Dignity, fairness: is this really the America’s Cup?
OPINION: Jimmy Spithill probably won’t agree but Team New Zealand has come up with a very good formula for the next America’s Cup.
Put the debate about the boats aside for the time being – the true value of the monohulls versus the multihulls won’t be found till we see more details of the 75-foot monsters in store or actually watch them under sail.
But what the America’s Cup has got now is a level and fair playing field. That’s a vast distance from what we saw in the leadup to Bermuda.
If any syndicate had a right to utilise the advantages given to the defenders, it is Team New Zealand after all the injustices they had to overcome in regaining the Auld Mug. But Team NZ has proven true to the its word and, along with Italian challenger of record Luna Rossa, has restored tradition and dignity to sport’s oldest contest.
The nationality requirements make sense. This should be more of a country versus country contest rather than a battle between two billionaires who can pay the most for their hired international guns.
Similarly the boats themselves should have a decent element of nationality about them in terms of build. But, as is the case now, they should also have enough room for development. Part of the intrigue of the Cup has always been the way it is a design and technology race off the water.
The races themselves will also be considerably longer than the dashes that went in a blink of any eye in Bermuda in what was TV schedules dictating sport.
Team New Zealand boss Grant Dalton emphasised as he went through the key points to the lengthy protocol released in Auckland yesterday:
But,in a move that will surely please Spithill, Team New Zealand has been as good as its word in also retaining some of the better aspects that Larry Ellison and Sir Russell Coutts did bring to the cup during their controversial reign.
The concept of a world series buildup to the main event will be maintained to a degree.
There will be TV coverage the equal of anything that unfolded in the last two regattas and an attempt, under the quirks of Auckland’s beautiful but tricky waterfront, to provide up-close action for spectators on land and at sea.