Fay Changes Mind, Puts Scheduled Challenge by British Yacht on Hold

New Zealand’s Michael Fay, suspecting a fast shuffle by British rival Peter de Savary, has put his agreement for a sail-off between America’s Cup challengers on hold.

The move late Thursday night followed by only a couple of hours an announcement by San Diego’s Sail America syndicate that it would agree to a substitute challenger in September should the British win an elimination series in August.

Until this week, De Savary had indicated that he wanted to bring a boat similar to New Zealand’s 90-foot-waterline monohull. But Tuesday, he told Sail America his boat would measure only 60 to 65 feet in length--slightly longer than Sail America’s 59-foot catamaran that also has aroused New Zealand’s objections.

Peter Debreceny, a spokesman for Fay, said by phone from Auckland: “Through all these discussions going back to the outset in August, it’s always been on the basis that other challengers would have boats to the same dimensions as New Zealand.

“We’ve now been notified by De Savary that the boat he’d like to bring isn’t the boat he asked permission for. We’ve been assured it’s a monohull, but we’ve been told it’s a pretty radical sort of boat.”

Other sources say the boat may be unballasted--that is, no lead keel underneath to keep the weight light for San Diego’s light wind. Instead, it has a narrow seven-foot beam at the waterline, and the crew will hike out on winged decks, extending to 26 feet, to balance the craft.

Sail America’s design chief, John Marshall, said: “For a boat of that size to be competitive, it will have to be a radically different concept from Fay’s.”