AMERICA’S CUP ’92 : America 3 Syndicate’s Jayhawk Sustains Another Broken Mast : Sailing: Expensive carbon-fiber mast snaps with Koch at the helm.

Jayhawk, one of two boats owned by America’s Cup defense syndicate America 3, on Friday sustained a broken mast for the second time in less than a year.

The accident occurred less than two weeks before the start of the defender selection trials between America 3, headed by skipper Bill Koch, and defending America’s Cup skipper Dennis Conner. Koch was steering Jayhawk when the mast broke.

Jayhawk and its newer stablemate, Defiant, were sailing upwind in about 15-17 knots on one of the America’s Cup courses on the Pacific Ocean off Point Loma. The yachts had just tacked, with Defiant to windward, when Jayhawk’s 105-foot, carbon-fiber mast broke to leeward and dumped the rigging into the water, said David Rosow, America 3 executive vice president.

Rosow described the sea as “lumpy, but nothing extreme. All of a sudden the mast just left the boat.”

Rosow said only a stub of the mast remained in the boat, which sustained minor damage when the boom bounced onto the deck. The mast, which broke in three places, was dragged into shallow water and will be retrieved Saturday, he said.

“We’ll pull it ashore, take a look at it and try to figure out what happened,” Rosow said. “However, with carbon-fiber rigs, it’s very difficult to find out. They shatter, not break.”

Jayhawk also sustained a demasting last spring.

In May, Koch criticized the new class of boats as too fragile and too expensive after Nippon Challenge demasted and several other yachts were damaged in stiff breezes during the first race of the inaugural International America’s Cup Class World Championship.

Rosow said the mast cost about $500,000 and the rigging another $250,000. He said the syndicate won’t know until today how much can be salvaged.

“These damn carbon-fiber rigs, you build them as light as you can, sometimes too light in spots,” Rosow said. “You can draw all sorts of conclusions as to what happened.”

America 3 has another rig, he said.

Jayhawk and Defiant will be entered in the defender selection trials beginning Jan. 14.

“The boats just got back into the water in the last two days and everybody was eager to go sailing to get ready for the first races,” Rosow said. “We had scheduled some practice races between our two boats. It’s not a setback to the program, it’s a setback to the schedule.”