Editorial- A Cup on Hold

by nzeditor@sailworld.com on 23 Nov 2007 Welcome to the week-end edition of Sail-World.Com/NZ’s newsletter

The news came through just before dawn in New Zealand, that what was to have been the 33rd America’s Cup, has been postponed.

While the daily media were quick to stretch this out to 2011, and a four year gap, in reality, probably not a lot has changed.

A tight deadline has been made easier for the Challengers, and probably the only certainty in the America’s Cup game is that the situation we are seeing now will certainly change, before we get too much older.

For the well funded teams it means that they can spend more time on design, and won’t be rushed into a build job.

For the start up teams they have more time to get a backer on board and beginning to gear up.

What will be critical will be the interim events. If a good program of Acts are put together, there should not be a problem for the teams– providing these are financially viable.

Certainly there is the opportunity for the sailing world to see the AC90 class before the start of what was to have been the 33rd America’s Cup in July 2009.

The risk for America’s Cup Management is that they lose control of the event – as Challengers make decisions between themselves as to what sailing they will do, in order to give their teams and campaigns some focus and direction.

ACM are out to lunch if they believe they can postpone an event for an indeterminate time, with eight teams entered/filing papers and another two others in the wings. Clearly there is a good Cup party gathering and it is now for Alinghi to decide whether they still want to be part of it – or risk having another game set up.

If ACM are to keep the America’s Cup game under control, then the answers must be through in a few weeks rather than months. Certainly before Christmas.

It is not sufficient for ACM to be able to threaten teams with exclusion from a future America’s Cup if the Challengers break Event and Competition Rules on a postponed Match.

While ACM might be quick to point the bone at BMW Oracle Racing, the point is that the settlement options were there, the majority of the challengers were in agreement and the Defender chose not to pick up the deal.

In this issue we feature an interview with Alinghi’s Hamish Ross, who sets out the background to the decision. We did try to get comment from Emirates Team New Zealand, however they chose not to comment at this stage, which is fine.

In contrast to the bash and crash of the America’s Cup lawyers, we have also featured the Top Energy Sailing Week to be held in Kerikeri. Run by the three YNZ Yngling Olympic Squad members, Sharon Ferris, Raynor Smeal and Shandy Buckley, the week is a great initiative to get kids into sailing – assisted by their Olympic heroines.

Most of us can remember back to some time when we were young and the sailing switch flicked in our minds – usually at about the age of 10 or 12. Hopefully the Yngling team will be renting some sailing mindspace for these Northland kids as a result of this exercise.

The furore over the Olympic classes decision continues unabated. In this issue we feature a letter from Carolijn Brouwer (BEL) who finished second in the 2007 Tornado World Championships in Portugal in August. And then returned to August as part of the ISAF Events Committee to hear the Multihull event dropped from the 2012 Olympics by the Council of the governing body of the sport. It’s a recommended read.

Have a great weekend

Good sailing!

Richard Gladwell
NZ Editor