Team New Zealand in action at the America’s Cup preliminary regatta in Sardinia.
Photo: photosport
Team New Zealand’s two crews are on the pace after an up-and-down start to the America’s Cup preliminary regatta in Italy, marred by tough, choppy conditions and a British capsize.
Eight boats representing five syndicates took to Sardinia’s Gulf of Angels in three fleet races – the first competitive racing ahead of next year’s 38th America’s Cup regatta in Naples, where Team NZ will seek to defend the Auld Mug.
Competing in four-person AC40 monohulls, New Zealand were fielding their full crew, along with a women-and-youth boat.
There was much intrigue at how they would perform, particularly against host syndicate Luna Rossa, who have former Team NZ skipper Peter Burling at the helm for the first team since announcing he was leaving the Kiwi syndicate a year ago.
Team NZ, with Nathan Outteridge at the helm, accrued a number of penalties early on before fighting back to place fourth, one spot ahead of the second team.
Race two saw the Kiwi No.1 boat forge an early lead, which they defended to the end to pick up a win.
However, it all went wrong in the third race, where Team NZ were leading into the final leg before suffering a splashdown off their foils when attempting a gybe in strong wind to drop to last place.
The women-and-youth boat finished fourth in races two and three.
Luna Rossa’s women-and-youth boat dominated day one, picking up two wins and a runner-up finish to power clear of the fleet on 29 points.
The two Kiwi crews are in a bunch sharing second place, on 20 points, alongside Burling’s Luna Rossa boat and Swiss outfit Alinghi.
Peter Burling at the helm of Luna Rossa.
Photo: photosport
Outerridge was positive about Team NZ’s progress.
“Our boat’s going really well. We learned a lot in the practice racing in the last couple of days, and the guys are doing a great job to give us a boat that’s going nice and fast,” he said.
“The middle race was probably the highlight of the day. It felt like we had a Luna Rossa boat everywhere I looked – on the left, on the right – but it was really fun racing those guys.
“And the last race it looked like we stepped out to a pretty nice lead, and you’ve got to start these boats hard, you’ve got to push them hard, but it feels like every time you go for a gybe, it’s a bit of a roll of the dice in that sea state.
“The boats do a bit of bouncing and wobbling and unfortunately, we got a big bounce and then the rudder popped out – it was sort of all over from there.”
Monday morning’s regatta final will be contested between the two leading crews after eight fleet races.
Great Britain’s youth and women’s team, Athena Pathway, made their job much harder after capsizing in race two, leaving them unable to line up for the third race.
The main GB1 team failed to contest the first two races because of problems with their boat.
Australia and the United States, whose teams both made late entries to challenge for the America’s Cup, are not competing this week.
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