OneWorld Challenge drew some comfort from a troubled week when it managed to beat Prada of Italy in the first race of its best-of-seven America's Cup semifinals series yesterday.
OneWorld's victory on the water balanced a legal defeat ashore, erasing a one-point handicap the Seattle syndicate was handed by the Cup's arbitration panel for breaches of the regatta's protocol.
When OneWorld's blue race yacht headed to Auckland's Hauraki Gulf for an opening race delayed a day by high winds, it was already, technically, one point behind Prada.
OneWorld beat Prada by 47 seconds as both yachts suffered equipment damage in winds gusting 20 knots (37.04kph)and in choppy seas. Prada broke its spinnaker pole when leading on the fourth of six legs and OneWorld's bright blue spinnaker exploded at the top of the final leg.
Alinghi of Switzerland led around all marks and beat Oracle of San Francisco by 1 minute, 11 seconds to take a 1-0 lead in the semifinal between top-ranked teams.
Two-time Cup winner Russell Coutts became the first skipper to beat his New Zealand-born Oracle rival Chris Dickson on the water at this regatta. Dickson was recalled from a shore job in round two to take charge of the Oracle sailing team and hadn't been beaten in 12 races.
OneWorld executive director Bob Ratliffe said his crew had been undaunted by the burden it carried into the remaining rounds.
``The attitude of the sailors has been great,'' Ratliffe said. ``One of the guys put it very well when the boat was leaving this morning. He said `it's like climbing Mount Everest. They've just added another 5,000 feet (1,500m) to it but you still know you can climb it'.''
The arbitration panel ruled that OneWorld should lose a point in each of the remaining rounds of the challenger series and in the Cup match, if it reaches it, for possessing design secrets of its rivals.
However, Challenger of Record Management, the organization that runs the challenger series, applied for a clarification of that ruling yesterday, asking the panel to consider awarding a point to each of OneWorld's opponents rather than deducting the point from OneWorld.
Under the terms of the Panel's ruling, OneWorld has to win five races to clinch its best-of-seven series against Prada. In a nine-race series, OneWorld would have to win six races to clinch the series.
That could lead to extra races needing to be sailed, CORM argued. If OneWorld's opponent led 3-0 in a best-of-seven series, for instance, OneWorld would have to win five races to progress.
That would mean the series would have to comprise eight races rather than seven.
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