SpeedDream by Brian Hancock

SpeedDream

“There are no speed limits on the road to excellence.” Brian Hancock

Quest for the fastest monohull on the planet

Dream

“The cure for everything is salt water sweat, tears and the sea.” Isak Dinesen

COVER PHOTO Boris Herrmann PHOTO CREDITS Billy Black, Boris Herrmann, Puma, Merijn van der Vliet, Skip Novak, On-Edition, Brian Hancock, Vlad Murnikov EDITED BY Brian Hancock GRAPHIC LAYOUT Brian Hancock TEXT Vlad Murnikov

Speed

SpeedDream

CONTENTS THE DREAM - Pg 6

TECHNICAL ASPECTS - Pg 14

FROM FAZISI FORWARD - Pg 8

GOING GREEN - Pg 19

THE CONCEPT - Pg 12

FROM DREAM TO REALITY - Pg 16

Quest for the fastest monohull on the planet

The Dream Vlad Murnikov, the driving force behind SpeedDream, talks about his latest sailing project.

WENTY TEARS AGO I was project leader and designer for the first ever Russian entry into the 1989-90 Whitbread Round the World Race. Our yacht FAZISI proved to be among the fastest offshore monohulls at the time, with her top speed approaching 30 knots. During the race she accomplished the second longest day run of 386 nautical miles. That was considered a great feat and many sailors believed it to be the outer limit of monohull speed.

ND YET LESS THAN two decades later during the Volvo Ocean Race 2008-09 (the same Whitbread event under a

SpeedDream

different name) I witnessed yacht ERICSON 4 come within a hair of breaking the 600 mile a day barrier with an average speed of 25 knots.

T ONLY TOOK TWENTY years of technical advances to move the mark from 400 to 600 mile a day, improving the record by fifty percent. How far might sailboat performance go in the future? Is there any limit after all? With progress advancing at the same pace, in twenty years we should see daily runs gaining another fifty percent and extending to 900 miles in 24 hours. In fact, multihulls are already capable of such performance and sailors have

proven that they can handle the speed.

UT WHAT ABOUT monohulls? So far Volvo 70 remains the fastest monohull on the planet. With an absolute top speed in excess of 42 knots, it is in the same league with the fastest catamarans and trimarans. However multihulls, with their needle-like hull forms can sustain higher speed for a substantially longer time than much wider and shorter monohulls, which tend to slow down after each burst of speed. There’s no doubt that eventually solutions to the monohull’s shortcomings will be found and in the future we will see speed

SpeedDream of these boats increasing steadily. But what about right now? Would it be possible today to design and build a yacht capable of covering 900 miles in 24 hours? The question kept nagging me and as a designer I started looking for answers.

EXT CAME A CLASSIC “napkin sketch” and some quick calculations. The more I toyed with the idea the more I realized that given today’s technology and design expert-

ise gained in such classes as Volvo 70 and Open 60, as well in multihull and powerboat design, it just might be possible to develop an extreme yacht capable of unthinkable speed. Capable, in fact, of taking on the 1000 Mile Day Challenge.

The SpeedDream was born.

Quest for the fastest monohull on the planet

From FAZISI forward Fazisi crewmember Brian Hancock tracks the path from Whitbread maxi to the world’s fastest monohull.

N 1989, A SCANT 48 hours before the start of the Whitbread Round the World race, I was invited by Fazisi skipper Skip Novak and project founder Vlad Murnikov to join the boat for the first leg of the race from England to Uruguay. I was to be Sailing Master, to help train

SpeedDream

an inexperienced crew and prepare them for the rigors of the Southern Ocean. It was a unique and humbling experience. None of the Soviet sailors spoke any english, few had spent much time offshore and the boat was new and completely untested. By the time Fazisi returned to England

nine months later the Soviet Union had disintegrated. Fazisi was on the cutting edge of a new Russian revolution, one that would showcase the innovation and creativity of a nation that for so many years had been behind the iron curtain, and I was thrilled to be a part of it.

