America's Cup World Series - Cascais Day 9: Fleet Racing Championsip

America's Cup World Series Cascais: Day 9

August 14, 2011

If you thought you were going to win the fleet race, and you saw this behind you, think again.
Photo:©2011 Chris Cameron/ETNZ

On this page: ACWS Cascais Day 9 - Fleet Racing Championship Statements
America's Cup: Emirates Team New Zealand Claims First AC World Series
Artemis Racing: The Grand Finale
Oracle Racing: Oracle Racing Concludes ACWS Cascais with Larry Ellison Aboard
Team Korea: Surprise of the Week
Emirates Team New Zealand: Finishing with a Flourish

From America's Cup Event Authority:

ETNZ's Dean Barker, Oracle's Larry Ellison and James Spithill, and Artemis's Terry Hutchinson celebrate after Day 9.
Photo:©2011 Guilain Grenier/Oracle Racing

Emirates Team New Zealand Claims the First AC World Series
Dramatic come from behind win for Kiwis again

Emirates Team New Zealand made an incredible recovery during the ‘winner takes all’ fleet race on Sunday to win the America’s Cup World Series Cascais, the first event of a new global series leading up to San Francisco in 2013.

With nine boats on the start line, the competition was close, and with a tricky, patchy race course area, there were passing lanes throughout the day. Oracle Racing Spithill jumped out to a convincing lead early, but couldn’t protect it. On the second lap of the race course, Kiwi skipper Dean Barker found more wind on his side of the race course to make the pass.

“For us it was fantastic,” Barker said. “It was always going to be a very difficult race, as the breeze never really established. There were big ‘holes’ in the race course, so it was about being at the right place at the right time.”

Artemis Racing, too, was able to work its way up to a second place finish from being back in the pack early; the early leader, Oracle Racing Spithill, was forced to settle for third.

“The guys did an awesome job to battle us up into the race,” said Artemis Racing skipper Terry Hutchinson, after a day where he climbed back from mid-fleet to second place. “It’s probably the best we’ve gone in the entire regatta. It's a very good finish for Artemis.”

But the feel-good story came from the Spanish GreenComm Racing. From a position of dead last early in the race, Vasilij Žbogar and his crew of dinghy champions began picking off the opposition on the final leg of the race to earn a fifth place finish, an incredible achievement for the novice crew.

“It's a fantastic day for the team, we were last to arrive, and were very last for the first three races, then we have been improving every day,” he said. “We were eighth, then seventh, sixth and now fifth. Today the spirit of the team showed more than ever we never give up. We fight to the end. Today, we are happy with our improvement, but still not happy with the result. We are a team of winners, so we won’t be happy until we win.”

Making its debut along with the AC45 catamaran was the new Guest Racer program where each team takes a guest aboard its race boat to compete with the team. The list of guest racers this week included VIP guests like Yves Carcelle, the Chairman and CEO of Louis Vuitton, pop singer Little Boots, Cecilia Meireles, the Secretary of State for Tourism in Portugal, along with names more familiar to the sailing world like former Cup winner John Bertrand, Artemis Racing CEO Paul Cayard and team principal Torbjörn Törnqvist, as well as Oracle Racing founder and principal Larry Ellison, who was aboard Oracle Racing Spithill today.

“We had a great start but both Artemis and Team New Zealand managed to pass us and that's what these boats are all about,” Ellison said following the race. “It makes the sailing much more exciting; it's not a matter of ‘you win the start, you win the race’. So it's just what we hoped for when we decided on multihulls for the next America's Cup It's really competitive and that's what people want to see. They want to see close races and the best sailors in the fastest boats.”

The America’s Cup World Series now moves on to Plymouth, UK, where the same nine teams will compete from September 10-18, before moving to San Diego, California in November.

From Artemis Racing:

Showing great form. Artemis pulled a second place together on Sunday, sailing well despite a slow start to pass everyone except ETNZ.
Photo:©2011 Gilles Martin-Raget/americasup.com

The Grand Finale

After seven full days of racing in Cascais, all the money was on today’s race, the grand finale of the Americas Cup World Series Cascais.

It was another perfect sailing day with 8-10 knots of wind. In the final fleet race, all nine teams were clear off the start line. The two Oracle Racing teams were soon leading the pack with Emirates Team New Zealand close at their heels.

