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The 2007
Season of the 32nd America's Cup Begins in Testing Conditions
The final season of the 32nd America's Cup opened with racing on a complicated spring day in Valencia. The changeable weather meant the leaderboard was shuffled on each leg of the race course, with a massive wind shift on the final run of the first race denying +39 Challenge a fairytale ending. Instead, BMW Oracle Racing charged out of nowhere, passing six boats on the final run, with the South African Shosholoza team close behind. +39 Challenge, after leading for most of the race, was forced to settle for a heartbreaking 10th place. The Italian team had been fortunate just to make the starting line on Tuesday afternoon, after sailing with a new mast for the first time after sunset on Monday. Valencia Louis Vuitton Act 13 is the ultimate preliminary regatta of the opening Acts, and represents a final opportunity for the challengers to move up or down on the Louis Vuitton Ranking table. For Alinghi, the Defender, this racing represents a last look at the challengers; following Act 13, won't race again until the America's Cup Match beginning on June 23rd. Large crowds gathered on the terraces of the Veles e Vents building to cheer the teams as they left for racing midday and again to see them return in the evening. RACE 1: Alinghi who broke the right-hand end of the start line too early and had to go back to restart, then found themselves on the favored side, climbing all the way back to fourth place at the top mark. Meanwhile, +39 Challenge tactician Ian Walker liked the look of the breeze on the right-hand side and made a break away from the rest of the fleet working up the left. The gamble paid off, launching +39 Challenge into a comfortable lead which it held for the next lap and a half of the two-lap course. The right-hand side of the course had been paying throughout, and not surprisingly the first few boats gybed around the final mark to consolidate their advantage. Alinghi and BMW Oracle on the other hand, saw something new on the left-hand side of the race course near the top of the second windward leg. Both made late gains there, and elected to pursue that side on the final run to the finish as well. +39 skipper Iain Percy, attempting to protect his lead, sailed down the middle of the course. But the Italians broke a spinnaker, before sailing into a wind hole from which they would never recover. The pack in the middle of the course slowed down while Ed Baird steered SUI 91 around the outside with Chris Dickson not far behind. BMW Oracle held further to the left and started to threaten the leaders on board Alinghi. As both boats converged, with Alinghi holding starboard right of way, Dickson launched USA 87 into a gybe while the foredeck crew executed a perfect peel to a new spinnaker midway through the maneuver.
This proved the winning move as Alinghi was forced away to the right. The Defender never recovered as the American boat sailed off to a whopping winning margin of 3 minutes 34 seconds as the wind became very light and variable. The remaining 11 boats were forced to look for whatever breeze they could find. Shosholoza did best in the difficult conditions, crossing in 2nd place ahead of Mascalzone Latino - Capitalia Team, the Italian red boat relegating Alinghi to 4th place. Original leaders +39 Challenge finished in a heartbreaking 10th place, and had company with Areva Challenge, who dropped from 2nd to 9th on the final run. Victory Challenge, who suffered two spinnaker breakages, and briefly appeared to lead early in the race, took up the rear in race one. The Race Committee then kept the fleet at sea for 90-minutes, hoping the shifty conditions would settle enough to have another race. But at 18:00, racing was cancelled for the day.
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