If I understood it correctly Alex Thomson was back in the race having made repairs to his boat when he hit something that broke his rudder. Is that correct?
We saw the interview in today's English language roundup. The poor guy was almost, if not actually, in tears.
The problem, obviously, with these foiling boats (any race boat for that matter) is to get the right balance between structural integrity and weight. They are really on the veryt edge of the possible.
You do understand correctly.
This video by Alex Thomas of Peak Torque is quite a good explanation for the layman of the structural problems which Alex Thompson repaired. He is not a naval architect, and (as with any such modelling), makes a whole bunch of assumptions, but I think his analysis is reasonable. `He makes quite a good joke, describing Alex Thomson as the "Colin McRae of sailing", his point being that the designers should have made adequate allowance for the fact that this is a guy who has a track record of sailing his boats really hard, so should be an intrinsic part of the brief.
Consider the point that he makes, (at about 21:30), that the reinforced areas where Thomson has made his repairs, may just transfer the shear force to the area forward of the repair, causing it to crack there.The thought of the boat breaking up under him in the middle of nowhere in the roaring forties doesn't bear thinking about. In the light of the sinking of PRB, it may well be that the rudder breaking when it did paid Alex Thomson a favour.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hKDv7vSemrI
