Bond Won’t Resort to Legal Action to Get Into 1988 America’s Cup Races

Australia’s Alan Bond has issued the San Diego Yacht Club and Sail America Foundation an odd ultimatum to allow him to compete for the America’s Cup in 1988.

He said if they don’t change their minds within 10 days, he’ll give up.

San Diego already had announced plans for a wide-open competition in conventional 12-meter boats in 1991 when the New York Supreme Court last month ruled Sail America must meet Michael Fay’s New Zealand challenge for ’88 or forfeit the Cup.

Bond, the multimillionaire entrepreneur whose syndicate won the America’s Cup for Australia in ‘83, has been an outspoken critic of San Diego’s resolve to permit only one foreign country--New Zealand--to compete.

In a statement released Tuesday, Bond said he was frustrated by what he called stonewalling on the part of the yacht club and Sail America and that he would have no alternative but to halt construction of his 90-foot waterline boat, “Waltzing Matilda.”

The San Diegans had been concerned that Bond would launch legal action to force his way into the two-boat regatta, but apparently he has no intention to do that.

“I’m bitterly disappointed to have to reach this decision,” said Bond. “In all my America’s Cup experience and in the hard-fought battles with the New York Yacht Club, we never had to resort to legal action, and I would loathe to introduce that element into our campaign.”

Bond expressed concern that court action would drag on and there would not be enough time to prepare the Waltzing Matilda and get it to San Diego.