In the depths of February, the reality remains wintry despite our thoughts, from the unlikely snowbound locales of northern Alabama and Dallas, Texas, northward to the unusually snow-challenged slopes of Whistler, where the Olympians this year help us embrace ice and snow for a few more weeks.

All of which has helped the Sunday victory by the U.S. in the America’s Cup, held in the comparatively warm Mediterranean waters off Spain, emerge unexpectedly from the headline stream. It’s huge news for sailing, of course—the winning BMW Oracle Racing team’s boat, USA 17, became the first American boat to win in 23 years, and it’s the first successful effort by team founder Larry Ellison, the Oracle exec and yachting enthusiast who has been sinking large amounts of his personal fortune into America’s Cup efforts for the last decade.

But the real meat is how a new and unusual rigid wing-sail trimaran has beaten an advanced flexible sail catamaran in head-to-head competition. The deceptively frail-looking hull of USA 17 was built specifically to support a multi-piece adjustable-camber wing that’s larger than a Boeing 747 wing. At 223-feet tall, the sail is bisected longitudinally, allowing the trailing pieces—each about two stories tall—to pivot independently. The forward, solid wing section is also adjustable by rotating the main mast. The gap in the bisected wing is crucial—it crucially allows the “wing” to reduce airflow separation and generate more lift before the sail reaches its stall point.

The America's Cup winner, USA 17, relied on a new split wing-sail design to claim victory in the America's Cup held last weekend in Spain.

When coupled with a complex arrangement of 250 sensors, the boat becomes an electromechanical wonder that, with the gennaker sail in place, can achieve astonishing speeds of up to 40 knots. USA 17 dominated both races, serving notice to the defending Swiss team that the game had changed. And the sailors themselves are subject to the technical wizardry—the BMW Oracle skipper, James Spithill, was apprised of vital wind and sail load information in real-time via a pair of sunglasses that were more reminiscent of the Borg than of a stiff breeze off Nantucket. Then there’s the environmentally-friendly friction-reducing hull treatment, which is apparently too innovative for anyone to describe in depth.

There’s been a lot of debate about whether the America’s Cup, once a field of many diverse competitors who laboriously hoisted and dropped sails and zigzagged upwind in pell-mell efforts to catch competitors in their dreaded wind shadow, has been completely ruined by the testosterone-fueled ambitions of rich corporations. True, it’s not the regatta of old. It’s an arms race, in which the “bigger” bazooka will win if it doesn’t break first. Maybe that’s a good thing—a specification series in which each boat is exactly the same might be a wonderful test of traditional technique, but it might not resonate with the resource any pro sport needs: sponsors with deep pockets.

Perhaps we’ll eventually see a backlash, a return to single-hull racing. But for now, let’s marvel at an elegantly complicated solution that appears to work as advertised.