A good call on the third leg to head out to the course boundary saw Artemis Racing move up into third place and steadily close the gap on the leaders. By leg four, Skipper Terry Hutchinson and crew were able to cross Oracle Racing Spithill and move into second place. With a slightly different sail plan than the Oracle Racing boats and good on the water calls, Artemis Racing stayed out in front to finish second overall in the ACWS Championship only 21 seconds behind winners Emirates Team New Zealand.

It was a really good Artemis team day, from start to finish. From the morning when we got down to the base, to the outcome on the water, said Skipper Terry Hutchinson. The guys did great work sailing the boat. We left plenty on the table at the start of the race so we had plenty to gain. In typical Artemis fashion we fought until the very end. That is probably the highlight of the day. There was no quit or surrender during the race. Kevin did great work positioning the boat in the breeze lines downwind. Sean and Morgan did really good work in keeping the boat fast. Julien, as always, was solid. It was a very, very good day for Artemis Racing.

From Oracle Racing:

On the back porch: Larry Ellison was the 6th man onboard Oracle4 with James Spithill, Sunday.
Photo:©2011 Gilles Martin-Raget/americascup.com

Oracle Racing Concludes ACWS Cascais with Team Founder Larry Ellison Aboard

After yesterday’s victory in the match racing championship, skipper James Spithill appeared poised to capture the event championship as well.

With special guest and team founder Larry Ellison aboard as the sixth crewmember, Spithill absolutely nailed the start at the pin end of the line with speed and precision and opened a lead of nearly 1 minute at the first leeward gate.

The Oracle Racing Spithill crew maintained its lead at the next windward mark, but leading down the second run they sailed into some patches of light wind. On the opposite side of the course Emirates Team New Zealand found a puff and crossed Spithill about two-thirds of the way down the leg.

A key element of the new class of AC45 catamarans was to create passing opportunities and this happened a second time on the next upwind leg. Oracle Racing Spithill dropped a place to Artemis Racing in a close port-starboard crossing halfway up the leg.

At the end an exhausting 40 minutes, Oracle Racing Spithill finished third for the race, one spot ahead of teammate Oracle Racing Coutts, skippered by Russell Coutts.

“It’s been a good week for us,” said Spithill. “We would’ve liked to finish with a win today. I think we sailed well in tricky conditions, the other guys just managed to do it a bit better as the breeze got funny. Full credit to Team New Zealand and Artemis Racing, they sailed well.

“The highlight was taking Larry out for his first race,” continued Spithill. “He’s really the guy who put this concept together.”

The introduction of a new racecourse was designed to keep the racing close and make it exciting for fans and television broadcasts. The wingsailed catamarans were developed for speed and to challenge the crewmembers in an athletic manner. After the first event of the ACWS it appears both goals have been realized.

“I’ve driven an RC 44 for the past four or five years. That, up until these boats, was the most fun I ever had sailing. Now the RC 44 seems like old technology,” said Ellison, who founded Oracle Racing in August 2000.

“We’re very excited that these boats go as fast as they do and can be pushed to such extremes by these great sailors who are driving them,” Ellison continued. “I think we made the right decision. It’s extreme sailing. Something the kids can get excited about, TV viewers can get excited about and even old monohull sailors like me can get excited about.”

Today’s racing featured plenty of place changing. While Oracle Racing Spithill went the wrong way, GreenComm made a great comeback from last to finish fifth, seconds behind Oracle Racing Coutts. It was only the eighth time skipper Vasilij Žbogar and his crew had sailed an AC45.

Yesterday’s match race final was punctuated by no fewer than five lead changes and top speeds of 45 kph/27 mph.

“Yeah, overtaking, what a shame,” Spithill chuckled. “It’s hard to defend in these boats and that’s a fantastic thing to have in a boat race. Make it hard to lead and have plenty of passing opportunities. I’m very happy.”

The America’s Cup World Series next moves to Plymouth, England, Sept. 10-18. In departing Cascais crews gave the revamped America’s Cup format a big thumbs up. “It will only get better,” said Artemis Racing’s skipper Terry Hutchinson.

