Kiwi tactician sacked

by Rob Kothe on 20 Feb 2003 Team New Zealand’s tactician Hamish Pepper has been this morning sacked from the Black boat, at this crucial stage in the 2003 race series with the Kiwi’s 0-3

It’s a big call from the Team New Zealand management as skipper Dean Barker has been sailing with Pepper since they were at school together.

They have had a lot of wins over the years. Last year Barker and Pepper defeated former syndicate head Russell Coutts, his onetime mentor and now leader of the rival Swiss Alinghi Challenge on the finals of the Swedish Match Cup, but the partnership has now been broken.

In Tuesday’s all-important race, Pepper made a major tactical mistake in the pre-start.

With the off the boat weather experts telling the Kiwi after-guard by radio that a right hand shift was moving down the course, Pepper chose to ignore the information and went left.

The rest is history and so now is Pepper.

His replacement is fellow match-racer the Frenchman Bertrand Pace, who has been tactician on the trial NZL81

More news from Sail-World during the morning.