Lake Gairdner drying out ahead of Team New Zealand wind-powered world speed record attempt – ABC News

It isa long way from the Land of the Long White Cloud to the long white salt lake in South Australia's far north where Team New Zealand is ready to set a new wind-powered world speed record.

Lake Gairdner is the venue and it has taken about 18 months for the team to get to the start line.

"It's going to be interesting understanding the conditions that we're working in now," Team New Zealand operations manager Sean Regan saidas he oversaw preparations.

"For everyone here it's like thumbs-up. We're happy. First step of many."

The carefully planned operation will try to steer the land yacht Horonuku across the salt bed at well over 200 kilometres per hour.

They will need 30 to 35 knots to surpass the world record of 202.9 kph and Horonuku will need to travel about 7 kilometres on the salt lake to get to full speed.

"It is such a boutique, cutting-edge technology project," said the craft's pilot, America's Cup winning yachtsman Glenn Ashby.

"We're pushing boundaries to limits they haven't been pushed to before with a wind-powered craft.

"The craft is very much engineered to do 250 kph.

"It really depends on Mother Nature for how much wind we get and also what the surface is of the salt."

Mother Nature has not been exactly kind to the project, with rain in January leaving about a metre of water across the normally dry lake.

"It's been slowly disappearing and over the last few days we've been able to get a dry surface," Ashby said.

It has allowed Team New Zealand to go forward with its plans and Horonuku has been transported from Adelaide to Lake Gairdner a trip of about 500 kilometres.

The team had initially hopedto have been at the lake and be readying for a serious run about five or sixweeks ago.

Nevertheless, the record-chasers are more than satisfied with what Lake Gairdner presents for them.

"The fact that we've got about 17 kilometreslong and about 8 kimwide will hopefully give us enough runway," Ashby said.

"We need about 67km from a standing start to get to our terminal velocity of hopefully around 250 kph."

The project has been funded and run by Team New Zealand, the current holder of the America'sCup, and based in Auckland, where construction and the initial testing of the yacht was undertaken.

"We're using tyres and wheels and suspension, which is pretty foreign to us, so we've had to get out of our comfort zone a little bit," Ashby said.

Horonuku was packed away and sent to Adelaide in June ready for the record attempt, only for the weather to intervene.

Team New Zealand is hopeful it will be smooth sailing from here on.

The team will pressure test the yacht's tyres, trim and traction in the next few weeks as it waits for the perfect conditions to sail no rain on the lake and plenty of wind.

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Lake Gairdner drying out ahead of Team New Zealand wind-powered world speed record attempt - ABC News