Defiant Is Finally Defeated : Sailing: Koch’s new boat beats its older sister by 49 seconds.

Dennis Conner is willing to lie low until April, but it may not be that easy.

A day after Conner said he didn’t need to win another race until the fourth round of the America’s Cup defender trials, Bill Koch passed up a chance to drop Conner’s Stars & Stripes into last place Monday.

Instead, Buddy Melges steered Koch’s new America 3 to an eased-up, 49-second victory over Koch on Defiant that left the older boat in last place with two points, one behind Stars & Stripes.

It was Defiant’s first loss (7-1) but Melges remained unbeaten (9-0)--realistically, a credit less to his considerable skill than to the fact that Koch keeps letting him sail his faster boat.

Both probably will be aboard America 3 again today against the troubled Stars & Stripes.

America 3, inheriting six points scored by Defiant in the first round, now has 10. But it doesn’t mean as much since Conner has reduced the first three rounds into a testing program, and it’s not too different for the Cubens.

“We’re still shaking down the boat,” America 3 mast man Peter Craig said after Monday’s intramural race in winds of 10 to 11 knots, fading to 7 by the finish.

Defiant’s starting helmsman, Dave Dellenbaugh, won a spirited pre-start sequence from Melges, stuffing the veteran up under the committee boat, then peeling off at the gun to cross eight seconds in front.

But Dellenbaugh and Koch couldn’t do much about America 3’s speed. Despite a broken jib sheet and halyard on the first leg, America 3 swept to a 19-second lead, which it extended to 2:37 at the final mark.

Then Melges made it close by hoisting a spinnaker as Defiant reached off faster with a smaller gennaker to make up 1:48 on the last three-mile leg.