land yacht record

Fastest speed achieved by wind-powered land yacht

The highest speed officially recorded for a land yacht is 222.4 km/h (138.2 mph) by Horonuku , piloted by Glenn Ashby (Australia), at Lake Gairdner, South Australia, Australia, on 12 December 2022. The yacht was designed and built by Emirates Team New Zealand.

In Maori, Horonuku means “gliding swiftly across the land “, a name apparently not chosen at random by Emirates Team New Zealand, because they succeeded in their intent by achieving an impressive 222.4 km/h in just 22 knots of true wind, racing across the salty surface of Lake Gairdner in South Australia.

Piloting Horonuku was Glenn Ashby, a professional sailor with an outstanding career behind: The team and I are obviously buzzing to have sailed Horonuku at a speed faster than anyone has ever before powered only by the wind – said Ashby – But in saying that we know Horonuku has a lot more speed in it when we get more wind and better conditions. So for sure there is a cause for a celebration, but this isn’t the end.

This record was ratified by the international governing body FISLY (Federation Internationale de Sand et Land Yachting).

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This America’s Cup Team Just Broke the World Speed Record on a Land Yacht

Emirates team new zealand smashed the record for non-powered vehicles with its fixed-wing, carbon-fiber horonuku on australia's lake gairdner., michael verdon, michael verdon's most recent stories, a frothy genoa international boat show proves the yachting world is alive and kicking.

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But Glenn Ashby’s speed-breaking ride of 222.4 kmh (or 138.2 mph) on Sunday across the dried sands of Australia’s remote Lake Gairdner is off the charts. Team New Zealand’s 46.2-foot-long land yacht, Horonuku , is a colorful, slender carbon-fiber structure with four wheels and a 36-foot-tall rigid-wing sail that burned up the white sands with only a paltry wind speed of tk knots (tk mph). There are no engines and, according to race rules, the vehicle had to be pushed by Ashby’s team at the start. It also had run over the sands, without any paved roads to help.

Ashby, a native Australian who has been on the Kiwi team for 12 years, had dreamed since he was a child of breaking the record. Englishman Richard Jenkins, who held the previous record, only did so after designing and building five vessels for a decade before establishing the 202.9 kmh (126.1 mph) record in 2009. On the day Jenkins set the record, the winds were blowing from 26 to 40 knots. Under the rules, Horonuku had to establish the new record by at least 1 mph.

There had been much drama leading up to the record run. The lake had received an unusual amount of precipitation earlier in the year and wouldn’t be ready for a record attempt until the sand dried. In November, the team sat around for several weeks waiting for the chance to break the record, but rain kept the sand waterlogged.

“The steering was tough work,” said Ashby after the earlier run. “So that is the main focus to identify solutions to lighten the load as this will help with performance. To be able to build speed more efficiently and effortlessly will help reaching higher speeds.”

The team clearly found it yesterday breaking the record with wind speeds of just above 20 knots.

So why is a professional sailing team messing about with land-speed records? Emirates Team New Zealand spokesperson Hamish Hooper told Robb Report that the lessons learned at Lake Gairdner will translate to its foiling yachts. “It’s provided a really valuable project for the whole team to keep them engaged and thinking outside the usual design parameters of the America’s Cup. Both have had significant benefits for our team.”

The group said on its Facebook page that it might continue to break its new record in the new year.

“We had a bit of dream and it was crazy but it’s starting to kick home,” said Ashby after breaking the record. Plus, he added, the ride was “bloody awesome.”

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Emirates Team New Zealand sets a new wind powered land speed record

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The New Land Yacht Aiming to Break a Land Speed Record

America's cup-winning emirates team new zealand is attempting to break the wind-powered record.

When I hear the term land yacht, the first kind of vehicle that comes to mind is either a full-size luxury sedan or an SUV. Could you imagine a Cadillac Escalade setting a land speed record? Not me. Though, there’s a new literal land-going sailing yacht looking to raise the bar. Emirates Team New Zealand, the America’s Cup-winning sailing team, has launched a land yacht to attempt to break the wind-powered land speed record later this year. The current wind-powered land speed is 126.1 mph (202.9 km/h), set in 2009.

