Melting Pot Stirs Cup
The Brits, the Swedes, the French and both Italian teams are gone, leaving only U.S. and Swiss sailors in contention with defender Team New Zealand for the America’s Cup.
Whoa! Take a closer look.
Most of the U.S. sailors departed the Louis Vuitton Cup challenger trials with Dennis Conner two weeks ago. Between Oracle BMW and OneWorld, which are scheduled to start a knockout semifinal repechage series Thursday (Friday in New Zealand), there aren’t enough Yanks left now to sail even one boat without dipping into the second string.
The America’s Cup Deed of Gift was written by George L. Schuyler, the sole surviving owner of the cup won by the schooner America in England in 1851. In 1887 he donated it to the New York Yacht Club, in his words, “upon the conditions that it shall be preserved as a perpetual Challenge Cup for friendly competition between foreign countries.”
“Friendly” didn’t last long, and “foreign” got all mixed up.
Oracle BMW is owned by software giant Larry Ellison and represents San Francisco’s Golden Gate Yacht Club. But Oracle BMW had only six Americans among its 16 crew members when it sailed its most recent race Sunday, closing out a 4-0 blitz by Switzerland’s Alinghi. They were Peter Holmberg, a U.S. Virgin Islander who is now only the part-time helmsman; bowman Geordie Shaver; pitman Matt Smith; and grinders Phil Trinter, Brian McInnes and Eric Doyle. Smith, Trinter and Doyle are Southern California residents. The skipper is Chris Dickson of New Zealand.
OneWorld, owned by two other billionaires, Craig McCaw (cell phones) and Paul Allen (Microsoft), represents the Seattle YC.
OneWorld has had only two U.S. citizens aboard in its bid to eliminate Italy’s Prada: tactician Charlie McKee of Seattle and navigator Kevin Hall of Ventura. The skipper is Cup veteran Peter Gilmour, the helmsman 23-year-old James Spithill, both Australians.
As for Alinghi, the only Swiss on the boat was its 37-year-old billionaire owner, Ernesto Bertarelli (pharmaceuticals), who serves a legitimate role as navigator. But Alinghi often sails with two Americans: pitman Josh Belsky and grinder John Barnitt, who is a throwback to Conner’s triumphant team that won the prize from Australia in 1987.
Even Prada had Rod Davis driving for the starts -- at least until Monday when Gavin Brady, a New Zealander, took over that task. It was academic. Although the Italians won by 17 minutes 46 seconds in very light and wildly erratic breezes to make the score 3-2, OneWorld was already the winner of the series because there was no time to run more races.
Throw all the Yanks together and they’re still still five short of a regulation red, white and blue crew. But between the two “American” boats, there are 14 Kiwis, seven Australians, two Japanese and one Italian.
After Conner won in ‘87, President Reagan invited the team to the White House. If OneWorld or Oracle BMW wins, the United Nations might be more appropriate.
Davis, 46, has sailed nine America’s Cups for four nations, but not his own since ’87. He was with New Zealand in ’88 and ‘92, Australia in ’95 and Italy in 2000 and now. A resident of New Zealand since ‘87, he has won Olympic medals for the U.S. and New Zealand.
And Davis, of all people, thinks the nationality thing has gotten out of hand.
“Maybe it should just be the first country you sail for,” he said, “unless if you want to change [countries] you can sit one out.”
John Cutler, an alternate tactician in the Oracle BMW afterguard, is a New Zealander who has sailed the Cup for Japan and now the U.S., as well as his country.
How can anyone do that? The America’s Cup has a rule that all one needs to do to sail for a given country is to establish residence there two years in advance. “Residence” is rather loosely defined and enforced.
“It’s bogus,” Cutler has said. “They should either make it a pure nationalistic sport or eliminate the rule. I think if George Schuyler saw what was happening now he’d agree.”
The problem is that there aren’t enough lucrative jobs for all the top sailors. Cutler said: “I’ve been a professional sailor since 1990 and I’ve sailed on one boat that had NZL on its sail. It’s a professional sport we’re doing now and you want to get the right people onto the team.”
If it became purely nationalistic, Cutler said, “We would have to find some other way to make a living.”
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The latest off-the-water issue to surface is a letter sent by Team New Zealand rules advisor Russell Green to the Challenger of Record Management. It points out that the America’s Cup Protocol would seem to prohibit challengers from switching boats between their semifinals and finals. Article 6.2 reads:
“The Finals of the challenge selection series will be between the top two yachts in the Semi Finals.”
One reaction is that Team New Zealand is exploiting sloppy wording to create a distraction among the challengers. By “yachts,” the creators of the Protocol probably meant yacht clubs or teams, not the actual boats.