, probably France. The teams that are out at the end of that series will probably not be in the mood to let gawkers in but I will look if I can. I have read that New Zealand is developing 30% more power than the grinding teams so maybe they will not need the accumulators that the other teams have had to develop. That would save weight and complexity... it would be interesting to know these technical details but I am not sure if we ever will.