Crew Lists:
Oracle Racing Coutts: Russell Coutts (helm), Murray Jones (wing trim), Matthew Mason (middleman), Daniel Fong (trimmer), Simeon Tienpont (bow)
Oracle Racing Spithill: James Spithill (helm), John Kostecki (tactician), Dirk de Ridder (wing trim), Joe Newton (trimmer), Piet van Nieuwenhuijzen (bow)

Team owner Larry Ellison had a prime view of the competition Sunday. Unfortunately Oracle4's lead slipped away to ETNZ and Artemis.
Photo:©2011 Guilain Grenier/Oracle Racing

From Team Korea:

Team Korea - Surprise of the Week at America’s Cup World Series

The first of the 2011-2012 America’s Cup World Series (ACWS) events drew to a close in Cascais, Portugal today, having set a new format competition on the way with style, excitement and huge promise. Team Korea have enjoyed their introduction to the competition with fantastic success, and are regarded as the surprise of the week given their stellar performance, but it wasn’t quite the champagne finish in the last race that people had started to expect from them, taking seventh in the fleet race on Super Sunday the big finale to the event.

This race carries points towards the World Championship title that will finish in July next year, and the team were on a high going into the race, having unexpectedly beaten Russell Coutts of the mighty Oracle Racing team yesterday to advance to the semi-finals of the Match Racing competition. They lost there to one of the strongest teams in the event from New Zealand, but it was an astonishing achievement to reach fourth position at the very first attempt with a brand new team, and widely applauded around the world.

Nine days ago, a seventh in an ACWS fleet race for the White Tiger Challenge would have been regarded as very respectable, but such has been the remarkable performance of the team since that first warm up day, there is disappointment in the camp tonight, as expectations have risen higher and higher as the results have improved day after day.

Perhaps it was inevitable that a fall was coming, but as the last seconds of the countdown ticked through, Korea were looking to have carved out a good position on the start line, and right on cue, Chris Draper the teams British skipper gave the command, and their AC45 catamaran known as the White Tiger with its distinctive black and white striped hull, sprang into life, blasting down the first leg at top speed and rounding the first mark in a solid fourth position. James Spithill of Oracle 4 led the pack followed by New Zealand, and both gybe off to the right side of the course followed by Coutts, but Draper decided to keep going in a straight line, gybing off as he said afterwards, about 20 seconds too late. The boat sailed straight into a hole, the wind lightening as they came to a dramatic halt, watching in dismay as the rest of the fleet gybed to stay with the shifting wind and sailed by.

As has been seen all week, and as the team has painfully experienced, one mistake at this level is often catastrophic, and Korea found themselves seventh within a matter of seconds. Gradually they filled the spectacular Tiger Eye Doyle Sails gennaker and picked up the pace again, but reached the bottom mark of this extra long course, pushing for 5th place in the melee around the gate mark. All week the team has shown tremendous speed upwind, and those watching and urging them on expected the routine of picking off places to continue. But today the contest had an extra edge to it, and that proved more difficult than previously with the teams all sailing well. Rounding the top mark they were struggling to improve in the lighter and shiftier wind, and while there was a superb battle at the front of the fleet between the big teams, it wasn’t to be Team Korea’s day, failing to find the boat speed they had become accustomed to in Cascais.

As we had seen earlier in the week, there are some teams that thrive in these wind conditions, and GreenComm Racing from Spain had an excellent race taking fifth over the line their best result when it mattered, having finished last most of the time in the stronger breeze. Emirates Team New Zealand won yet again, their performance almost faultless, but allowing Artemis from Sweden to come back at them in the closing stages and make for an exciting finish between them, together with James Spithill’s Oracle4. With Terry Hutchinson of the USA helming Artemis, his light wind experience came to the fore, crossing second ahead of Spithill, with Coutts taking fourth. A dejected Draper crossed in 7th place behind Aleph from France, another team that Korea has been outpacing all week, a huge disappointment for the team knowing what might have, and probably should have been a better result based on their earlier results.

Commenting shortly afterwards Chris said, “Our performance today is very sad, it’s our worst result of the week in the race that really counts, and not only do we know we can sail better than that, but have been proving it all week. It’s sad to finish on this note, but it’s fantastic what we have done here overall. I am so pleased with what we have achieved this week, as we have surpassed our expectations in so many ways. At the end of the day, it’s about the America’s Cup, and that’s what we are focusing on, so this has been an incredible week of learning, not just for us but for everyone. We are going to get bad races we know, but it’s about how we react to them and bounce back. Were annoyed about today, but it means we are going to have to be even stronger in Plymouth and we are looking forward to the next one.”

