Emirates Team New Zealand emerged from the fourth day of the America’s Cup in San Francisco almost totally happy with their day on the water and looking forward to the final day.
They were delighted with a semi-final win over Artemis Red followed by a first and a fourth in the two fleet races sailed.
That puts them in striking distance of the lead if they put it all together in the final fleet race to be sailed tomorrow.
They were disappointed though in the match-race final. They lost the start in the last 10 seconds when Oracle 4 got a hook right by the line, Barker had to keep clear and the committee boat was looming. A 360 deg turn right on the line left them slow and flat and Oracle got away.
At the first mark, Barker and crew – Derek Saward, James Dagg, Ray Davies and Adam Beashel - were 29 sec behind.
Then began the determined climb back into the race. By gate 3 they were 21 sec adrift, on the fourth mark only 13 sec . But on these short-course match races there was not enough runway and Oracle 4 got the gold medals.
It was a heartening day. Memories of a performance at the first San Francisco regatta only six weeks ago were largely erased, showing the progress that had been made since.
The AC72 testing and training programmer in Auckland may still be the team’s primary focus, but the sailing team showed today that it could still put together a good performance racing the AC45.
Tomorrow’s final fleet race score 40 points for first, The winner of tomorrow's final fleet race earns 40 points, second 25, third 20, fourth 16, fifth 13, sixth 11, down to six points for the last boat home.
ACWS San Francisco Fleet Racing (after 6 of 7 races)
1. BAR (Ben Ainslie) 1-3-1-2-4-1 – 63 points 2. Artemis White (Terry Hutchinson) 10-2-2-1-3-3 – 52 3. Emirates Team New Zealand 2-8-5-6-1-4 – 47 4. Oracle 4 (Spithill) 8-1-6-5-DNF-2 – 39 5. Artemis Red (Outteridge) 4-4-4-4-9-8 – 39 6. Energy Team (Loick Peyron) 6-7-7-3-6-7 – 36 7. Team Korea (Peter Burling) 5-9-10-8-2-5 – 33 8. Oracle 5 (Coutts) 3-5-8-7-8-10 – 31 9. Luna Rossa Piranha (Chris Draper) 9-6-3-10-10-6 – 28 10. China Team (Phil Robertson) 7-10-11-9-5-11 – 19 11. Luna Rossa Swordfish (Iker Martinez) 11-11-9-11-7-9 – 14
AC World Series San Francisco Match Racing Championship 1. Oracle Spithill, 2. Emirates Team New Zealand, 3. Artemis Racing – White, 4. Artemis Racing – Red, 5. Oracle Coutts, 6. Energy Team, 7. J.P. Morgan BAR, 8. Team Korea, 9. China Team, 10. Luna Rossa Piranha, 11. Luna Rossa Swordfish.
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