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Earlier this week, Team New Zealand officially unveiled its land speed record challenger, the Horonuku. The vehicle will be powered, for lack of a better term, by a 10-meter (32.8 feet) tall rigid carbon-fiber wingsail. The wingsail is designed to propel the land yacht up to 155.3 mph (250 km/h) if the conditions allow.

Glenn Ashby will pilot the vehicle. Ashby has won two America’s Cup Matches as a sailor with Team New Zealand. He said in a statement:

“There is definitely an element of needing the stars to align when achieving a world record like this where you need the conditions on the ground and in the air to be perfect. It is our job now over the next month or so, to get as much useful testing as we possibly can done here in Auckland, before we put Horonuku on a ship to Lake Gairdner to continue testing and tuning on the salt lake so we are ready to roll when a weather window comes along.”

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Emirates Team New Zealand and the Horonuku are expected to make their record attempt in August on Lake Gairdner, a salt lake in South Australia. To break the record, all Ashby has to do is exceed 126.1 mph for three seconds during his run. The sailing team is also preparing for their next America’s Cup Match in 2024 in Barcelona, Spain.

LAND SPEED PROJECT

After the 36th America's Cup victory in 2021, the stars aligned for Emirates Team New Zealand to aim for the current World Wind-powered Land speed record. The attempt took shape when the passion for speed of Grant Dalton – Emirates Team New Zealand CEO – and the childhood dream of Glenn Ashby -  a key team member for over 10 years – met the expertise in the technical and research industries of Team Principal Matteo de Nora. In a few weeks, they put together the core group that, just over a year ago, started working through the new design and engineering challenges entirely focused on beating the existing Speed World Record.

THE RECORD: 202.9 km/h (126.1-mph)

The Wind Powered Land Speed World Record is currently held by Britain's Richard Jenkins, whose 'Greenbird' land yacht hit 202.9 km/h (126.1-mph) in 2009 across Ivanpah Lake, a dry lake in the California's Mojave. It took him ten years to achieve the result.

World records attempts must undergo a stringent verification process with either NALSA (North American Land Sailing Association) or FISLY (International Land and Sand Yachting Federation). - Must be sailed on a natural surface with a flat elevation within 1 metre of elevation - Starting only by human push start allowed for the record run - The record speed must be more than one mile per hour for at least 3 seconds above the existing record (>204.5km/h x 3")

THE CRAFT: Horonuku

'Horonuku' - meaning gliding swiftly across the land - has been conceptualised, designed and built by Emirates Team New Zealand. A one-of-a-kind 14-metre hard-winged land yacht with no engines. It's all about wind. Instead of a conventional sail, Horonuku uses a rigid wing that produces thrust, as an aeroplane wing produces lift. The entire craft is built of carbon composite materials, aside from the metal parts used in bearings for the wing and the wheels.  Length (long mode) = 14.2m Max Beam = 8.2m Wing height from ground = 11.1m Wing = tailplane actuated unstayed rigid wing spar Total Mass (incl max ballast) = 2800kg Power = wind only, no stored energy allowed Wheels = 2x inline rears 18", 1x front and 1x pod 15" Construction = vacuum-formed carbon fibre epoxy sandwich panel main body elements Controls = steering from wheel, brakes/tail flap trim function from foot pedals/hand levers

THE PILOT: Glenn Ashby

Born in 1977 in Bendigo, Australia, Glenn is a long-time Emirates Team New Zealand member with an outstanding sailing career that includes, among others, three America's Cups, an Olympic silver medal and 17 World Championships in four different classes of boat.

EMIRATES TEAM NEW ZEALAND: The core group

To face the design and engineering challenge of Horonuku’s endeavour to be the fastest wind-powered craft in history, Emirates Team New Zealand had to put together a few of their best member. Together with Team Principal Matteo de Nora, the core group consists of naval architects Guillaume Verdier, Romaric Neyhousser and Benjamin Muyul, Mechanical/Structural engineers Jeremy Palmer, Romain Gard, Tim Meldrum, Adrian Robb and Jarrod Hammond and shore crew members Sean Regan and Dave French.

