What Cup? Race Fever Hardly Hot on 1st Day

Peter Strachan and a group of friends were rushing to the waterfront--as tourists, not racing spectators.

Strachan knew that Tuesday was the beginning of the long-awaited America’s Cup sailing regatta, but that wasn’t what he had come for. Organizers have likened the event to the Olympics--but so far, Cup fever is less than Olympian.

On the waterfront, it was eerily quiet.

“I’m from Sydney, Australia,” said Strachan, 47, who was in San Diego for a club managers’ convention. “When the America’s Cup was held in my country in 1987, interest--even at this early stage--was fanatical. I don’t see it happening here . . . yet.”

Tuesday’s first day of racing brought reactions ranging from “What?” to “When?” and “Where?” It was slow going, from a spectator standpoint, all along the bay. Trickles of people wandered along as though this was any other weekday on the bay.

“I was aware of it only because I heard about it on the radio this morning,” grumped Bob Marshall, 62, a cigar-smoking hotel employee from El Cajon. “I’m not enthused about it, and I’m not going to watch it on television or in person. I don’t have good eyes. I couldn’t see a darn boat even if I was right up next to it. Just a bunch of rich people anyway.”

William DeYoung, 68, and his wife Hendrikje, 64, were walking along the waterfront near Seaport Village, framed by the Coronado Bridge and gazing at a vessel on the waters--not the Spanish yacht practicing right in front of them for the upcoming challengers’ race, but a Navy ship, heading out to sea.

In other words, DeYoung said, it was patriotism they were feeling, not curiosity about who won Tuesday’s race.

“I’m not surprised the going is so slow,” the Spring Valley resident said. “People are not flocking to much of anything right now. Christmas just isn’t Christmas when Mom or Dad, or both, are out of work. The recession is hurting everybody. It just isn’t a great time for a yacht race.”

And he laughed at Mayor Maureen O’Connor’s contention that such events as the America’s Cup and the upcoming baseball All-Star Game will make San Diego “recession-proof.”

“About the only thing that’s recession-proof,” he said, “is poverty.”

Executives at the America’s Cup Organizing Committee believe interest will pick up--perhaps even fanatically--once the regatta enters its closing stages in April and May. DeYoung agreed.

“Anything that puts San Diego on the map is good,” DeYoung said. “Anything that focuses attention on the city is good. Maybe the race will be the spark that leads to something far more important than a boat race.”

Tom Ehman, executive vice president of the America’s Cup Organizing Committee, said the recession has hurt the group’s plans, but he regarded opening day as a big success.

Ehman said Tuesday’s race attracted 40 to 50 spectator boats, watching the America 3 crew win the first heat against Dennis Conner’s Stars & Stripes by a minute and 33 seconds. Ehman said national and international media coverage had been “fantastic.”

“The mass interest will not come until April or May,” he said. “But we were pleasantly surprised by (Tuesday’s) interest. We’ve had nice ink for the last three days in the New York Times, the Chicago Tribune, the Miami Herald, USA Today . . . and on the CBS and ABC evening news shows.

“I don’t think anyone should get their expectations up at this point. The real events don’t start happening until April, and things really heat up in May. Why, I remember in Australia, on the first day of racing, you could count the number of (spectator) boats on one hand. So this isn’t unusual at all.”

When ACOC president Malin Burnham appeared before the San Diego Unified Port District in 1990 asking for more than $10 million in port money, he compared the America’s Cup with the Super Bowl, the World Cup soccer competition and the winter and summer Olympics.

Spurred by testimonials of what joys--and millions--the race would bring, the Board of Port Commissioners agreed to give the organizing committee more than $8 million.

Ehman said the recession means that, instead of being an event worth more than $1 billion to the local economy, the cup may “instead be a $500-, $600-, $700-million event. But that’s still better than nothing, by a long shot.”

“Maybe it’s better to have this event during a recession than during a boom time. It’s all a matter of whether the glass is half-empty or half-full. The economic impact in Newport, R.I., when the race was held there (in 1983) was about $450 million, and in Australia (in 1987), it was about $600 million. So, we’re well within that range. Regardless, it’s great news for the local economy.”

Even so, representatives of several charter boat companies said they were surprised by the lack of local interest.

Their companies’ names and numbers are listed in the official America’s Cup visitors’ guide, but none reported having acquired a single customer interested in watching an America’s Cup practice or race. Reservations for April and May are not looking good. In some cases, the charter merchants say, the books are empty.

“We didn’t have a single reservation by anyone to go out and see any races at all,” said Oliver Patrick, assistant manager of Point Loma Sportfishing. “Maybe people are waiting until the semi-final races to get interested, but so far, nothing. It’s dead.

“It started out with this big hype, and then everything just kind of died. Then everyone started to change their opinion of it, believing they’d made a bigger deal out of it than it is. As it gets closer to the end of the races, maybe it’ll pick up. I certainly hope so.

“We had such a bad season in our business. . . . I think everyone was hoping this thing was going to be our savior, and, well, it just hasn’t been. It hasn’t been good (business) for whale-watching either.”

“It has to be the economy,” said Mark Crigler, the manager of H&M; Landing, which hasn’t benefited much either. “We didn’t send out a single boat today to watch the races. There was no interest.”

“We didn’t have a boat out--no interest,” said Carl Pressley, assistant manager of Fisherman’s Landing. “We are counting on the America’s Cup, but the interest hasn’t happened yet.”

Paul Cronin, and his wife Marilyn, both 43, were walking along the harbor near Seaport Village on Tuesday afternoon. They live in Nashua, N.H., and were in San Diego attending a business meeting.

Cronin, an avid sailor, said interest in any regatta usually isn’t intense until the semifinals or finals. He equated Tuesday’s underwhelming beginning to the opening of the preseason in the National Football League.

Cronin predicted that a heated competition between America 3 and Dennis Conner--fueled by Conner’s raw, competitive drive--would eventually pique fan interest. But he agreed there was little evidence of anyone’s interest being piqued Tuesday.

Joyce McCarville, 44, a businesswoman from Cedar Rapids, Iowa, said she knew the America’s Cup was under way, because the opening of competition was the theme of the first-night party for the convention she’s attending.

But so far, McCarville said, the most exciting thing she’s seen in San Diego had nothing to do with the Cup. It was a speech by Joan Embery, the celebrated animal handler for the San Diego Zoo.

“ That was terrific,” McCarville said, “and so is the zoo. That’s what people really want to see.”