BARELY HAD TIME TO look around the boat before we left the dock and on the way out to the start line I had my first opportunity to size up our competition. I was totally amazed. The bulk of our competitors were sailing massive, heavy, overcanvassed ketches. Fazisi was tiny by comparison. Our mast height was barely higher than the mizzen masts on many of the other boats. They were sailing powerful machines; we were sailing a toy boat. I wondered what Vlad Murnikov was thinking when he designed such a radically different boat. It was too late to get off and so

I settled into what I thought was going to be a long and tedious sail to Uruguay. How wrong I was.

ITHIN 10 MINUTES minutes of the starting gun firing I realised that I was aboard something special. Fazisi might have had a lot less sail area than the others but the boat weighed just over half that of the big Brice Farr ketches. They threw up as much sail as they could and dragged their overweight boats through the spectator chop. Fazisi, light and easily driven, was easily as fast and had our

crew been experienced, we would have been faster. It was an eye-opening experience not only from me, but for the many observers who had looked down their aristocratic noses at the raggedy Russian team. Murnikovs concept was right on and it was this innovative thinking that guided his career as a naval architect and has subsequently led to SpeedDream.

NCE THE WHITBREAD was over Vlad, his wife Tatiana and son Pavel moved the US. At first they stayed with me at my home on Cape Cod but gradu-

Quest for the fastest monohull on the planet

ally got the feeling for the country, the language and the culture. Within a very short time they were fully integrated and living the American dream. Vlad set up shop as a naval architect and started to draw boats that were, as to be expected, very different from anything else out there. He designed the MX20, a performance “pocket rocket” day sailor that out performed bigger boats yet was still roomy enough for a weekend away. His real breakthrough boat was the MX Ray, a tiny dinghy that appeared to be halfway between a tricycle and a rocket; simple in concept yet loaded with power. The MX Ray took off and soon sailors across the country were skipping across lakes and dams turning heads as they set asymmetrical spinnakers and left all other craft in their wake.

PEEDDREAM IS IN MANY WAYS an oversized MX Ray. Both boats are a radical departure from anything else out there. Free from rules and class restrictions Murnikov is able to let his creative mind go wherever it takes him, and once again it is taking him to new and innovative places. SpeedDream incorporates everything known to allow boats to sail fast. A splinter thin hull that pierces the water rather than rides on top of it provides minimal drag and when combined with ample sail area compensated for by a massive canting keel, you get a package that has low resistance yet is massively powerful, a winning package, for sure.

SpeedDream

Quest for the fastest monohull on the planet

The Concept

HIS PROJECT PROVIDES a unique opportunity to showcase marine industry by creating the fastest, most revolutionary and advanced yacht ever. It would grab attention not only of the sailing community but of the general public as well by tackling such formidable sailing challenges as 50 knot speed record, the fastest Atlantic crossing, sailing 1000 mile in 24 hours and finally breaking the speed record for a circumnavigation under sail. Design and research that will go into this project and experience gained will benefit future sailboat design, setting direction for the next generation of sailing yachts. The impact of this project on sailing will be far greater that development

SpeedDream

of record-braking multihulls, simply because the vast majority of sailboats are monohulls.

VER THE COURSE OF one year from the initial idea, a design concept of the record-breaking boat has evolved. It features an extremely light 100 feet long monohull weighting only 18 tons. A super-slender hull, almost triangular in plan view and featuring a long and sharp wave-piercing bow has an extremely low resistance and will cut through waves without pitching, slamming or slowing down. High speed would come as result of efficiency and low resistance, not just row power. A canting keel on 18 feet long strut will provide enough stability to carry a generous sail plan

on a 120 feet carbon fiber mast. Very important for this boat’s performance is deck design and layout. Since at high speed deck frequently gets submerged, its shape should be optimized to reduce resistance and provide the best protection for the crew.

T THIS POINT THIS IS just an early design concept. Before it becomes a real boat a huge amount of design work has to be performed. A team of world leading designers working on this project will include specialists with expertise in offshore racing yachts like Volvo 70 and Open 60, multihull and powerboat designers, along with hydrodynamics and structural engineers.

