The Race Course is about 1.7nm long (about 3km) and between 0.5nm and 0.8nm (0.9km to 1.5km) wide, with boundaries on all sides that the boats must stay within.

It's called a windward-leeward course, named after the orientation of the course directly into the wind and away from the wind. From the start, the yachts race directly upwind – to windward, round the 1st mark then downwind, or to leeward. Rinse and repeat.

At three minutes to the start, the boats "enter" – sailing from above and outside the start line, and from opposite ends. This is the beginning of the "pre-start". The teams take turns over which side they enter from, as the boat coming in from the right-hand side has the advantage – with the right-of-way.

Because the AC75s travel so quickly, the boat coming in from the left-hand, or port, side enters first, 10-seconds before their opponent. This is to help reduce the risk of collision by coming in at the same time.

The goal is to time your run to the start line exactly to the second: When the countdown reaches zero, and the race is on.

Arrive too early, and you've blown it. In sailing terms, this is an "OCS". If you are "on-course side" at the time of the start, it means you've jumped the gun. The umpires will send a start penalty immediately, and you'll have to slow down to get behind your opponent, before getting racing again.

Once underway, the boats race upwind, constrained by boundaries on both sides of the course – step outside of any of those and it's another penalty.

Once at the top of the course, it's decision time, which way around the "top-gate". There are two separate marks – you just have to pass one from the inside, before heading off back downwind from where they've come. Once back at the "bottom gate", the boats will have completed their first "lap". Once there, the drill is exactly the same - choose one mark to go around before headed back-up upwind.

The Race Director determines the number of laps the boats will sail, based on how much wind there is, and therefore how long it will take to complete a race. On the final lap, headed downwind, the only difference is instead of a downwind gate the yachts cross the start/finish line to complete the match.

The main rule to know is what happens when boats are on a collision course. Take this case for example, when the boats are approaching on opposite tacks: If they hold their course, they're going to collide. So who has right of way? The answer is the yellow boat... Yellow has the wind coming across the right-hand side – making it the "starboard" boat. The blue boat has the wind coming across the left side of the yacht, making it the "port" boat. Starboard has rights over port. This means, in this situation, the yellow boat has all the power, and can hold its course – whilst the blue boat has to get out of the way. Blue can either change course to pass behind or by tacking underneath. Both manoeuvres costs them time and puts them into the turbulent air of the yellow boat. This applies whenever boats meet like this, either upwind or downwind.

There is only one exception to, which applies when the boats approach a boundary. You can't force a boat off the Race Course. When a boat is within 90-metres of the boundary – about 5-boat lengths – it gains the right of way and the right to tack or gybe.

Another key rule is when the boats are going in the same direction, but they're not overlapped. In this case, the boat behind has to keep clear of the boat ahead.

However, being in front doesn’t always mean you are leading. If the yellow boat gets its bow across the stern of the blue boat in front, it now has right of way. They call that an "overlap". When this happens, yellow, has all the power. Blue, has to get out of the way.