Emirates Team New Zealand, Southern Spars partner to beat wind-powered land speed record

Emirates Team New Zealand, a sailing team based in Auckland, has announced that it is returning to partner with composite specialists Southern Spars NZ (Auckland, New Zealand) in an attempt to beat the wind-powered land speed record of 202.9 kilometers/hour set in 2009 by Richard Jenkins onboard his Greenbird in the U.S.

“Emirates Team New Zealand approached us and asked if we would come on board to build the wing on the land yacht,” Mark Hauser, Southern Spars co-founder recalls. “This is a huge credit to our team, their experience and expertise. It’s an interesting project for us to get our teeth into — we jumped at the chance to be involved.”

With a long history as the go-to partner for Emirates Team New Zealand, Southern Spars says it has built a reputation as being the best in the world at designing and manufacturing carbon fiber spars and rigging. After being in business for more than thirty years, the company claims that it thrives on making the seemingly impossible, possible.

Long-time Emirates Team New Zealand member Glenn Ashby, who will be in the driving seat, says the record attempt is fulfilling a boyhood dream and that he needed to have absolute confidence in the team involved: “To beat a world record you need to work with the best in the world. I’ve never once heard Southern Spars say we can’t do that — it’s always let’s make it happen,” Ashby says.

With production already under way at Southern Spars headquarters in Avondale, the team is on track for completion in the next three to four weeks. The different components of the land yacht will then be brought together and shipped to Australia for the record attempt which will likely take place in August on one of Australia’s salt lakes.