You could almost see the steam coming out of the gentlemen in blazers from the New York Yacht Club on Saturday as the Prada Cup got the wobbles in light winds.
They are the men who want to return the America’s Cup to large displacement yachts.
We got a taste of that in Auckland for long periods as the winds dropped and so did the boats, falling off their foils and languishing in the water, desperately looking for puffs to get them going again.
American Magic were victims on the minefield course that turned their races against Luna Rossa and INEOS Team UK into games of snakes of ladders, where gains could turn into losses with one cruel roll of the dice.
This was often a case of the wind finding the boats rather than the boats finding the wind.
In the immediate aftermath to the loss to Luna Rossa, American Magic helmsman Barker lamented “you question why you want to do that as part of the event?”, referring to racing in those “lottery” conditions.
But he answered his own question, saying: “It is what it is”.
And that’s the point. The rules are made and teams need to find a way to deal with what they’ve been served up. Some are doing it better than others.
The Americans found that in their second race against INEOS Team UK as well, as they got stalled on the start line against the British with Sir Ben Ainslie sailing away to a commanding win, though he was racing the 45-minute time limit more than American Magic most of the way.
Suddenly the unfancied Brits are 3-0 and the highly regarded Americans are 0-3.
As tough as it was to watch at times – imagine enduring it on board an AC75 – there was also a strange fascination in seeing who could make the best of a bad situation.
On the back of similar struggles in the warm-up regatta, American Magic skipper Terry Hutchinson made a plea for the lowest wind limit of 6.5 knots to be raised to around 8 knots to guarantee conditions that would be suitable for foiling.
There is zero chance of that happening now, with teams so far into their development.
Challenger of record Luna Rossa won’t want it because they rate themselves in light winds, and they showed that on Saturday with a composed performance.
Defender Emirates Team New Zealand won’t budge either. Right now they are working on ways to dominate in these light conditions during a testing period that takes them up to the America’s Cup match that starts on March 6.
