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Crew Strives to Be Cut Above in Quest for America’s Cup : Sailing: America-3 members are well into their ‘training camp.’ Their methods reflect a football influence.

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TIMES STAFF WRITER

It was mid-January, a year before the America-3 crew will hear the opening gun, and yet they were meeting and working and sailing like the America’s Cup was riding on tomorrow’s winds.

Day after day, Jan. 12 to Jan. 26: Running along Mission Bay at 0700, lecture at 0930, racing by 1100, videotape review at 1930, and no need to make any other plans before 2200. Back again on Thursday: Same routine, same objective.

The traditional two-week gap between the finish of the NFL playoffs and the Super Bowl seems interminable to professional football players. Try to persuade a group of them to begin preparation for a competition that won’t begin for another 11 months.

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“Are you kidding?” said Bobby Beathard, Chargers general manager.

The driven quest for the America’s Cup, however, is under way for the prospective crew of America-3. It will be 1992 before they sail in earnest in the defender selection races against Team Dennis Conner, but it is not too soon to find that edge.

“Dennis is always well-prepared, and hopefully we got a little more jump on him and it’s hitting him where he hurts right off the bat,” said Stu Argo, crew member for America-3. “Dennis is a guy that values preparation more than anything, so right now we got the jump and that’s got to be grinding salt in some wounds. We’re hoping that psychological start, as well as physical start in sailing first, will hold him down for a while.

“Our first two-week session got a lot of the growing pains out of our syndicate. So now we’re ready to go, and our learning curve will go higher and higher. It’s a good edge.”

While Team Dennis Conner has yet to hit the water, America-3 has enjoyed practice time in a boat--already dominant in previous competition--that was purchased from the French. In April, they will add their own boat to the water and use the French boat as a pace-setting playmate.

“One of the things in this America’s Cup is that we’re heading into the unknown,” said Gary Jobson, vice president/co-skipper for America-3. “We’ve never had boats like this before, and we want to make sure all our bases are covered.

“Usually in the Cup in the end, the fastest boat wins. But it’s hard to rely on your designers having a faster boat. You better be prepared to sail it. And you know taking Dennis Conner on in his hometown is going to be tough. He’s the champ, and he’s at home.”

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For the next year, the crew of America-3 will do nothing but prepare for competition with Team Dennis Conner.

“We have to knock off Dennis to get to the Cup,” said John MacGowan, who raced with Conner in 1980 and 1983, and who now will race for America-3. “Everyone else, due to economics and attrition, has fallen to the wayside, so we know who we’re sailing against.”

They know all about Conner, all right, and his success and his single-minded determination not to be defeated. They read about him, hear about him. Some have sailed with Conner in triumph, and now they are employed to defeat him.

“Dennis is a very good competitor,” Argo said, “and hopefully we’ll generate our boat speeds up to where the challengers that are coming from 12 different countries won’t even be able to touch us.”

While the designers work their computers and magic into constructing the fastest boats, the organizers of America-3 concentrate on the 32 crew members who will vie to be the final 16 in competition.

“We will have the chance to do this thing in front of the world; a chance to do it on live television,” Jobson said. “So it’s like when they turn on the Super Bowl lights. How will your team react to it?

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“The way to overcome that is to be involved in a routine, and grow into it. When it comes time, we’ll be in the same boat we’ve been practicing. The only difference you will have will be the 63 helicopters flying over your head.”

Last month, Jobson, on behalf of America-3 syndicate chairman Bill Koch, brought together more than 30 of the world’s finest sailors. The burgeoning team stayed together in an apartment complex here.

“It was like an NFL mini-camp,” said Larry Mialik, a former tight end for the Falcons, Oilers and Chargers, who is now director of sailing personnel for America-3. “We went through physical training, the classroom routine and began working on the boat.”

They also lined up an impressive list of guest speakers for daily lectures. They have already heard from sailing experts on tactics, crew positions and racing rules.

Former Notre Dame defensive coordinator Barry Alvarez, who was hired by Wisconsin a year ago to resurrect its program, will address the ups and downs of athletics later. One of the top executives at ABC-TV will talk about how to handle the media. A request to hear from the “Smartest Man in the NFL,” however, has been rejected.

“I didn’t feel after a 6-10 season that it would be in their best interests to listen to me,” Beathard said.

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Beathard, though, gave America-3 permission to utilize the Chargers’ facilities at San Diego Jack Murphy Stadium. And he made Coach Dan Henning available as a speaker.

“He’s good at giving pep talks,” Beathard explained.

Henning was delighted. He has heard the captain’s bark first-hand, and he said he has responded unflinchingly as a former crew member on a racing sailboat.

“I have felt it,” Henning said. “I crewed for two friends who raced Ensigns. Eddie owned his own employment agency and was also a painter, and his wife, Jan, was one of the senior stewardesses for United Airlines. Very quiet laid-back people.