THE LOCATION: Lake Gairdner, Australia

Lake Gairdner is located about 440 kilometres northwest of the state capital of Adelaide and 150 km from the nearest town along dusty outback roads. The lake is over 160 km long and 48 km across, with salt over 1.2 metres thick in some places. The usually bone-dry salt lake in South Australia had 50mm of water in it in July due to abnormal weather conditions. About 100mm of water evaporation is expected each month, and as summer approaches, this will only increase. As will the winds, with October expected to be the windiest month of the year in the location.

THE CONDITIONS:

It's a technical and tactical challenge as highly contingent on weather and conditions. Constant evaluation and plan adjustments are essential to ascertain the perfect weather window to attempt the record. Just a few knots could equal success or failure. Approximately 30 to 35kts of wind and a dry surface are crucial elements to have a chance of breaking the current record. 'Horonuku' needs about 7km distance to go from a standing start to full record speed.

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New Zealand aims for windpowered land speed record

• Toby Heppell
• May 24, 2022

Emirates Team New Zealand are in a bid to set a new windpowered land speed record. Here's everything we know about their plans so far

Not content with being one of the most successful teams in the history of the America’s Cup – and current holders of the Cup – Emirates Team New Zealand is attempting to set a new wind powered land speed record.

The team announced its intention to try for the record in early 2022 and are now well on the way to making an official record attempt.

As of the 23rd May 2022, Emirates Team New Zealand has completed a successful week of testing at Whenuapai Air Base where they have been able to run Horonuku , their speed sailing land yacht, up to nearly maximum load and complete structural and component checks.

As has become a significant part of Emirates Team New Zealand culture, Ngāti Whātua Ōrākei (an Auckland-based Māori hapū in New Zealand) as the iwi manaaki of the team have again named and blessed the craft in its endeavour to be the fastest wind powered craft in history.

‘ Horonuku ’ means gliding swiftly across land. Horo means fast or swift movement and nuku is connected to over earth or land.

With a week of testing now under their belts, the team says that in this initial testing week Horonuku has worked extremely well, has been sailed in 15-30 knots and already seen speeds in excess of 140kmph.

The team has another week of testing scheduled before shipping to Australia on 9th June where the planned record attempt will be taking place. During this time there will be some small changes implemented to the steering geometry and wing ballast and finally some testing will take place with the slick rear tyres.

The windpowered Land Speed record

The current wind powered land speed record has stood for an astonishing 13 years, having been set back in 2009 by British innovator Richard Jenkins in his custom built land yacht, Greenbird .

The 2009 wind powered land speed record run was the culmination of a decade of trying to break the record by Jenkins, who had travelled to a series of locations throughout Australia, Britain, and the United States, but struggled to find suitable weather conditions for him to reach maximum speeds. Jenkins eventually found success at Ivanpah Lak, a dry lake bed in the Mojave Desert, California.

His record-setting run to set a new wind powered land speed record saw him record 126.1 mph (202.9 km/h) in the Ecotricity-sponsored solid wing-sailed land yacht, Greenbird – the fifth iteration of the craft that he had built over the many years it took him to break the record.

Lake Gairdner in South Australia is a potential location for the record attempt

Jenkins’ new record eclipsed the previous benchmark, which American Bob Schumacher set a decade previously, by just shy of 10mph. It also continued a British tradition for speed that dates to the 1920s, when Sir Malcolm Campbell set several records on land and sea.

Greenbird was made entirely of carbon composite materials, and the only metal parts were the bearings for the solid wingsail and the wheels. The enormous power generated by a solid wingsail and a wide wheelbase meant that Greenbird could achieve vehicle speeds up to five times greater than wind speed.

Solid wingsails of a similar type to that used by Greenbird are now familiar to many sailors – even if they remain the preserve of high performance development designs. The solid wing generates lift in the same manner as an aircraft wing and, unlike material sails, does not deform under pressure.

A well built and engineered wingsail is typically vastly more efficient at speed than a soft sail.

America’s Cup winners to land speed record holders?

It is this incredible efficiency in generating power that has seen wingsails adopted for the America’s Cup . The sail concept was successfully used by BMW Oracle Racing on the giant trimaran in 2010, then also used when the event moved to the high performance AC72 catamarans in 2013.

The kiwis have plenty of experience when it comes to solid wings.

Any seasoned fan of America’s Cup racing will know it is – primarily – a design, engineering and technology contest. It attracts the biggest names in the world of sailing and can make stars out of the winners but, as with the world of Formula 1 (a sport many Cup teams have formed significant partnerships with in recent years) the team with the fastest boat (or car) usually comes out on top.

