Umpires are also undergoing rapid changes as America's Cup boats can now reach speeds up to 55 knots. They use an online tracking program to supervise racing from ashore.

The British team was penalized by the umpires for an incident that occurred during the America's Cup Final between New Zealand and Britain, when two AC75 monohulls were within inches of colliding foils.

Officials are only a third second behind the real time using The Umpire tool (TUT), a GPS tracking system that pinpoints the location of the boats.

The GPS in the boats that New Zealand, the current holders of the race, and Britain will be competing against this weekend gives their position and direction to a millimetre and a thousandth degree.

Chief Umpire Richard Slater demonstrated TUT and said, "We can't physically have umpires boats."

If something goes wrong, officials can use a VAR System as a backup plan in case the technology fails.

It involves 11 feeds that include the live video from the two helicopters, stern cameras of the AC75s or chase boats and anything else the umpires deem useful to help them make decisions regarding incidents at sea.

Slater said in Barcelona that "this allows us to put together as single, dual, quad pictures, which are all synchronised, and then we can pause and replay if needed."

Slater demonstrated how two umpires, each of whom is tracking a boat during a race, can see its outline, the boundaries that surround it, the speed and compass settings, as well as the true wind angle.

Slater, who spoke about the VAR system, said that the goal was to provide the umpires the information they need to implement the rules.

Slater, who is a big fan of the application, said that he expects it to work 100% of the time. However he would love to see a second version because so many changes need to be done.

Some sailors asked if there was a gap in experience between officials overseeing the races and those who actually handle the boats.

Slater's simple solution to getting foiling experience while relaxing and avoiding the stress of managing races is to take up the challenging sport of wing-foiling.

(source: Reuters)