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NEWS
AMERICA'S CUP: Americans win with Aussie skipper
An improbable and epic comebackSitting at an 8:1 race deficit in the 34th America’s Cup, where the first to nine wins the Auld Mug, ORACLE TEAM USA this morning (September 26) pulled off what is one of the most improbable and epic comebacks in sporting history by winning yachting’s oldest race.
Providing a thrilling spectacle in the latest high-tech AC72 foiling catamarans, ORACLE TEAM USA exhibited blistering boat speed around the San Francisco Bay race course in stiff winds to win by a convincing margin.
With the barrel of the gun facing them, as Jimmy Spithill described it, the never-say-die Australian-born skipper of ORACLE TEAM USA fronted the media and said: “we can still win this.”
And he has, by a margin of 44 seconds over what must be an incredibly dejected Kiwi team that sat on ‘match point’ for the best part of a week and lost eight consecutive races.
Hitting the finish line at 35-36 knots, the-now-two-times-America’s-Cup-winning skipper Spithill and his crew, comprising no less than five Olympic gold medallists, exploded into cheers. The roar of the thousands of spectators lining the foreshores affirmed that history had been made in what will go down as one of the greatest ever comebacks – and comedowns – in any sport.
Performing a triumphant fly-by for the crowds, ORACLE TEAM USA picked up owner and visionary Larry Ellison who leapt aboard and said: “Hey, guys, you just won the America’s Cup,” recounts Spithill, spluttering between mouthfuls of spectator-craft spray that it was very much a team effort.
“To be facing the barrel of the gun at 8:1 down, what do these guys do? They didn’t even flinch,” Spithill said, adding “maaan, this is one hell of a day.”
The 34th America’s Cup is now decided, but so too the future of the world’s oldest yacht race. The striking event has created sailing converts right around the world. American Larry Ellison and Kiwi Russell Coutts are to be congratulated for resurrecting a sport that threatened to go the way of the thylacine. Or Kiwi.
The online coverage, clever use of electronic media, crosses and camerawork, along with on-screen graphics and descriptive devices, have collectively brought sailing well and truly into the 21st century.
Meanwhile, as the Auckland boat show opens today, New Zealand must be a country in mourning.
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Written byDavid Lockwood
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