In Defense of Larry Ellison
Can’t we look forward to the future without trashing the past?
No, I was not rooting for Oracle Team USA in this 35th America’s Cup defense. And yes, like many others, I look forward to seeing how Emirates Team New Zealand will transform the oldest competition in sports. But I do not understand why everyone has been trashing Larry Ellison. Most of the commentary I’ve seen would have it that he was the devil incarnate, and that but for ETNZ he would have destroyed modern-day Cup competition.
How ungrateful can we be? I’ve never been a fan of Larry Ellison’s, but I do think we need to give credit where credit is due. Have we forgotten that it was Ellison who thwarted Ernesto Bertarelli’s heavy-handed attempt to highjack AC33? Have we forgotten that it was Ellison’s team that staged what many have termed the greatest comeback in the history of sport in AC34?
I personally found AC33 and 34 to be two of the most fascinating Cup cycles in the event’s long history. Number 33 was a true “Battle of the Tycoons,” in the best tradition of the Cup, both in court and on the water, culminating in an overthe-top Deed of Gift match sailed in boats the likes of which we will never see again. After that came number 34, which saw huge foiling catamarans duking it out on the windy waters of San Francisco Bay, with teams climbing learning curves so steep there were literally lives at stake.
Number 35, admittedly, was a snore compared to its predecessors, but let’s maintain some perspective. Ellison’s many critics are now complaining as follows:
1) He has undermined the role of yacht clubs in AC competition. Maybe, but it’s not because of Larry Ellison that yacht clubs are increasingly irrelevant in modern sailing. And it was Bertarelli who made the Cup’s club clause a total joke by creating the fictitious Club Náutico Español de Vela in 2007 to stand as a bogus Challenger of Record. It was Ellison who saved us from that scam. He did tricky things with the Golden Gate Yacht Club, but it is a real club, and the deal he cut saved it from dying.
2) He has undermined the Cup’s nationality clause. Yes, he continued this trend, but again it was Bertarelli, a Swiss yachtsman who had no hope of mounting a purely Swiss challenge, who blew Cup nationality all to hell by hiring Russell Coutts away from Team New Zealand right after AC30 in 2000.
3) He betrayed the United States by taking this defense to Bermuda. Again, maybe, but Bermuda, which is easily accessed from all of the U.S. East Coast, was a reasonable venue. And again it was Bertarelli who set the precedent for venue-shopping when he took the Cup to Valencia in 2003. It was also Bertarelli who proposed that AC33 be staged in Ras Al Khaymah, within rocket range of Iran, a ridiculous notion Ellison had to fight in court.
4) His attempt to “mainstream” the Cup by introducing foiling cats in a stadium format has been misguided. True, at least in my opinion; however, Larry Ellison was never the only one promoting this concept. There has been no shortage of people who believe Cup competition should somehow become as regularized— and as popular— as Formula One racing.
As to that last point, I think we at least had to try this “popular” format, if only to demonstrate that competitive sailing can never be truly popular. We have to face facts. Sailing is too technical and esoteric for a general audience. Which brings us to Larry Ellison’s biggest contribution to AC competition: he spent the bucks needed to create video graphics that make sailboat racing truly telegenic. This may not make sailing interesting to laypeople, but it has made racing much more fun for the sailing cognoscenti to watch on TV.
In organizing the next defense I do hope ETNZ will bear all this in mind. To make AC36 a success the Kiwis need to forget the general audience and create the best event possible for sailors. Meanwhile the rest of us should doff our caps and just say thanks to Larry Ellison. s