THE RACING GAME WHY COMPUTER SIMULATION COULD BE THE KEY TO AMERICA'S CUP VICTORY
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HP CASE STUDY
TH E R AC I N G G A M E
WH Y COM PU T E R SI MUL ATI ON COULD B E
T H E K E Y TO AMERI C A’S CUP VI C TORY
H P Z Workst at i on s allow E m irates Team New Zealand far
greate r p e r forman ce to t urn d at a into i nc red ib ly d et ai led
si mu lat i on s of t h e real t hing, wi t hout t im e-c rit ic al d elays .
CASE STUDY | THE RACING GAME
Challenge
The America’s Cup has become just as much a technology race as a race on the water.
Emirates Team New Zealand’s latest boat is a 75-foot monohull weighing 7.5
tonnes (with the crew), mounted on foils with a hull that lifts completely out of the
water when it sails. Just like an aircraft, the yacht is supported by wings, which fly
through the water.
Industry: Country:
Sporting New Zealand
Creating a boat this futuristic is a massive undertaking – impossible by the standards
of even two decades ago. As Head of Design, Dan Bernasconi, explains:
“When I started with the America’s Cup 15 or 16 years ago, it was on the verge of
IT Matters:
becoming a science. But even then the head designer still drew yachts by hand – it was
• Improves reliability of technology infrastructure
as much about experience as technology.”
• Unthrottled performance
Perfection these days requires Emirates Team New Zealand to run millions of
• Nvidia® Quadro® certified graphics for
preeminent visuals calculations daily on sail shape, elevator refinements and foil tip refinements, making
their boat not just ship-shape, but record-breaking. Computers create a completely
realistic simulation of the yacht, testing every single upgrade in all kinds of conditions
Business matters:
without needing to step off the base.
• Strengthens security of critical and confidential data
That takes some serious horsepower: and that amount of grunt costs money.
• Allows for workplace efficiencies
Carl Hansen, Technical Specialist for campaign sponsor, HP New Zealand, says
Emirates Team New Zealand’s old bank of servers, hosted off-site, was racking up high
Hardware:
power consumption fees, hosting charges and causing delays as staggering quantities
• HP ZBook 15 G5, HP ZBook 15 G6 of data shuttled back and forth. Luckily, one solution had the answer to everything.
• HP ZBook 14u G5
• HP ZBook Studio G5
• HP Z27n Display
• HP Z38C Curved display
• HP Z8 x 8 all with Nvidia Quadro P6000 cards
• HP Z4 with P5000
• HP Z1 x 4 Tower with RTX2080 cards
Computers create a
completely realistic
simulation of the
yacht, testing every
single upgrade in all
kinds of conditions
without needing to
step off the base.CASE STUDY | THE RACING GAME
Story Highlights:
Approach
“It’s pretty usual for the winners of the America’s Cup to stick with the same class
of boat next time, but we believe by changing to something completely new we’re
giving ourselves an advantage. In the technology stakes, we have the edge,”
E IG HT
Bernasconi says.
The reason for that confidence: an array of eight HP Z Workstations, helping to
HP Z Workstations helping to process
process highly technical computational fluid dynamics modelling.
highly technical computational fluid
dynamics modelling
Cameras, sensors and other data points are mounted on the chase boats that follow
the yacht, wirelessly transmitting a host of data back to mobile Workstations on
board. All the while, the computers run hydro- and aerodynamic analysis so they
can test how the boat’s key components perform in and on the water.
But that’s just the start. The real power of HP’s Z Workstations is their ability to turn
that data into incredibly detailed simulations of the real thing.
“After drawing by hand, everyone used wind tunnels and towing tank testing for
30 ST RO N G a while, with scale models. It was incredibly time-consuming – it took weeks and
weeks to compare a couple of hull designs in towing tanks,” says Bernasconi.
team of designers developing the yacht until
the week before the competition begins “Computational fluid dynamics allows us to cut out that step. Now we can simulate
aerodynamic or hydrodynamic forces on the yacht. Every foil, rudder or sail is run
through the simulator before going into production. We do laps in a virtual yacht,
change the conditions and time it. Being able to do that is a game-changer in the
way we design America’s Cup yachts.”
As in any race, time is critical. Although it’s a three-year competition, there are a
whole lot of deadlines to meet over that time, from getting initial designs ready
to the final touches on the boat. Bernasconi’s 30-strong team of designers will be
developing the yacht until the week before the competition, so every extra second
can be squeezed from the final version.
“The ability to run computational simulations on powerful machines is absolutely
paramount. Every ounce of grunt we can get out of the machine makes all the
difference. HP Workstations have bought us more time. We can make adjustments
“The ability to run and run simulations every time the boat hits the water,” says Bernasconi.
computational
Pushing innovation to the limits
simulations on
So much of design is optimisation. Calculating exactly the right dimensions
powerful machines and angles is made exponentially faster by artificial intelligence, which can
is absolutely automatically come up with the strongest design to meet optimal requirements.
paramount. Every Bernasconi describes the process in detail.
ounce of grunt we “In structural engineering we use finite element analysis, breaking down the
can get out of the structure into thousands of little Lego bricks called finite elements. Then we
model the load paths where stress and strain goes through the structure, so we
machine makes all know exactly where to put reinforcement instead of making the design over-safe
the difference.” everywhere. This is a massive saving in both weight and time.”
– Dan Bernasconi, Emirates Team
New Zealand head of designCASE STUDY | THE RACING GAME
Benefits It was this kind of analysis that came up with the famous plan to use pedal power on
Emirates Team New Zealand’s boats via cyclors (cyclist sailors) instead of the hand-
cranked winches.
Computational analysis :
“Going from grinders to cyclors was a bit of a no-brainer. The guys have more strength
in their legs than their arms. But to make that step, there were technical challenges to
overcome, including the amount of space on the boat,” Bernasconi explains.
“We were originally thinking we’d need recumbent bikes. Computational models looked
at how to create minimum drag and the configuration of the cyclors across the boat
Ability to turn data into and ended up with an even better configuration than the original set-up of grinders on
detailed simulations
the boat. The simulations gave us confidence that the yacht would do well.”
Having HP Z Workstations on site also means far greater performance, without
time-critical delays. For Emirates Team New Zealand IT manager, Marty Yates, the
Extreme reliability : benefits are huge.
“We’re extremely happy the rendering and computational simulations are being
run in-house. We can run those machines day in, day out, and the cost is minimal
compared with a cloud-based solution.”
Bernasconi is also full of praise for HP’s human support.
Backed by hundreds of hours of
“We have a really good partnership with HP – in every area we’re pushing
testing, every HP Z component
is put to the test optimisation really hard and we’re relying on HP computational analysis to push that
design to the limit. The HP team are really keen to get involved with the design team
and support us with our needs.”
Yates says their achievements go beyond the yachting world, showing other New
High performance :
Zealanders exactly what can be done in their own backyard.
“What this partnership shows is innovation can occur in New Zealand at a very high
level – we have the skills and technology to be the best in the world.”
Greater performance,
without time-critical delays Learn more at
hp.com/ETNZ
hp.com/workstations/overview
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