America’s Cup Race One - Quotes of the Day

by ACM on 24 Jun 2007 Ernesto Bertarelli, President of Alinghi, and Defender of the America’s Cup, on today’s result: 'We are obviously very happy because there was a lot of pressure riding on the first match. Everybody was expecting a victory and so we are very satisfied. We wanted the left and had it, but it was a little difficult at the beginning because Emirates Team New Zealand had a good right-hand wind shift and were able to hold us off. We gradually came back into it and they then had to tack. We still have to win another four races so it is a little early to draw any conclusions about boat speed. We first have to sail a good race against a very strong New Zealand team.'

Brad Butterworth, Skipper of Alinghi, on what they can work on after today’s race: 'It is probably just on our modes. Obviously NZL92 is a new boat and has changed its configuration since we sailed it last time a few months ago. We tried a few different things today; some things worked and some didn’t, so we have to look at that. I think the boats are much the same speed – we caught some nice waves downwind but they are pretty much the same. The key to winning is simply toughing it out, I think that getting the left hand side of the course today was key. We got that managed to get the other boat to tack away and that was it.'

Juan Vila, Navigator of Alinghi, on the first ten minutes of the race: 'The call on the start was that the left could be favoured up the beat, so we were happy to start to leeward of our opponents. It was very close at the beginning for a while, and when we tacked away with them we had a nice left shift, so from then on tried to close any possibilities from them passing us. The sea was a lumpy, short chop so it was a little bit more uncomfortable than a normal south-east sea breeze especially early on.'

Dean Barker, Helmsman of Emirates Team New Zealand, on what they learnt today about Alinghi: 'It was no surprise what we saw today. They are fast and they sail well. There is certainly nothing that we didn’t expect. I think we go out there expecting to win. Every day there is going to be a winner and a loser and when you are racing against a very strong opponent the chances get smaller, although we back ourselves to come out on the right side more often than not. It is the way we have approached this whole Louis Vuitton series and it is the same now. Should we have won the race? Well it’s very difficult, you take the opportunities when they come and try and capitalise on them. They took the first opportunity, got in front and controlled the race very well from there, and that’s what we have seen all through this series. It is early days, but the nice thing is we feel competitive and that is the best we can ask for if we are not going to win the race.'

Dean Barker, on the new configuration of NZL92: 'We have put the ‘Buzzy Bee’ bulb on the boat now, which is different to what we used throughout the Louis Vuitton Cup. It is just a part of the process to try and put us closer to where we think our opponents are.'

Adam Beashel, Strategist of Emirates Team New Zealand, on coming back in the second beat: 'After the bottom mark rounding there was a bit of a left shift again. Alinghi looked like they were going to do quite well out of it, but fortunately it didn’t eventuate quite as much as it was looking at first, and we managed to get a bit of a right shift back and come back at them. They swapped sides with us and doing that I think we had a little advantage just to the left of them and chipped away at their lead quite nicely. It was then a bit more even with a few more exchanges and we came in to the mark with a little bit less of a deficit.'