Ainslie’s men to face Kiwis in semi-final showdown
Team New Zealand quick to choose British outfit Olympic legend confident their rivals can be beaten
Land Rover BAR will, after all, have to face the pedal-powered might of Emirates Team New Zealand in the best-ofnine semi-finals of the America’s Cup challenger play-off series which begins in Bermuda today. The Kiwis, as the highest-placed challenger in the qualifying round robin, had the right to pick who they wished to face in the semis, and they duly plumped for the British team, helmsman Peter Burling describing it as an “easy decision”.
British fans will, however, be encouraged by Land Rover BAR’s two performances yesterday – a win over Softbank Team Japan and a defeat by Oracle Team USA, both of which featured good clean racing and boat-handling from the British challenger; a definite improvement from their performance on Thursday.
And while Sir Ben Ainslie conceded that his team were certainly “up against it” faced with the might of the Kiwis, who won eight of their 10 qualifiers, losing only to defenders Oracle Team USA, he insisted that New Zealand were “beatable”.
“Of course we think we can,” Ainslie replied when asked whether he felt his team could upset the odds. “Why else would we be here? Obviously we’re up against it, we know that. But they are beatable. They do make mistakes. And we’ve improved our performance a lot through these qualifying rounds. Our team will never give up. We’ll fight to the end.”
Ainslie’s point about his team having improved over the last week is demonstrably true. In the first of their two races yesterday, Land Rover BAR beat Japan by 13 seconds; making yet another flying start that saw Ainslie brilliantly force a penalty on his opposite man Dean Barker – gaining revenge on the Kiwi exactly one week after the collision which had left his boat with a hole in its hull and in need of all-night repairs. In winds of just over 10 knots, Land Rover BAR then held off the Japanese fightback.
It was their performance against Oracle Team USA in their second race yesterday, however, which was probably of greater note. Although they lost the start, and eventually went down by 36 seconds, they sailed cleanly in winds of just over eight knots, staying up on their foils well, and managing to keep the gap more or less steady.
There was a caveat; Ainslie admitting that both Japan and the USA, anticipating that the breeze might be stronger than it proved to be, had their medium-air daggerboards on while Land Rover BAR had their light-air daggerboards. But overall it was clear that they had learnt from Thursday and had managed to find a better set-up.
“We did have good speed in the lighter airs today, although Japan and Oracle had their medium air dagger board configuration,” Ainslie said. “Our weather team did a good job to set us up with our light air boards. So some positives there but I think it was mainly board configuration.
“To hang in there against those guys, the guys sailed two really solid races in terms of the tactics and boat handling.”
Whether they can bridge the gap to New Zealand is another matter. Today’s forecast is for light winds, and the Kiwis have proved themselves the masters of those conditions; their light-air daggerboards significantly longer than those of some of their rivals. Land Rover BAR will hope it is so light that it stays below the six-knot average which will permit racing, and for racing to be postponed to another day when it is a more even contest.
“We know we can race well,” Ainslie said. “We’ve had very good starts throughout this qualifying round and that’s something we will look to capitalise on; try to put New Zealand under a bit of pressure.”
Burling said the team had been unanimous in choosing Land Rover BAR as their semi-final opponents, as opposed to Artemis Racing or Softbank Team Japan.
“It seemed like a pretty logical decision,” he said. “There weren’t too many people – in fact no one – would have done anything else. So it was a pretty easy decision for us.”