Yachting: 'Spooner slide' helps crew stay on board

Joe Spooner (right) learned his sliding technique from baseball.

In the new era of America's Cup racing where the demands on the crew are greater than ever before, even just getting from one side of the boat to the other has become a challenge.

Traversing the 14 metres between the two knife-like hulls at speed across a soft trampoline surface while the boat sails at speeds in excess of 40 knots is a skill in itself.

But given how technically difficult the boats are to sail, it is a skill that is often overlooked in discussions on the highly complex AC72 catamarans.

An incident on the Oracle Team USA boat before Sunday's opening races highlighted just how easy it is for sailors to topple off the boat. Oracle grinder Joe Newton took an unscheduled swim after losing his footing as he was crossing the boat, tumbling into the water.

The ungraceful fall generated plenty of light-hearted discussion on social media, mostly at Newton's expense. Twenty-four hours later the genial Australian still hadn't managed to come up with a good cover story.

"I just fell off," he said at the dock-out show before yesterday's third and fourth races.

He was eventually retrieved from the water and back on board USA-17 for both the opening races.

While he got plenty of ribbing from his peers, most of the sailors aboard the AC72 catamarans would be able to sympathise with Newton. The crew have to scamper across the boat quickly and somehow slow themselves down on the other side when the G-forces of the boat are sending them in a different direction.

Oracle grinder Joe Spooner has come up with a nifty way around the problem, known in the team as "the Spooner slide".

Constantly getting "banged up" as he jumped into the cockpit set-up on the Oracle boat, the Kiwi sailor took his inspiration from watching baseball players slide into home base.

"Sometimes if you're a little bit late getting round there or Jimmy starts to turn the boat early, the platform's moving and it's dangerous to be standing to be honest because your directional sense is limited. You can end up getting injured, whacking your legs or falling overboard," said Spooner.

"I was just getting banged up a lot so I went on YouTube and was looking at different techniques for the baseball slide and it works for me.

"I just drop down on to my side and go with gravity basically, nine times out of 10 I end up in my cockpit," he said.

Three or four other of the crew have now followed Spooner's lead, but as the inventor of the move, he had the honour of having the technique named after him.

There is no word yet on what the Oracle camp have named Newton's effort on Sunday.