
Jimmy Spithill, the young Sydney-born yachtsman who steered BMW Oracle's giant 90 foot trimaran to victory in the America's Cup in February, gets back on the helm of a yacht again this week.
Spithill will steer "Boat 17" for Larry Elliston's BMW Oracle racing team in the RC44 Austria Cup which starts in the shadows of the Alps on Lake Traunsee this weekend.
It will be his first sailing race since he beat Swiss billionaire Ernesto Bertarelli's catamaran in the 33rd regatta for the world's oldest sporting trophy off Valencia in Spain.
Spithill, who told the Boatsales Network he was "really looking forward to getting back on the water", will return to older America's Cup style yachts at the end of May when he competes in the Louis Vuitton Trophy at La Maddalena in Sardina.
Elliston, who challenged for the America’s Cup on behalf of San Francisco’s Golden Gate Yacht Club, has still not announced where, in what type of yachts, or when he intends to defend the America’s Cup.
The city of San Francisco is hoping it will be there and has promised to hand over vast areas of old waterfront dock space for an America’s Cup village and to keep commercial shipping away should the yachts race between the Golden Gate bridge and Alcatraz Island.