Emirates Team New Zealand have been totally dominant in the last two America’s Cup cycles so it is unsurprising that they have turned their significant engineering, design and computer simulation skills to trying to become the new wind powered land speed record holders.

The plan currently would see the team take a first run at the record in July / August on one of Australia’s vast salt lakes. Lake Gairdner in South Australia or Lake Lefroy in Western Australia are both potential locations.

Any world record needs to be stringently verified and will require officials from the North America Land Speed Association to measure and record the run with a specific set of rules that must be adhered to in order to qualify for the World Record.

Glenn Ashby has been instrumental in Emirates Team New Zealand’s Cup success – both as part of the sailing team on the water and liaising with design and engineering teams to encourage development.

Australian Ashby came into the New Zealand America’s Cup squad as a performance multihull expert. He has won 3 America’s Cups, an Olympic Silver Medal and 17 World Championships in 4 different classes of boat. Away from sailing Ashby also has a past in land yachts and is a keen motorbiker.

He also shares a long-held interest in the land speed record with ETNZ CEO Grant Dalton. In the lull in the Cup sailing cycle after their 36th America’s Cup victory in 2021, the chance presented itself to try and take on the speed record.

“I have never spent so much time on the computer as I have this past year,” says Ashby, who has been working on the project while unable to leave Australia and go to New Zealand due to covid travel restrictions. “Basically, from the point that Dalts said ‘let’s look at it’ after the finish of AC36, we have been all go.

“First job was a two-week in-depth feasibility study to ensure enough of a global understanding that this was something that could be done in a positive way for ETNZ and would not impact the team and its America’s Cup objectives financially or resource wise.”

Emirates Team New Zealand’s landyacht will look similar to current record holder, Greenbird . Photo: Emirates Team New Zealand

The New Zealand land yacht

“In doing our research and digging deeper and deeper into the intricacies of the design challenges, it became very apparent that Richard [Jenkins, builder of Greenbird ] really did an incredible job with his world record design.” explains Ashby.

“As a team we explored some pretty creative and innovative conceptual ideas in the quest for more speed, however in the end our design and performance principles evolved into a concept reasonably similar in basic layout to the existing record holder, which really emphasised to us what a huge challenge this will be.”

New territory

Wind power will be very familiar to Emirates Team New Zealand, as will the design, technology, complex composites work, aerodynamics, and many other aspects of building a land speed record holder. But what will be a new challenge for the team will be the wheels and tyres, about which they have almost no experience.

The man leading the charge in the area is Mechanical Engineer Tim Meldrum, a mountain biking enthusiast – one of the key designers behind the legendary Cyclors mechanical system that was so integral to the team’s success winning the America’s Cup back for New Zealand in 2017.

Wheels and tyres represent a new area for Emirates Team New Zealand. Photo: Emirates Team New Zealand

The team will be using a mixture of off-the-shelf wheel and tyre combinations for the outrigger and twin rear wheels, but have custom designed and manufactured their own front wheel in order to get the steering accuracy they need.

With a craft likely to be so similar to Greenbird, it will take everything Team New Zealand knows about marginal gains to beat the current wind powered land speed record. Areas such as machining their own front tyre might just turn out to be the vital advantage they need to set a new record.

“The objective is to design a craft that becomes the fastest wind powered land yacht ever.” said Glenn Ashby.

“And no one would have ever been that fast in a wind powered craft on or off the water. So that’s a pretty bloody exciting thing to try to become.”

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America's Cup-winning skipper sets sights on 250kph wind-powered record in SA outback

By Daniel Keane

ABC Radio Adelaide

Topic: Wind Energy

America's Cup champion Glenn Ashby is shifting his focus from ocean to land. ( Supplied: Emirates Team New Zealand )

Glenn Ashby is no stranger to moving like the wind, but he will have to travel considerably faster to break the world record in his sights. 

Key points:

• Yachtsman Glenn Ashby's feats include America's Cup glory in 2017
• He is now shifting his focus from the sea to the land
• He wants to be the first person to travel at 250kph in a wind-powered vehicle

A champion yachtsman, the America's Cup winner  has, in recent months, shifted his focus from the sea to the land — specifically, to the flats of Lake Gairdner in South Australia's far north.

