Shortly after the three ships had been authorized, the Navy learned that the Russian battleship , recently ordered from William Cramp & Sons in Philadelphia, would be capable of steaming at , a margin of over the "Maine" design. The Navy requested that the shipyards submitting designs for the contract increase the speed of their proposed ships to match the Russian vessel. Cramp & Sons responded by lengthening the hull by to increase its fineness (and thus reduce drag) and incorporate new Niclausse boilers, while the Newport News Shipbuilding & Drydock Company lengthened the hull by and increased the horsepower of the propulsion system by sixty percent, to . Ultimately, the Newport design was chosen for the new ships.