“But on that boat they were animals. The competitive fires that are ignited in competition changed their personalities. I didn’t want to screw up for them because I didn’t want to be called a . . . by some stewardess lady.”

Henning has had his own competitive triumphs as evidenced by the two Super Bowl rings he earned as assistant coach for the Redskins.

“He was quite inspirational,” Mialik said. “He relayed a saying to us that Bill Parcells uses in regards to being part of a team. He said, ‘Expect nothing, blame no one and do something.’ We kind of all grabbed onto that.”

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Had the water not beckoned the crew of America-3, Henning might have talked on into the night. The America’s Cup has piqued his interest.

“A very competitive fire burns in men like that,” Henning said. “To me, it was like talking to Pro Bowlers in the sailing business.”

Henning has spent time with Conner, including a sailing excursion on the Stars and Stripes. He asked him to speak to his team last season, and used selections from Conner’s book, “No Excuse to Lose,” to rouse his players and defeat Cleveland, 24-14.

Now he has asked for the opportunity to sail with America-3.

“I look at this whole thing as helping the San Diego Chargers,” Henning said. “Because over a long period of time, we can grab something from watching some of the finest sailors in the world competing for a world championship.

“I think any time you’re around great competition, it makes you feel like you want to be a great competitor. The best against the best is riveting.”

Beathard has a reputation for identifying the best athletes available to play professional football. And he has an affinity for sailing since his father was a crew member with the world’s fastest catamaran, the Pattycat I and II.

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“These guys are something,” he said. “But you know what’s interesting? They tell me they are not looking for special skills. They look for the great attitude and teach the skills. In football, we’re looking for skills.”

The skill and attitude of the sailors who gathered in January already has come under review, and like professional football, several sailors have been waived. Invitations were extended to 25 sailors to return in February, and seven applicants have been signed.

“I can sympathize with Beathard and what he goes through in Plan B (free agency),” Jobson said. “I’ve got 300 resumes in front of me from some very good sailors, and I’m wondering how I’m going to give everybody a tryout.”

No, it’s not too far from football, “or any pro team,” Argo said. “If you make a big enough mistake, you’ll be on a plane headed for home tomorrow.”

Conner, of course, is headed straight toward the finish line.

“I can imagine what it’s like for those who have raced for Dennis and who will now be up against him,” Henning said. “It’s like going up against Don Shula after working for him, or maybe Vince Lombardi. You know guys like that aren’t going to leave any stone unturned, so you better not.”

That’s the game plan for America-3. It begins with Koch, who has been providing the money to go first-class, and continues with Jobson’s attention to detail.

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An example: “We’re going out of the harbor and we’re being towed out, and the New Zealand boat goes by and their tender is faster,” Jobson said. “You start thinking about it because you never like to be passed even if you’re getting towed. But those guys are going four knots faster, which means they’re going to get out there 15 minutes earlier.

“OK, it’s not a big deal, but if they do that for 200 days that’s 3,000 minutes, or about two full weeks more of practice than we’re going to get. So we have to get a faster tender, because I don’t want to lose time. So we’re going to get a good tender; we’re going to tow the damn thing at 20 knots.”

America-3 has hired former Padres’ trainer Dick Dent to oversee its conditioning program. They will have one of “the finest weight rooms in the county in the America-3 compound when it’s ready,” said Dent, who had to sign a confidentiality agreement before joining the January session. “I’m just amazed how motivated they are; they have a goal.”

The syndicate also has talked to Chargers’ team physician, Gary Losse, about gaining his help.

“In this particular America’s Cup, the boats are extremely physical boats,” Jobson said. “They are probably more so than at 12-meters. They are going to be very tough to sail. So the physical training is absolutely required.

“Secondly, if you look at the physical specimens arriving here from Italy, they are all 6-4, 215 and in perfect shape. It’s clear they have been working hard. You think of the little Japanese, and they are not little. They’re all 200-pounders. This America’s Cup will be a very physical competition.”

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More than that, it will be a contest of wills, preparation and psychology. It’s everything that Conner has already done, and done well.

“He’s all the competition anyone could ever want,” Mialik said. “I don’t know what his team is doing, but we’re just going to assume he’s doing everything right.”

So America-3 will get ready for another intense two-week session later this week. Just one of the many steps to be taken. Ten months to go. And with each passing day, the practice hours on the water add up.

“Dennis has got a lot of experience to draw from,” Jobson said. “I’ve raced in three of these and done two of them as a broadcaster for ESPN, and one of the reasons Conner has been successful, is he’s simply outdone everybody.

“More practice time. More boats. More money spent. What we’re trying to do is just do it all better. Better quality, more focus, careful preparation, and spend our time well.”

In that regard, the race already has begun for America-3. “We’re immersed in it day-to-day, full-time,” MacGowan said. “For us, the gun’s gone off.”

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