While his aim is to travel at 250 kilometres per hour, there'll be no petrol, nor any other fuel, propelling him. 

Instead, he'll be piloting a vessel purely powered by the breeze.

"It's the world wind land-speed record that we're trying to break," he told ABC Radio Adelaide's Jules Schiller.

"The current record is 202.9km an hour and we're trying to break that … over the next couple of months."

The so-called land yacht is named Horonuku, meaning "gliding swiftly over land". ( Supplied: Emirates Team New Zealand )

Originally from Bendigo, Ashby's renown rests on his feats as a yachtsman.

An Olympian and multiple world champion, he skippered Emirates Team New Zealand to a famous victory in the 2017 America's Cup, and the same team will be behind him as he attempts to make history at Lake Gairdner.

If the change of surface — from saltwater to salt lake — will be a challenge, the change of vessel will be a little easier to negotiate, he said.

Ashby played a pivotal role in the 2017 America's Cup victory. ( AP: Gregory Bull )

Named "Horonuku", which means "gliding swiftly over land", the so-called land yacht looks like a cross between a dragster and a glider.

"We've got a big long arm that's about eight metres wide that goes out one side of the craft which has got about 850 kilos of steel and lead and a wheel under it," Ashby said.

"It's like a keel of a yacht that's out to the side, and that basically stops us rolling over and behind me is about a 10.5-metre solid carbon fibre wing sail."

Salt lake chosen for ideal surface

Lake Gairdner has previously hosted feats of the kind Ashby is about to embark on — a favourite of daredevils, it was the site of Rosco McGlashan's 1994 Australian land speed record of just over 800kph.

ABC Radio Adelaide regular and Triple J Science Hour host Dr Karl Kruszelnicki said the flat surface of a salt lake was probably the best possible spot for such an endeavour.

"You can keep the friction way down," he said.

"With a boat, you've got a long hull and there's a lot of friction, [and] you can reduce that by having little hydrofoils.

"But on land, we've got a lot of technology for low-friction wheels."

Ashby said the South Australian site was chosen after a painstaking selection process.

"We've looked at various options around Australia and actually around the world," he said.

"We've honed our sights on Lake Gairdner purely for the fact that it has, generally, a really good surface.

"There still is, unfortunately, a little bit of water [there] at the moment but it is drying."

Ashby described the vehicle as a cross between a yacht, glider and dragster. ( Supplied: Emirates Team New Zealand )

The current world land speed record for a wind-powered vehicle was set by British engineer Richard Jenkins in 2009.

To build up the necessary momentum to surpass it, Ashby said Horonuku would need a "runway" of about 7km "to eventually get up to what we're hoping is going to be close to 250km an hour".

"We're targeting 30 to 35 knots of wind. We're sort of looking at doing roughly seven times wind speed," he said.

"You start off slowly and you slowly build and we're about two-and-a-half tonnes of weight all up.

"Once we get rumbling it's a pretty hairy ride."

'Great new challenge' is 'reasonably safe'

It might sound paradoxical that a vehicle entirely powered by the wind can travel significantly faster than it.

But, as Dr Karl explained, the principle has been exploited by sailors for centuries.

It involves something called "apparent wind" — and relies on the fact that travelling at an angle to the wind can generate more speed.

"We've known how to do it for thousands of years," Dr Karl said.

"After doing it for a while, tacking to the left and right, the sailors realised that sometimes they were travelling through the water faster than the speed of the wind."

He said he would be observing Ashby's progress with "extreme interest".

"To see physics in action is always a joy," he said.

Lake Gairdner's salt flats are a favourite with daredevils attempting to set new records. ( ABC: Ginny Stein )

Horonuku has already arrived in Adelaide, and will be trucked to Lake Gairdner in the next few weeks.

Ashby will be boldly following in the vessel's wake. But is he nervous?

"I like to think that it's reasonably safe — that's certainly what I tell my wife," he said with a laugh.

"Compared to a lot of the other boats that I've sailed over the years, but on water obviously, I think it's the most safe [vessel] I've ever sailed in my life.

"This is certainly something very, very different to what I normally do so it's a great new challenge."

