SAILING : Dickson Gets Mahaney as His Semifinal Foil

When Chris Dickson made Kevin Mahaney the chosen one, he may have picked his poison.

Saturday Dickson picked Mahaney to sail against in today’s semifinals of the Mazda World Championship of Match Race Sailing at Long Beach.

“If I were Chris Dickson, I’d pick me, too,” said Mahaney, a late, darkhorse alternate entry from Bangor, Me.

But later, fixing Dickson with a pre-fight stare, he said, “How’d you like to go home to New Zealand and hear, ‘You lost to whom? Kevin who?’ ”

Dickson: “I’m regretting it already.”

Dickson was 13-5 in the double round-robin that ended Saturday, and Mahaney was 12 1/2-5, having lost a half-point in an unusual resolution of a technical protest.

More significant, Mahaney was 1-1 against Dickson this week but 4-0 against the other semifinalists--Australia’s Peter Gilmour (12-6) and New Zealand’s Russell Coutts (11-7). Standing fifth going into Saturday with his odd count, he reached the semifinals with momentum, winning his last five races.

“My crew really rose to the occasion,” he said. “(Tactician) John Kostecki steered me around the course like a seeing-eye dog.”

Mahaney broke up an all-America’s Cup semifinal, with Paul Cayard of San Diego the odd man out with a 10-8 record after losing all three of his races Saturday.

Cayard fouled out of the running with penalty turns in each race, including two in his last, desperate effort against Wales’ Eddie Warden-Owen.

The semifinals will be best-of-three. If the wind cooperates, the best-of-five final for $32,250 will follow immediately, and the races will be run near the beach, close to the Queen Mary.

The semifinals were scheduled for Saturday until the wind quit Friday with three rounds remaining. The wind was so good--eight to 16 knots all day--that they might still have been run if the racing hadn’t been delayed by a protest by Coutts--it was dismissed--and an injury to Gilmour’s bowman, Mark Walsh.

The top of Walsh’s head was gashed when he was struck by the boom because he failed to duck during some fierce pre-start maneuvering against Dickson in the last race. Gilmour didn’t know about the injury until after the race, which Dickson won.

“He took off his hat and it was covered with blood,” Gilmour said.

Walsh was expected to sail today.