Kiwis gunning for America's revenge
VALENCIA, Spain: The 32nd America's Cup, sailing's most prestigious competition, gets under way on Saturday with Swiss defender Alinghi facing a tough test from challenger Emirates Team New Zealand.
The Kiwis will be gunning for revenge after Alinghi swept them aside 5-0 in 2003 and recent form points to some close encounters in the best-of-nine series that runs from June 23 through July 7.
Since that whitewash four years ago, Emirates Team New Zealand have notched up a 6-4 win tally over Alinghi.
Last year, they met five times and Alinghi won just once, although it is important to point out that the Kiwis were sailing their first new boat (NZL 84) and the Swiss their old boat (SUI 75).
America's Cup defender Alinghi of Switzerland prepares to round the windward mark during a training session in Valencia on Tuesday, four days before the 32nd America's Cup match race against challenger Emirates Team New Zealand. Reuters |
"We're pretty much ready to go racing," said Emirates Team NZ principal Grant Dalton.
"The shore team is putting the finishing touches to the boats. For everyone else, it's important to have a little more down time because the next few weeks is going to very intense."
But the Kiwis, victors of the Auld Mug - the oldest trophy in sport first raced for in 1851 around the Isle of Wight - in 1995 and 2000, were in impressive form in the Louis Vuitton Cup, the pre-final event in which 11 competing teams were trimmed to just one challenger.
They were the top ranked team after the round robin stage with 17 wins out of 20, and went on to beat Desafio Espanol 5-2 in the semi-final and whitewash Luna Rossa 5-0 in the final, leaving them with a win tally of 27 in their 32 races.
Since the creation of the Louis Vuitton Cup as a challenger selection series for the America's Cup in 1983, the winner of the Louis Vuitton has beaten the defender on four out of six occasions. Last time, Alinghi was one of them.
Alinghi, with skipper Brad Butterworth gunning for a fourth America's Cup title after calling tactics for Team New Zealand in 1995 and 2000, and Alinghi in 2003, has been in steady practice over the last couple of months, racing against both Deasfio Espanol and Luna Rossa.
"We have been sailing every day, we are still crossing things off the list, there is always something we want to test or a crew manoeuvre that we want to fine tune," said Grant Simmer, design team coordinator.
"We are doing a lot of race practice and pre-start practice, we're preparing for the racing."
Simmer said it had been great for Alinghi to race against two of Emirates Team NZ's rivals in the Louis Vuitton Cup.
"Historically the defender getting an opportunity to sail against a strong challenger has always helped," he said.
"In our case that's also true, we were happy with our performance against both those teams.
"With Desafio Espanol, we only did pre-starts but with Luna Rossa, we had four races. There was high intensity and our performance looked very encouraging against them."
Simmer warned, however, that Emirates Team New Zealand were a team to be wary of.
"Their strengths are that there is a lot of experience in the team. They've done a lot of racing, they've kept their crew very stable - so I would say they are match fit.
"Performance wise, clearly their boat has come a long way, they've used the same boat (NZL 92) through the LV Cup. So they are fast and we are not expecting to have a speed edge on them. We expect them to be very similar in speed and to be match fit so they are going to be a very tough opponent."
Simmer added that Alinghi would wait until the last minute until naming the starting helmsman.
"We don't need to announce it any earlier. Both Peter Holmberg and Ed Baird have been working together and competing against each other for several years. We've asked them to do something really tough, to compete for that position while working together and supporting each other."
AFP
(China Daily 06/22/2007 page23)
