Bermuda Sunday, June 25, 2017
On a gorgeous Sunday at Bermuda’s Great Sound, America’s Cup defender Oracle Team USA suffered a major defeat losing both Races 7 and 8 to Emirates Team New Zealand, giving the Kiwis a 6-1 lead and the match point on Monday. Unlike the 34th America’s Cup in San Francisco in 2013, the rule has changed to the team scores more wins in 13 races wins the cup vs the 17 races. Team USA needs to win the next 6 races in order to defend the Cup while Team New Zealand only needs to win one more race.
However, don’t count them out yet, at post race press conference, Oracle Team USA skipper Jimmy Spithill was confident about repeating his amazing come-back from 1-8 to 9-8 to win the Cup in San Francisco. He admitted a few mistakes were made and praised Team New Zealand’s young skipper, Peter Burling and the team’s performance. Burling, a cool and calm 26 years old Olympic gold medal skipper told the press he is not taking the winning for granted, mindful of the Team USA winning races from far behind can likely happen.
Oracle Team USA has made changes last week on the boat to improve the speed and it showed on Race 6 on Saturday when they beat Team New Zealand. The losses on Sunday due to unexpected mistakes including the slow start and a penalty when the boat went out of race course boundary. It prompted the reporter from TV New Zealand to question Spithill the reliability of the Oracle software that boasts 1,000 sensors per boat and 40,000 data points per second. Spithill denied any software problem. I was seated next to Jimmy’s father Arthur Spithill at the press conference, he shared his son’s confidence that the team will win from behind. All attentions are on Monday’s Match Point. Stay tuned!