The team has won many fans both here and around the world, and shown that they can be extremely competitive. CEO Kim Dong-Young said, today we are a little disappointed with seventh place, and its absolutely clear we need more support, more money and more training. This is not an easy competition and is a big challenge for us as a new nation to the America’s Cup, with a long way to go and a lot to learn still, but it is fantastic to see Korea competing against the biggest teams at the highest level of the sport. The good thing for us is that we can see the opportunity and the possibilities for the team after this event. I am very happy at how we have done overall, a huge experience, and now we know what we have to do to be up with Team New Zealand, Artemis and Oracle. Before we came, we were worried that we might finish last and be embarrassed by our performance, but its completely the opposite the whole world knows that Team Korea has arrived and is a serious contender.

There has been tremendous support for the team from within the sailing community who have welcomed Korea into the America’s Cup family, while spectators have cheered them on with enthusiasm. The results have come through the week, counting a superb second place in the AC500 Speed Trials event, leading fleet races, and finishing a surprising fifth overall to qualify for the next stage, the match racing finals, at the very first attempt. Yesterday was the true champagne moment for the team, one that will long be talked about in beating Russell Coutts, the greatest America’s Cup sailor of all time in their first ever match to reach the semi finals, finishing fourth. That could never have predicted a week ago, and the praise for the team has been flowing.

Speaking after the closing press conference today, Russell Coutts said, I expected Team Korea to be good, but they have proved to be very good. Its a fantastic team, and they have made some really good decisions on who to get involved. I believe they could be really competitive in this America’s Cup, and there’s no reason why they can’t go on and actually win it....”

ACWS Regatta Director, Iain Murray said, “This has been an excellent week, and we’ve produced high quality races that people doubted we could deliver in a short space of time like this. I haven’t been surprised that Team Korea have done so well here, the crew is a quality act, but to put a team together like this for the first event and perform as well as they have is wonderful achievement really, so with more time in the boat, and some more resource, I think you will see even further improvement. With this high speed racing, where there are big gains and big losses by small mistakes, there’s a lot of opportunity for a lot of people, and so the smart guys and the good sailors will always come through, and the Korean team has got that and should do really well moving forward from here.”

The show now moves to the UK for the second America’s Cup World Series event, to Plymouth on the south-west coast where huge crowds are expected as the America’s Cup returns to the country where it was first contested, 160-years ago. Together with some of the smaller teams, Korea plans to arrive early and train hard ahead of the regatta, with hopes high that they can improve further and close the gap on the big three teams ahead of them. The contest begins with the preliminary fleet races on September 10th, with the finals over the following weekend, closing on the 18th. With a big Korean community resident in Britain, support for the team is expected to again be high, and hopeful that the results will flow after the team has analyzed the lessons from Cascais.

Kim Dong-Young said, this has been an amazing event for us, and we have opened people’s eyes around the world. Now we are focusing on improvement, fewer mistakes, and building our team stronger and broader. It’s been a tremendous start to our America’s Cup campaign, and there is a long road ahead to San Francisco in 2013, but the White Tiger Challenge has taken its first steps with what can only be considered a marvelous success by all.

From Emirates Team New Zealand:

Finishing With a Flourish

Emirates Team New Zealand finished the Cascais AC45 World Series regatta with a flourish on Sunday, wining the final fleet race.

The win gave the team the title of AC45 World Series fleet race champions- a fitting end to a great week for Dean Barker, Glenn Ashby, Ray Davies, James Dagg and Winston Macfarlane.

They stumbled yesterday in the match racing final winning the preliminaries last weekend and three straight days of combined fleet and match-racing, but today they were back in form on a difficult race track.

Oracle4 made a break at the start of the second leg and quickly got what looked to be a comfortable lead. Bu it was the sort of day when passing lanes could open suddenly for a team to make a big gain; or for a hole in the breeze to form equally suddenly with consequent bit losses.

For Barker, it was a classic come-from-behind win. For most of the race he was the patient hunter with Oracle4 (James Spithill) in his sights after he had picked off Oracle 5 (Russell Coutts). They dramatically snatched the lead on the second down-wind leg and Barker immediately became the hunted with Artemis, Oracle 4 and Oracle 5 chasing hard.

Barker hung on and finished 21s ahead of Artemis and 34 ahead of Oracle 4. He paid tribute to the crew and their ability to bounce back from a bad day on Saturday.

He said tactician Ray Davies and wing trimmer Glenn Ashby made the right calls on the breeze as they moved on Oracle 4.

ETNZ is headed for Plymouth, carrying with them great momentum from a successful opening regatta for the AC45s.
Photo:©2011 Gilles Martin-Raget/americascup.com

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