AMERICA’S CUP DAILY REPORT : TRIALS : On Blustery Day, It’s Italy, Conner

Italy scored an 11-second, come-from-behind win over France Monday in the America’s Cup Challenger Trials.

Paul Cayard, Il Moro di Venezia’s skipper, said after the victory, “Believe it or not, I was thinking to myself up the last beat, even though we were still behind, that I was having a helluva good time. I was starting to think sailing was really a boring sport.”

France’s 25-second win over Il Moro last month was the closest previous race of these America’s Cup trials. But northwest breezes building to a solid 14 knots brought most of the big boats to life.

Dennis Conner sailed Stars & Stripes to a 47-second win over America 3 c,8.5 ‘s Defiant in his last race of the second round of the defender trials.

In other challenger races, New Zealand trounced Espana ’92 by 4:55, Spirit of Australia defeated Challenge Australia by 2:28, and Nippon downed Sweden’s Tre Kronor by 2:21.

Halfway down the last leg, Ville de Paris was holding off Il Moro when the French lost a line out of their spinnaker pole and a snap-shackle on their spinnaker sheet opened, forcing them to jibe away. When they jibed back, Cayard was almost alongside and ready to make his move.

Cayard worked Il Moro onto Paris’ wind and swept past with ease. Pajot counter-attacked, so close that Il Moro claimed his spinnaker brushed the Italian mainsail.

Five minutes later Il Moro finished a boat length ahead.