Videos and flight radar show plane crash believed to have killed Prigozhin

Yevgeny Prigozhin ’s rise owed much to videos that spread rapidly through Russian social media and nationalist circles: charting his feud with the Kremlin’s military leaders, then showcasing his armed revolt against them — all carried by a gust of intrigue and anger.

On Wednesday those same channels were filled with video that appeared to document what may have been the Wagner mercenary chief’s final, fiery plummet into a field outside Moscow .

Though much is still unclear, here's what we know and what NBC News has verified about the dramatic incident.

Follow our live coverage on the deadly plane crash

In one video geolocated by NBC News near the village of Kuzhenkino in Tver oblast, Russia, what looks like a plane can be seen spiraling down through clouds, trailing smoke behind it. The video , filmed from the ground and posted on social media, shows the apparent jet hurtling toward the ground before crashing and erupting into flames, sending a dark plume of smoke spiraling into the sky.

Another video filmed from a car near the same area shows an eyewitness driving beside a field in which the fiery wreckage of a plane can be seen. Another, graphic and close-up, shows someone inspecting the flaming wreckage in a field and swearing as they come across what appears to be two bodies.

Part of the aircraft’s registration number, “795,” on what appears to be the blue tail of the plane could also be seen in another video geolocated near Kuzhenkino. An Embraer Legacy 600 jet belonging to Prigozhin was known to have the serial number RA-02795. The executive jet was believed to be carrying Wagner leaders from Moscow to St. Petersburg on Wednesday.

The aircraft could be seen making a sudden drop in flight-tracking data published by Flightradar24. The jet appeared to lose around 1.5 miles of altitude in just half a minute, according to the site, transmitting data for the last time at 11:20 a.m. ET.

The aircraft had shown no sign of any problem until it started making “a series of vertical movements” downward and upward before making a “rapid descent,” Chris Lomas, an aviation content specialist with Flightradar24, said in a phone interview.

Lomas said it was "very difficult to speculate" on what might have caused the crash. "What we can say was that ... whatever that event was, it was very quick and it was pretty devastating."

Prigozhin was listed by Russian authorities as one of 10 people aboard the jet that crashed Wednesday. Everyone on the aircraft died, Russian officials said, with a Telegram channel associated with the Wagner group also announcing that Prigozhin had died.

The Kremlin has yet to comment on the fate of the man whose clash with Russia’s military leadership saw him challenge President Vladimir Putin's authority.

Along with Prigozhin, an official passenger list for the crashed plane posted  on Telegram included Dmitry Utkin, another senior Wagner official.

The bodies of those onboard were removed from the crash site and sent to a nearby morgue Thursday morning, according to photos and videos shared by news agencies and Russian media.

Photos also showed a fragment of the plane found more than two miles away from the site of the crash, the Russian state news agency RIA reported Thursday, near the entrance to a nearby village in the Tver region. 

So far, there has been no official confirmation about exactly whose bodies were found or identified.

A Western official told NBC News on Wednesday that U.S. and European allies were comparing assessments to get clarification on Wednesday’s crash.

In St. Petersburg, Prigozhin's hometown, photos showed mourners gathering at a makeshift memorial outside the Wagner Group's former headquarters, with Wagner badges placed alongside red candles and flowers.

Video verified by NBC News also appeared to show small bouquets of flowers left at a café in the city that was purported to be associated with the mercenary leader.

Photos also showed a makeshift memorial in front of the Wagner office in the Siberian city of Novosibirsk on Thursday.

While the mercenary chief had largely fallen out of view following his aborted armed rebellion in June, he appeared to be shown delivering his first video address in months earlier this week.

In a 41-second clip published by several Telegram channels affiliated with Wagner on Monday, a person who appeared to be Prigozhin was filmed standing in a desert-like area dressed in military fatigues and wearing a bulletproof vest bearing the Wagner logo.

He vowed to make Africa "more free" and Russia "even greater on every continent." NBC News was not able to verify the video’s authenticity, as well as when or where it was shot. 

It is still unclear what lies ahead for the Wagner mercenary group, which has been linked to violence in Syria, Mali, the Central African Republic and other nations, if its leadership has been lost.

Chantal Da Silva reports on world news for NBC News Digital and is based in London.

Bianca Britton is a reporter for NBC News' Social Newsgathering team based in London.