Alinghi Base for the 32nd America's Cup, Valencia, Spain

On 2 March 2003, Team Alinghi went down in history for defeating Team New Zealand to bring the America's Cup (AC) to Europe for the first time in over 150 years. After that victory, the Société Nautique de Genève, Switzerland, on whose behalf Team Alinghi competed, together with the Challenger of Record, the Golden Gate Yacht Club, announced the creation of America's Cup Management (ACM), an independent company mandated to organize the 32nd AC. On 26 November 2003, ACM announced that Valencia, Spain, would host the 32nd AC. The programme for this edition of the AC included an ambitious 4-year schedule of regattas starting in 2004 and culminating in the AC Match, to be held between 23 June and 7 July 2007. As a result and within the framework of a more ambitious urban development project, the Inner Harbour of the Port of Valencia has been reconditioned for the AC event. The infrastructure works included, among others, 12 bases that would serve as homes before and during the regattas for the defender, Team Alinghi, and each of the 11 challengers from all over the world. In an environment in which the most recent scientific and technological innovations are put immediately into practice in pursuit of lighter and faster boats, the challenge was to deliver sound buildings based on modern structural solutions, in which the design objectives of safety, serviceability, economy and elegance were to be achieved mainly by means of coherent conceptual design, efficient use of materials and good detailing. This paper describes the structural concept underlying the Alinghi Base, along with the solutions for a number of structural details and certain constructional considerations.