Quest for the fastest monohull on the planet

Technical Aspects

HE PERFORMANCE potential of the SpeedDream boat could be best demonstrated by comparison to the Volvo 70 – today’s fastest monohull. A typical Volvo70 has Displacement/Length ratio D/L=40 and Length/Beam ratio L/B=6. In relative terms SpeedDream is much lighter and longer with an amazing D/L=17 (!) and L/B=10. This means that her resistance at high speeds will be signifi-

cantly lower, yet she will be 40% more stable enabling her to carry a much more powerful rig.

NLIKE THE VOLVO70 that has to perform well in a wide variety of conditions – light and heavy winds, upwind and downwind sailing – the SpeedDream performance optimization will be focused on the narrow band of wind speed (moderate to heavy) and

apparent wind (close reach, beam reach and occasionally, broad reach). Boat will always sail with a constant heel angle (around 15-20 degrees) and her hull, appendages and sails will be designed accordingly.

RELIMINARY ESTIMATES show SpeedDream capable of reaching top speed in excess of 55 knots and maintaining 40-45 knots for extended periods of time.

Technical Data Overall length -100ft Waterline length -100ft. Maximum beam -20ft. Waterline beam -10ft. Displacement 18 ton Sail Area (main + genoa) – 480 sq.m Sail Area downwind – 1100 sq.m Ballast 9 tons

SpeedDream

Quest for the fastest monohull on the planet

SpeedDream

Quest for the fastest monohull on the planet

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D d ee

SpeedDream

Going Green

the clean energy of wind for Millennia, and with great results. Our SpeedDream project will remind the world that sailboats are, in fact, the ultimate clean, no-emission vessels, infinitely more efficient than solar powered ones. The 450sq. meter area of solar panels that powers PlanetSolar could generate

HIGH PROFILE PlanetSolar project is currently underway aimed at circumnavigating the globe on a 100 feet vessel powered by solar panels in order to demonstrate the possibilities of clean energy. It’s quite a noble goal, but let’s not forget that people have been using

90kW of power (126hp). Sails of roughly the same area will provide SpeedDream with the equivalent of 3000hp and propel her through the ocean at 50 knots. We hope that our project will highlight the fact that sailboat are the most efficient, by far the cleanest, and very nearly the fastest vessels on the planet.

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p S 19

Quest for the fastest monohull on the planet

From dream to reality

HE ENTIRE PROJECT from designing the boat, building, testing and optimizing her to achieve all objectives in a series of trans-Atlantic crossings should take between 30 and 36 months. After this the boat could be further used for more high visibility events like the record globe circumnavigation, participating in famous ocean races like TransPac, Bermuda Race, Sydney to Hobart, Fastnet Race, etc, and in demonstrations and shows worldwide.

ITH PROPER m a r k e t i n g , S p e e d D r e a m should become a major media event, bringing

SpeedDream

invaluable return on investment necessary to finance it. Funding for the project could be provided by corporate sponsorship, or it could be backed by a discriminating sailor or group of sailors who have ambition, desire and financial means to participate in this extraordinary venture and to own the fastest and most advanced yacht on the planet.

RITISH ENTREPRENEUR Richard Branson used a similar project as a promotional tool to win over business and clients. In order to gain maximum publicity his new airline, Virgin Atlantic, he set out to establish

a new speed record of crossing Atlantic on a powerboat. Not only the super fast vessel called Virgin Atlantic Challenger helped generate enough publicity to successfully launch his airline. It also propelled Richard Branson into celebrity stardom, making him a best-known modern adventurer.

UR PROJECT PROMISES same benefits for those brave and ambitious individuals and companies who will become our partners in bringing SpeedDream to reality.

SpeedDream Team Contact BOSTON, USA Vlad Murnikov Email: vmurnikov@verizon.net Skype: vladsailing1 MARBLEHEAD, USA Brian Hancock Email: brian@brianhancock.org Skype: callbrianhancock KIEV, UKRAINE Eugene Platon Email: eplaton@msn.com Skype: eugene.platon MOSCOW, RUSSIA Valery Zakhovaev Email: valerzah@mail.ru Skype: valeriy_Zakhovaev

Quest for the fastest monohull on the planet

SpeedDream

“Goals are no more than your dreams with a deadline.” Brian Hancock

Quest for the fastest monohull on the planet