The 36th America’s Cup match race will be in 2021 in Auckland, New Zealand. The class boats (the AC75) are foiling monohulls. Some development boats have been launched, and some video is available.

First up is a 37 second video from the Luna Rossa Prada Pirelli Team, of their boat foiling around the Gulf of Cagliari, Sardinia, Italy. They are serving the role of “Challenger of Record.” It’s an America’s Cup thing. I’m not sure if it is a sailing, match-racing^‡ thing in general.

Ineos TeamUK (headed by Sir Ben Ainslie) have launched their boat, and there is some nice video (though it is silent) of the boat foiling in Portsmouth, UK. It includes some slow motion. No info on speed, but by the look of the chase boats, they are moving pretty well through the water.

Emirates Team New Zealand (the defending champions) launched their development boat, and New York Yacht Club christened their first boat in class, Defiant. Both of those boats were launched in October. There is a bit more explanation of how these things work, in a segment of The World Sailing Show. There is less video of actual sailing.

If you want to see how all this works, here is a link to a 2 minute video on how these boats actually fly. It is a pretty good explanation, but it is all animation, so of limited interest to me.

‡ The America’s Cup is a match race between 2 boats. All of the challengers will meet in the Louis Vuitton Cup Regatta. The winner of that series will be the challenger in the America’s Cup series, which will include only the Challenger and Emirates Team New Zealand, who won the 35th series of races.

It is called America’s Cup, because the first boat to win was the schooner America. It wasn’t expected to be an ongoing series. That original race was in 1851 and cup was awarded by the Royal Yacht Squadron for a race around the Isle of Wight in the United Kingdom. The cup and boat were donated to the New York Yacht Club, and it became a perpetual competition. That is why the Brits are so set on winning, and why the New York Yacht Club sticks its toe in the water all the time.