Cup Class Championships to Begin One Week Earlier

The competitive kickoff to more than a year of America’s Cup madness in San Diego will begin a week earlier than scheduled.

The America’s Cup Organizing Committee announced Thursday that the first International America’s Cup Class World Championships had been moved up, to a May 4 start, to avoid local scheduling conflicts and accommodate television plans.

Under the new schedule, the world championships will include five days of fleet racing, May 4-8, a lay day May 9, match race semifinals May 10 and the finals May 11.

“The new schedule enables us to position the IACC Worlds as a kickoff for the telecasts of the events of America’s Cup ‘92,” Tom Ehman, executive vice president/general manager of the ACOC, said in a prepared statement.

The ACOC is expected to announce a $9.3-million television agreement with ESPN and foreign companies that will include no fewer than 30 one-hour and half-hour broadcasts, not including the live coverage of the most important races. The Cup class world championships is expected to be the beginning of that coverage.

Ehman said 10 boats from seven nations are scheduled to compete in the event--three from the United States, two from Japan and one each from France, Italy, New Zealand, the Soviet Union, and Spain.

It will be the first major competition for the new 75-foot America’s Cup class yachts. They will be bigger, lighter and carry almost 1 1/2 times the sail area of the 12-meter yachts used from 1958 to 1987.

The America’s Cup will be contested from January through May, 1992, in the waters off San Diego.