Beaming Kate reigns in rain
IT was hardly jolly boating weather but the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge were determined not to let two washed- out yacht races dampen the spirits yesterday.
They cheered British victory in the America’s Cup World Series events in Portsmouth without actually seeing any action as rain and high winds forced the event to be cancelled.
Thousands in the city to enjoy the spectacle were disappointed but the scuppering of racing at least meant Olympic hero Sir Ben Ainslie’s British team were declared winners over five other nations, based on the results of the previous day.
In matching team tops with their names on the back, keen sailors William and Kate were welcomed by the Lord Lieutenant of Hampshire Nigel Atkinson. The Duchess did her best to cheer up the children, pulling funny faces to try to stop one toddler crying. The royal visitors came away with presents for two- year- old Prince George and two- month- old Princess Charlotte – tiny team tops and wooden model aircraft carriers.
“Thank you very much. We look forward to testing them in the bath,” William, 33, told Royal Marines officer Colonel Mike Tanner, deputy commander of Portsmouth Naval Base, who presented the couple with the replicas of the Navy’s two new aircraft carriers under construction, the Queen Elizabeth and Prince of Wales.
Kate, also 33, revealed that cheeky George, who celebrated his second birthday on July 22, is so precocious that he already tells people he is three. She talked about her son after meeting two- year- old Freddie Wilson, son of the British team’s head coach Rob Wilson.
When Freddie told the Duchess he was three his mother Wendy Maxwell put her straight. “George says that. He thinks that he’s older,” Kate replied.
At the Ben Ainslie Racing team headquarters in Old Portsmouth, where Kate joined four- times Olympic gold- medal winner Sir Ben, she tried on a pair of virtual reality goggles to get the feeling of being on deck in an ocean boat race.
Staff warned her to stop if she felt sick but she seemed perfectly able to cope, though she described the experience as “weird”.
THERE is a lot that Sir Ben Ainslie can control in the world of America’s Cup racing. Sadly, the weather is not one of them.
It is two years since the greatest Olympic sailor of all time helped to spark one of the greatest comebacks in sporting history – when Oracle Team USA came from 8- 1 down to beat Emirates Team New Zealand 9- 8 and retain the America’s Cup.
Since then Ainslie has set up his own team, raised 75 per cent of a projected £ 100million budget, recruited 70 staff for his new HQ, built a state- of- the- art AC45F foiling catamaran and staged a sailing festival that drew more than 100,000 to Portsmouth.
He even controlled the script to the extent that his Land Rover BAR boat won the opening race of the America’s Cup World Series on Saturday, and led the standings after fi nishing second behind the Kiwi boat in the next. Then weather gods intervened.
A howling gale prompted the cancellation of yesterday’s two races and an evacuation of the Southsea seafront.
“The English summer – you can’t count on it,” said Ainslie. “Yesterday was the most amazing day of my sailing career. There were so many people , everyone had a fantastic time. I’ve never seen anything like it. Today was a shame, but we’ll get that sorted and book the weather next year.
“We were delighted with the results on Saturday . It gives us a lot of belief and motivation.”
It has also proved this new format of America’s Cup sailing, which aims to promote the competition all through its four- year cycle rather than only during the fi nals, does work.
These boats are able to sail almost beside the shore, and the massive crowds made a huge impact on the sailors, with Oracle skipper Jimmy Spithill describing it as “like sailing in a stadium”.
Sadly, that stadium was empty as Ainslie was presented with the fi rst ACWS trophy yesterday by the Duchess of Cambridge. But still a statement had been made – Ainslie and his crew are deadly serious about bringing the Auld Mug back to Britain for the fi rst time in its 164- year history. DANNY WILLETT shot a fi ve- under- par 65 to clinch his third European Tour title, the Omega European Masters in Switzerland.
Willett, 27, won by one shot from fellow Englishman Matt Fitzpatrick on 17 under thanks to a bogey- free fi nal round at Crans- sur- Sierre.
Tyrrell Hatton completed an all- English top three with a best- of- the- day 62.
“I was very, very good. I kept very, very calm all day,” said Willett. “I just waited for the right things to happen.”
A late collapse by Colin Montgomerie, in which the Scot visited three bunkers, handed the Seniors Open at Sunningdale to little- known American Marco Dawson.
Montgomerie had led going into the fi nal round but shot a 67 while Dawson hit 64.